GOOD FRUIT

(This is an abridged version of the sermon I preached at Epworth Chapel, Baltimore on 6/3/12)

Matthew 7:15-20

The older I get, the more nostalgic I become. I’m sure many of us, as we get older, become more apt to reminisce about the events of our past, and we remember those important people, places and things of our youth, and we realize how they impacted who we are today.

One of most important parts of my youth was the way my sister, brother and I spent our summers. We were raised mostly in the city – in Washington, DC - but each summer – until I was about thirteen years old, we would travel to Madison Heights, Virginia (just outside of Lynchburg, Virginia) to spend the summers with my grandparents.

There are many things that I remember about Madison Heights, Virginia and those summers. I remember our large extended family (all of our uncles, aunts and cousins, and those we thought were our cousins). I remember Rose Chapel Baptist Church - where we would go every Sunday for Sunday School and worship service (even though we were Methodists when we got back home to DC-we were always reminded that while we were in Virginia, we were Baptists).

I remember that the doors of my grandparents’ house were seldom – if ever - locked, and I remember that we would run and play outside without seeming ever to worry about anything or anybody.

I remember my grandmother, Dorothy Mae Parrish’s cooking, and I remember my grandfather’s large garden. He called it a garden, but – being a city boy - it seemed like a farm to me. Every summer, my grandfather, William Andrew would grow enough vegetables in his garden for all of his seven adult children and their families to have enough canned goods for the whole year to come – and then he would give away much of what was left over to other relatives, neighbors and friends.

I also remember that my grandparents had several fruit trees in their yard. One of the fruit trees was a large peach tree. I can remember – every summer - watching that peach tree, and waiting until the middle of summer when the peaches on the tree would be ready of picking and eating. Sometimes, we would pick the peaches, and eat them right off the tree – right at the tree. We didn’t think to wash them – we would just eat the peaches off the tree. It was good fruit.

I realize now that such good fruit did not just emerge instantaneously. The good fruit of that peach tree emerged within the context of a seed that had been planted many years before. It was a seed that had been planted in good, fertile soil - soil that had been watered by consistent rains over the years, which with the sunlight that beamed down on it, served to nourish and cultivate the seed, and help the seed grow into a tree over the years. As a result of all of this nourishment and cultivation – combined with the irrigation and aeration of the soil - the peach tree that eventually emerged that would bear good fruit.

One of the lessons that Jesus is trying to teach here in what has come to be known as the Sermon on the Mount is a lesson about good fruit. In the Sermon on the Mount, we find that the Lord addresses a number of specific issues about how those who would follow him should live their lives. In these teachings, the issue is not so much focused on “what” we believe, but on “how” we live out what we believe – how we live out our faith before God and one another. These are ethical teachings that relate to our relationships with God and with each other.

Here in Matthew 7, the admonition of the Lord is first to “beware of false prophets - those who come in sheep’s clothing but are really inwardly ravenous wolves.” Jesus says, "You will know them by their fruit." Then Jesus goes on to teach this lesson within the context of two types of fruit – good fruit and bad fruit.

The Lord here makes a clear distinction between these two types of fruit. He indicates that good fruit is born from a good tree; good fruit cannot be born from a bad tree. And bad fruit is born of bad trees.

The teachings of the Lord here have implications for us on both individual and communal levels. We are to take account of how fruitful we are in our faith journey. In other words, what kind of tree are we? And what kind of fruit are we bearing? Are we bearing good fruit or bad fruit?

If you’ve lived long enough, you know what bad fruit is like, and how different it is from good fruit. Thinking back on my grandfather’s peach tree, we knew as soon as we bit into a peach from the tree, whether it was good fruit or bad fruit.

Bad fruit is either overly ripe or not yet fully developed. Overly ripe and rotting fruit has lost its texture and its flavor has become distorted from what it would taste like if it were still good. And if it is underdeveloped, the fruit is hard and usually hasn’t developed the full measure of what it would taste like if were allowed to grow to maturity.

And another thing we know about fruit is that it’s difficult to discern whether it’s good or bad – by outward appearances alone - without biting into it. Fruit might look good on the outside, look like it’s perfectly ready to eat, but when you bite into it, you might discover that it is rotting or underdeveloped on the inside.

That’s how many people’s lives are. They may look good on the outside, seem to have everything in their lives in order – even seem to have a measure of spirituality and godliness and holiness in them – they may go to church occasionally (some even regularly), they may even sing in choirs or serve on church boards, or preach from pulpits, but on the inside – their fruitfulness has begun to rot away or it has not been fully developed. Jesus says, “You will know then by their fruit.”

And so what does good fruit look like for the Christian? The apostle Paul points out in Galatians 5 that good fruit is born of the Spirit. Paul says that the “fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, gentleness, faithfulness, long-suffering, generosity, and self-control.” (Gal. 5:22-23)

In other words, these nine things are the marks of fruitfulness for Christians. What kinds of fruit are we bearing?

Good fruit is also born when we heed the words of the prophet Micah who said that the Lord requires that we "love kindness, do justice and walk humbly with God.” (Micah 6:8)

The good news is that as we bear good fruit in this life, when we meet Jesus, we will get our reward in heaven. Indeed on judgment day, Jesus will inspect our fruit, and if we have born good fruit in this life, he will say to us, “Well done, my good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a few things. Now I will make you ruler over many.”