“Early in the
morning, as Jesus was on his way back to the city, he was hungry. Seeing a fig
tree by the road, he went up to it but found nothing on it except leaves. Then he said to it, “May you never
bear fruit again!” Immediately the tree withered.”
Matthew 21:18-19
“…nothing on it except leaves.”
Trees are supposed to have leaves.
So why would Jesus curse the fig
tree.
Was he intolerant because He was
hungry?
It can’t be that because we know He
wasn’t ruled by His flesh.
Certainly, we learned that when He
was tempted of the devil in the wilderness.
No, this clearly wasn’t an “Esau
moment”!
Jesus would not curse the tree out of
a fit of anger because He was famished.
There had to be more to it than Jesus
being hungry.
Maybe, because He knew His time was
near, He just lacked His ‘normal’ patience?
Nope, even when He drove out the
money-changers, He did so with complete control of His emotions!
Some people ‘play the part’ well as
Christians.
From a distance they may convince
others to be true disciples of Jesus Christ.
But ‘up-close-and-personal’ they are
like the fig tree; their ‘outer-wear’ (the leaves)
seems right but the character of
Christ – the fruit – is missing!
Like the Temple in Jerusalem it is
quite possible to be very impressive and even ‘showy’ but lacking any real
substance.
Jesus cursed the fig tree for its
hypocrisy.
We might say it was ‘religious’ but
lacked the fruit that comes from abiding in the vine!
In her day program today my daughter
had to play the role of the teacup from the story of “Beauty and the Beast”.
Since the costume did not fit it was
pinned on to the front of her.
Don’t go through life with a
Christian costume “pinned on”.
God has given us His Holy Spirit and has
the expectation of fruit in our lives that is grown out of relationship with
Him.
Lord:
Help me to desire a bumper crop of
the fruit of your Spirit that I may present Christ to the world in words and in
deeds!
Amen
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