Fruit And Foundations Series

Fruit and Foundations: Luke 6:43-49

The Lord’s Prayer

‘“Our Father in heaven,

hallowed be your name,

10 your kingdom come,

your will be done,

on earth as it is in heaven.

11 Give us today our daily bread.

12 And forgive us our sins,,

as we also have forgiven those who sin against us,

13 And lead us not into temptation,[a]

but deliver us from the evil one.[b]”

For yours is the kingdom, the power and the glory forever and ever. Amen.

I started into the series last week called ordinary to extraordinary with Jesus first miracle, can anyone remember which day of the week that this miracle would most likely occurred on please? (ans: Wednesday) Why because this is the day that weddings of people getting married for the first time occurred in that society. But that aside what I want to look at today is how do we as ordinary people do extraordinary things as we do this Christian journey? How does the Spirit of God work in us and through us in such a way that God’s kingdom comes and his will is done on Earth as it is in Heaven.

The passage that I have just read has two key points about us as individuals, and I think about the church or corps as a body. “No good tree bears bad fruit, nor does a bad tree bear good fruit. Each tree is recognised by its own fruit. People do not pick figs from thorn-bushes, or grapes from briers. A good man brings good things out of the good stored up in his heart, and an evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in his heart. For the mouth speaks what the heart is full of.

Where was Jesus going with these verses? There are some interesting links in these verses relating to other stuff and this was important stuff for the people listening to him at the time. It would be vital to Christians for the time he was with them and immediately after his death and resurrection and as the Church developed past its infant stages and into the future. The fruit and the words that came out of those who believed would be a great indicator of the spiritual health of people within the Church and the Church itself. When I say spiritual health, I mean and have no hesitation in saying the spiritual health of people who claimed to be in relationship with Christ Jesus.

A thing to remember about this passage is that while Jesus was talking about trees and fruit he was and he he wasn’t talking about trees. This was metaphorical, that word picture stuff. Jesus was talking about people and in doing so he used a couple of interesting fruit at that. He talked about figs and grapes and compared them to thorn bushes and briers. Briers are a prickly wild rose; there are a lot of them growing up the Waitaki valley around Otamatata.

The nation of Israel at the time was itself is compared to three types of fruit producing plants two of which are the fig and the grape vine. But hey there are another couple of sermons in that at least – another day.

Back to us and the Church and doing not so ordinary stuff. In fact doing extraordinary stuff, life changing, eternity shaping and heaven coming down to Earth stuff. What is it that Jesus is saying in these couple of verses about this? How is it that you get to store up good stuff in your heart and bear good fruit? This could be well worth knowing.

Is there anyone here who is content to do stuff in your life that hurts others that is negative, that is counterproductive, that is evil? If you’re content to be in that place you are probably in the wrong place this morning. If you have that sort of thinking going on it’s time to sort out that thinking, maybe it’s time to change.

The mouth speaks what the heart is full of. What do you want your heart to be full of, good, bad, or something indifferent? I see that Jesus didn’t refer to indifferent. Because if you are indifferent that’s ‘not good’. We were not saved from our sins to be indifferent. The Spirit of God does not enter a person’s life so that they can become indifferent. He changes people for good. He dispels evil and good fruit comes through him and out of them.

I read this the other day by a Christian thinker by the name of Erwin McMannus;

“What if we didn’t have to go outside the narrative of Christ to invent and to create this beautiful reality that is known as the future? Most of us have a passive view of the future—our view is that it already exists, that it’s already determined, that it’s already going to be whatever it’s going to be, and we wrap it up in our theology and our faith.