New Testament reading: Luke 13.1-10 "Good Fruit"
Luke chapter thirteen begins with Jesus talking to a crowd when “someone present tells him about Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices.” Jesus responds by asking them if they believe the Galileans suffered this way because they were worse sinners. Jesus immediately says no, they were not worse or better. Then Jesus says, “but unless you repent, you will all perish just as they did.” He says pretty much the same thing about eighteen Jewish men and women who died when the tower of Siloam fell on them. “Unless you repent,” again He says, “you will suffer the same fate.”
As you may know, to repent is to turn around and go a different direction. In the context of the Christian faith, it means to turn away from our selfish ‘sinful’ nature and back to God.
Then at the close of Jesus’ conversation with the crowd, he tells a parable about a barren fig tree:
The fig tree symbolizes the situations above. Those who rely on themselves will not produce fruit; those who accept the gardener’s care will produce fruit. I think this is what Jesus is trying to get across to the crowd.
I wonder, however, if we ever considered the church as the fig tree planted by God and that we are the fruit – good or bad. Growing up in rural West Virginia, we had two peach trees in our yard, and they produced fruit, but it was never edible. The peaches were small and hard and only suitable for throwing or hitting with a baseball bat, not for eating. I recall checking the fruit hoping to find one good peach. My father worked long hours and sometimes seven days a week, so he spent very little time caring for the yard. I realize today if those trees had been trimmed and cared for, they probably would have produced good fruit.
In my perspective, the church (the Body of Christ, not the building) is the tree grown to produce good fruit, which Christ the gardener wants to nurture and care for, so it will produce good fruit. How does Christ nurture the church? Is it through worship, Bible studies, perhaps fellowship, maybe service, or possibly all the above? If I remember correctly, Jesus said he came not to be served but to serve. Service, therefore, must be included in the care for the tree and fruit, and you cannot have service without fellowship. Most certainly not just worship.
Have you ever thought of yourself as God’s fruit? Probably not, but what would it require of us to become good fruit, the Body of Christ?
