The Tree and Its Fruit

43“A good tree can’t produce bad fruit, and a bad tree can’t produce good fruit. 44A tree is identified by its fruit. Figs are never gathered from thornbushes, and grapes are not picked from bramble bushes. 45A good person produces good things from the treasury of a good heart, and an evil person produces evil things from the treasury of an evil heart. What you say flows from what is in your heart.

My natural tendency is to say God is telling us how to judge the people around us, but that can’t be because he just told us not to do that. I think this is a great place to remind myself that reading the Bible is a personal conversation between me and God. What he is saying, he is saying to me, about me, for me. So I guess what God is asking me to answer, are the following two questions.

Am I producing fruit or thorns?

If I am producing fruit, is it the kind of fruit God wants me to produce?

They seem to be separate questions, and in some ways they are, but then again, maybe not. In John 15:5 Jesus says, “Yes, I am the vine; you are the branches. Those who remain in me, and I in them, will produce much fruit. For apart from me you can do nothing.” With that in mind, perhaps the only way we can produce good fruit is when we are producing the kind of fruit the vine, Jesus, wants us to produce. At least for me, I think the two questions are simply two parts of the same question.

Lord, thy will be done!