“For no good tree bears bad fruit, nor again does a bad tree bear good fruit, for each tree is known by its own fruit. For figs are not gathered from thornbushes, nor are grapes picked from a bramble bush. The good person out of the good treasure of his heart produces good, and the evil person out of his evil treasure produces evil, for out of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaks.” Luke 6:43-45 (ESV)
I have a confession to make: I have a hard time driving the posted speed limit. That’s not to say that I drive recklessly fast, but somewhere between 8-10 mph over the speed limit. Maybe you can relate. During my normal daily travels, I know where the speed traps are. There’s usually a cop car pulled off out of sight, waiting to nab someone. Given that knowledge, naturally I always slow down when I get to those areas. And for that quarter of a mile or so, I become a driving instructor. I’ll even put my hands at 10 and 2 on the steering wheel. But when I’m out of the cop car’s sight, I’m Sammy Hagar. I just can’t drive 55.
For many years, this was my approach to how I lived my life. I’d be polite to someone face-to-face, but the moment they left I would start complaining about them. I would watch my language around certain people, but around others I would tell crude jokes and use profanity. If someone was riding with me, I’d throw a couple of dollars to the homeless guy holding the sign at the intersection. But if I was alone? I wouldn’t even acknowledge him. And I never once thought anything about it.
But had you asked me, “Hey, do you consider yourself a good person?” I would’ve said, “Heck yeah! I do some good things.” And I truly would’ve believed that.
But here’s the thing, at least according to Jesus: a good person isn’t good because he does good; he does good because he is good.
As Jesus talked about good trees bearing good fruit and bad trees bearing bad fruit, he was reminding us that our speech and actions reveal our true beliefs, motivations, and attitudes. We can try to put on a good show in front of others, but if it’s not sincere it won’t last. Eventually what is in our hearts will come out in our words and behavior.
Even though Peter was a disciple of Christ, he would be called out by the Apostle Paul for his attitude and behavior.
But when Peter came to Antioch, I had to oppose him to his face, for what he did was very wrong. When he first arrived, he ate with the Gentile believers, who were not circumcised. But afterward, when some friends of James came, Peter wouldn’t eat with the Gentiles anymore. He was afraid of criticism from these people who insisted on the necessity of circumcision. As a result, other Jewish believers followed Peter’s hypocrisy, and even Barnabas was led astray by their hypocrisy. When I saw that they were not following the truth of the gospel message, I said to Peter in front of all the others, “Since you, a Jew by birth, have discarded the Jewish laws and are living like a Gentile, why are you now trying to make these Gentiles follow the Jewish traditions?” (Galatians 2:11-14)
Even for Peter, sometimes his tree produced the odd piece of bad fruit.
And sometimes our tree will too. But when we consider the whole of Peter’s life, we clearly see someone who truly loved Jesus and tried to live as he lived. A bad piece of fruit is no reason to chop down the tree. But if we’re bearing more bad fruit than good, perhaps we should read our Bibles and get to the root of the problem.
Former Blackout Artist 