#47 The Barren Fig Tree Series

#47 The Barren Fig Tree

Series: Mark

Chuck Sligh

July 25, 2021

NOTE: A PowerPoint presentation are available for this sermon by request at chuckcsligh@gmail.com. Please mention the title of the sermon and the Bible text to help me find the sermon in my archives.

TEXT: Please turn in your Bibles to Mark 11:12.

INTRODUCTION

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that many things in the New Testament are vastly different than in the Old Testament. The Old Testament moral prohibitions (adultery, lying, stealing, murder, covetousness, profaning God’s name, etc.) are wrong in both testaments, and the basic themes of the Old Testament (our sin, our need for forgiveness, God’s holiness, God’s call to His people to love Him, etc.) are carried over into the New Testament.

But how we approach God, and the nature of worship are different. Why don’t we worship in the Temple? Why don’t we have in our church an Altar, a Laver, a Table of Showbread, a Lampstand, an Altar of Incense, or an Ark of the Covenant, or a Mercy Seat? Why do we not have to come and sacrifice animals to atone for our sin? Why are we not bound to the Old Testament ceremonial and dietary laws?

Although why these things changed is explained in many New Testament scriptures, in today’s text Jesus gives the FIRST INKLING of the end of the Old Testament system by two simple acts: the cursing of a fig tree, and the judgment of the Temple in Jerusalem. They point to a big change in God’s way of dealing with people. Let’s examine these two incidences today and try to uncover their significance.

Now the first thing you’ll notice is that we face Mark’s unique sandwich structure again. We’ve talked about this distinctive feature in Mark’s gospel on several occasions before. Mark often starts a story (the bottom slice of the sandwich), then switches to another story (the middle part) and then concludes the original story (the top slice). Usually, the two stories are non-related but in today’s sandwich, the middle is important in understanding the meaning of the top and bottom slices.

So let’s look at this sandwich construction in today’s text:

In verses 12-14, the bottom bread slice is the story of Jesus cursing of a fig tree.

In verses 15-18, Jesus cleanses the Temple (the middle story).

In verses 19-22, Mark returns to the fig tree, now withered from its roots.

I. FIRST, NOTICE WITH ME A CURIOUS CURSE IN VERSES 12-14 – “And on the morrow, when they were come from Bethany, he was hungry: 13 And seeing a fig tree afar off having leaves, he came, if haply [or perhaps] he might find any thing on it: and when he came to it, he found nothing but leaves; for the time of figs was not yet. 14 And Jesus answered and said unto it, ‘May no man eat fruit of thee hereafter forever. And his disciples heard it.’”

Coming from nearby Bethany on His way to Jerusalem, Jesus spied a fig tree, and being hungry, stopped to get a bite to eat. At first reading, verse 13 is confusing to our modern Western urban ears: Mark says Jesus went to eat, but it was not the season for figs. Why would Jesus go to find fruit from a fig tree if it was not the season for figs?

A person in that region of the world would not be confused at all. After the fall fig harvest, the branches of fig trees sprout buds that remain undeveloped throughout the winter. In the Spring, around mid-March to mid-April the tree produces leaves, and the little buds develop into small, green, rounded sprouts called paggims which eventually fully develop into figs that are harvested in the Fall. Paggims are called “baby figs” in English. These paggims could themselves be eaten and were often eaten by the poor.

This story takes place right before the Passover, placing it in the middle April, just the right season for paggims. So when Jesus saw this fig tree with leaves at a distance, He should have been able to get a satisfying bite of paggims to eat. But when He arrived, the tree was barren; it had no paggims at all. This meant it was not going to bear fruit at all since the paggims were basically little, undeveloped figs, so…no paggims now, no figs later.

As we’ll see, within 24 hours the fig tree would completely die after Jesus cursed it, so this was a miracle—the only destructive miracle of Jesus in the Gospels.

To some people, Jesus’ actions here seem out of character for Him. Why would He doom a tree just because it didn’t have paggims on it? I mean, the tree never did anything to anybody, right? Was Jesus being petty and vindictive?