Fruit and Root Luke 6:43-49

It's good to see everybody fellowshipping ahead of time. Afterwards as well, you know, come to some churches and as soon as the pastor says amen at the end of the service.

Like, everybody's out.

But not here, you know. It's wonderful to see God's flock to just linger and to engage with one another.

That's what we're going to do in heaven.

We're going to do it for eternity. So let's get it warmed up, you know. So anyway, I want to welcome you here this morning at Faith Bible Church. I wanted to, as you all picked up your bulletins, I want to give a call out to Jack Keaton.

Jack puts these together every week and takes the time and assembles what we ask him to put in there and order service and so on. So we just want to say thank you, Jack, for putting these together. So for announcements, we have a prayer meeting tonight.

Biblical counseling, of course, begins again as the next one, it's not beginning, but it's continuing on next Saturday at 11 o 'clock. All are welcome to that and need not have come before, but to come out for just the first time and to see what that's all about.

It's a great teaching time of being in the word. Men's breakfast Bible study is Saturday the 3rd at nine o 'clock in the morning. All men are welcome and we'll have some breakfast and some fellowship and a devotional.

I wanted to just share a moment. Pastor's been going through the Psalms and it's a very, very rich study as we take one Psalm a Sunday for the most part. Today was from Psalm 63 and it's about joying in the fellowship of God.

And in the tabernacle, verses three through five, it talks about, because your loving kindness is better than life, my lips shall praise you. Thus, I will bless you while I live. I will lift my hands in your name.

My soul shall be satisfied as with marrow and fatness and my mouth shall praise you with joyful lips. What a beautiful picture of us and how we can worship our Lord and what we will do on into eternity.

That he is worthy of our praise. When I remember you in my bed, and he's talking about meditation and that in the modern world of other religions, to meditate is emptying yourself, emptying your mind.

That's quite the contrary to what scripture wants us to do. It wants us to fill our minds with the things of the Lord, to fill our minds with his word. When we empty ourselves, we're not left with but the flesh and the man of our sin nature, but we wanna fill it so that there's no room for anything else but the Lord.

So, excellent study from Psalm 63. Okay, well let's, would you join with me in prayer? Our dear heavenly Father, we thank you this morning that we can gather together, Lord, when we can lift our voices, when we can hear your word preached, that we can come to you in a humble and contrite manner, Father.

We pray that our hearts would be glad, that you would be pleased, that your will would be done in our worship of you, Father. God, you are our God, our only true God, Father, that we might seek you, that our soul might thirst for you, that our flesh might long for you, that where there is no water, Father, we might look for you in the sanctuary.

So, we come to you now, Father, to give you praise. Father, we pray for those that are homebound, that aren't able to be here today. We pray for continued recovery for many. We pray for Richard, that you would bless him as he's doing well and looks forward to coming back and to being with the flock and to be with his church family.

So, Lord, continue to strengthen him in his physical therapy. Father, there's many others that we can't mention, Father, too many to mention, Lord, but you would be with them in where they're at, Father, that you would be their sanctuary, even in their own heart, Father, and that, Lord, as today, as we lift our voices to you, Father, we might remember you in a special and unique way.

So, God, will you go before us, Father? We pray that we would honor you in all that we do and that we would just rejoice in a God that is worthy of our praise. So, God, go before us, we pray now, in Jesus' name, amen.

Whenever Barb and I pick the music, Pastor sends a list, here's my verse, which he usually has up on the board, and then he says, here's my main verse, and then I was unsure, so I texted him back and I said, are you gonna do the whole chapter to the end?

And he said, yes, and my child brain said, I know just the song. And it's a children's song. Are you young enough to do a children's song? And I wanna talk especially to Brandon and Kason and Faith, and this is a song just for you.

And in the Bible, you know that it says, Jesus said, he's told a story about two men, a wise man and a foolish man that built a house. One built a house on a rock and it stood firm. One built a house on the sand and it went splash, it fell down, but there's actions that go along with this song.

And so, a wise man built his house upon a rock, okay? A wise man built his house upon a rock. And then it talks about the rains came down and the floods came up. The rains came down and the floods came up and the house on the rock stood firm, okay?

Then it says, a foolish man built his house upon the sand. A foolish man built his house upon the sand. A foolish man built his house upon the sand and the rains came tumbling down. The rains came down, the floods came up, the rains came down, the floods came up and the house on the sand went splash.

Okay, you got that?

Okay, here we go.

We are gonna be in children's church.

When pastor tells us the reason that Jesus told that story. And so, when you get home, you have to ask mom or dad, why did Jesus tell the story about the two men building a house? Thank you for going along with me, I enjoy children's song, I'm kinda in that vein myself.

So I'll just talk through two, verses six to 10. As he had therefore received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in him. Rooted and built up in him and established in his faith as ye have been taught, abounding therein with thanksgiving.

Beware of the steady man, spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit. After the tradition of men, after the brilliance of the world, and not after Christ. For in him doth all the fullness of God head bodily.

And ye are complete in him, which is the head of all prosperity and power. May the Lord have mercy to remember his word.

Stand together with me as we continue to praise our Lord.

A Good Tree Bears Good Fruit

Luke chapter six, verses 43 to 49. Luke chapter six, verses 43 to 49. For a good tree does not bear bad fruit, nor does a bad tree bear good fruit. For every tree is known by its own fruit. For men do not gather figs from thorns, nor do they gather grapes from a bramble bush.

A good man out of the good treasure of his heart brings forth good. And an evil man out of the evil treasure of his heart brings forth evil. For out of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaks. But why do you call me Lord, Lord, and not do the things which I say?

Whoever comes to me and hears my sayings and does them, I will show you whom he is like. He's like a man building a house who dug deep and laid the foundation on the rock. And when the flood arose, the stream beat vehemently against the house and could not shake it, for it was founded on the rock.

But he who heard and did nothing is like a man who built a house on the earth without a foundation against which the stream beat vehemently and immediately it fell. And the ruin of that house was great.

This is the word of the Lord. Let us pray. Father, we're thankful that you have sent Jesus to save us and not only to save us, but to call us to be his disciples. Thank you that he doesn't leave us at the point in which we have believed, but that he transforms us to be more like him so that we may be firmly founded in his grace, in his mercy.

Help us to experience Jesus' presence this morning in Jesus' name. So last week, we went over the significance of self-examination, removing the plank of one's own eye before removing the speck out of your brother's eye.

Now, Christians, therefore, are the type of people who must evaluate their own lives first before they attempt to fix someone else's problem. And this passage shows us what criteria, what the criteria of self-evaluation are.

After all, the assurance of our genuine faith does not come from our tearful prayer that we prayed in a parking lot, right? And the assurance of our genuine faith does not come from what our parents or our grandparents believed.

And this is important because people often claim to be Christians, but live like pagans. People claim to love Christ, but blatantly stray from his scriptures and mock his instructions. And one of the most dangerous belief system is the belief that you are a follower of Christ, but are not.

In fact, it's harder to share the gospel with someone who delusionally believes is saved than sharing the gospel with an atheist or even a Satanist. Because at least the atheist and Satanist know that they're not followers of Christ.

But someone who delusionally believes that they are, but obviously are not, it's harder to persuade them, first, you're not a Christian, and then now this is how you receive Christ. So the main point of today's text is, what are the signs of a genuine disciple of Jesus?

What are the signs of a genuine disciple of Jesus? First, Jesus' disciples produce good fruits, which are the products of transformed hearts. Jesus' disciples produce good fruits, which are the product of transformed hearts.

Now Jesus teaches what we need to examine in our lives. Verse 43 shows us Jesus' summary statement. For a good tree does not bear bad fruit. Nor does a bad tree bear good fruit. Through this proverb, Jesus emphasizes the fact that the external good deeds actually come from the internal identity.

The external good deeds flow naturally from the internal reality. The fruit here represents what your life produces. It's what you do. It's what you say. It's how you live your life. Just like a fruit, it is obvious when it's there.

And just like a fruit, it's pleasant when it's there. And just like a fruit, you may not see it grow until it's grown. And many gardeners know this. All of a sudden, there's a tomato hanging from the branch.

And you didn't think it was there before. Now, this horticultural imagery paints this reality well. By nature, good quality fruits only come from good trees. And we really don't have to be gardeners to know that.

The health of the tree really matters. The fruits do not cause the trees to be good. That's important. The fruits do not cause the trees to be good, but good trees naturally produce good fruits. The fruits can't make a bad tree good.

The fruit cannot make a dead tree alive. The fruit has to only come from the living tree that is good. Now, on the other hand, bad trees naturally produce inferior, poor quality fruits, or no fruit at all.

Now, in verse 44, Jesus illustrates his teaching further using the whole horticultural language. The theme continues here. The agricultural theme continues. For every tree is known by its own fruit. For men do not gather figs from thorns, nor do they gather grapes from a bramble bush.

This illustration, the horticultural illustration, intensifies the previous point of the identity of the plant and their fruits. Instead of quality, Jesus compares completely different types of plants.

Note that he is not talking about bad fig tree producing bad figs, right? That would be going along with the last verse. No, he's talking about picking figs from thorns, or picking grapes from a bramble bush.

A bramble bush is a thorny bush, by the way. Now, for those of us who are not into gardening, figs do not grow on thorns. That's naturally impossible. Figs grow on trees that have no thorns. And in the same way, grapes do not grow on bramble bush.

So both thorns and bramble bush not only lack the delicious and desirous fruits, like figs and grapes, but also they signifies the uselessness in the orchard. They represent the utter fruitlessness. They are the types of plants you don't want to cultivate in your precious land.

Now, Jesus drives his point home through this absurdity of gathering figs from thorns, and grapes from thorny bush to make a point. No one in the right mind would even attempt to harvest figs from thorns, or harvest grapes from a bramble bush, because it's abundantly clear that figs and grapes cannot come from them.

After all, the thorny plants produce thorns, not fruits. They are of a completely different nature than the precious fruit-bearing trees. Now, what is Jesus' point? He's not here to give you gardening tips.

In verse 45, Jesus applies it to the life of his followers. A good man, out of his good treasure of his heart, brings forth good, and an evil man, out of the evil treasure of his heart, brings forth evil.

For out of the abundance of the heart, his mouth speaks. As thorn bushes cannot, naturally cannot, produce delicious fruits, good deeds are only produced by good man. It starts from his heart. The core of one's will, emotions, and being, that's the heart.

That heart has to be clean. That heart has to be of a different nature, just as a thorn is of a different nature than a fig tree. Now, the treasure, in this case, means what is stored inside the person's heart, just as the treasure is stored.

There's goods that can be stored in the person's heart, and there are bad things that can be stored in the person's heart. And the key theme here is that what's stored inside of the person's heart naturally comes out.

The external goods are the natural fruits of the internal goodness. The external goods are the natural fruits of the internal goodness. In other words, good fruits cannot come from evil hearts, and bad fruits cannot come from good hearts.

And the example that Jesus gives is the speech. And that's because words are harder to control than behavior. Oftentimes, words just slip out. And there are many times in my life I wish I hadn't said it, but that's not my tongue's fault.

That's what was in the heart. I desired to think it. I desired to ponder on it. I desired to let it out the moment I spoke it. It naturally flowed out, because that's what was in the heart. And this is important for us this week.

This morning, because it shows the futility of behavioral modification. If the undesirable, wicked behaviors come from the heart, telling people don't do that, don't do this, will not actually solve the core problem.

In fact, telling them don't do that and don't do this is just a reapplication of the law, which did not change the hearts of sinful humans. It's just another form of enslavement. For example, there are all these secular programs that help with addictions, whether pornography, alcohol, drugs, name it.

And they give you 12 steps. In the short run, it might work. By your willpower, you might be able to abstain from those. But in the long run, your heart remains unchanged. You will still be tempted by the next time you see that glass of alcohol.

You will still be tempted by next time you meet one of your druggy friends, but a changed heart. That desire is not there. The desire to lavish oneself in those substances, over-consume, that's not there.

And the behavior will flow through. That's why for people who were never addicted to drugs or alcohol in the first place have no problem going through the growth cycle of addiction. You can go to the grocery store with the aisles with all the wine and spirits.

Because there's no desire for them to buy it. That flows from the heart. If the desire was not there and is not there, then the behavior naturally flows out. And in fact, behavioral modification is what false religions claim you have to do.

You gotta be good. You gotta do good. And then God will bless you. You gotta be good enough in order to approach God. And in fact, that is the opposite of the gospel. The gospel says you are not good enough.

You can't do it yourself. That's why Jesus Christ, the son of God, God himself made man. The incarnate God will accomplish the righteous deeds on your behalf and he will die the death that you deserve.

So that he can start working in your heart. So that he can start to change you. So that you may be a good living tree, producing good fruits. The order, if it gets flipped, is heresy. If it's that you have to be a good, if you have to be producing good fruits in order to become a good tree, that's legalism.

And that's really the core problem of most false religions to this day. You gotta be good enough. You gotta be good enough. You can't eat that. You can't consume this. You can't do this activity. Now experience God's blessing.

The gospel says you're not able to follow any of that. You're incapable of obeying God. Trust what Jesus has accomplished for you on the cross and you'll be given a new life. You'll be given a living heart.

It will be the heart of flesh, not the heart of stone, which was so hard and unchangeable. It will be the soft heart that God can work with so that you will transform more like Christ. And that's because everyone starts out as a bad tree.

We're all incapable of producing good fruits. If we have to turn ourselves into good trees in our own power or produce good fruits as bad trees, we're just doomed. The types of fruits we produce are undesirable and inedible and that's because our hearts are soaked in sin.

That's what's stored in our hearts. If you open it up, it's filthy, it's moldy. You can't even smell it. And some of you might know, you can't bear to see what's in your heart. You can't bear to stand hearing what you've said before.

You can't bear to replay that in your mind, what you went through, what you did to someone, what you've said to someone. That's because that's what's in our heart by default. No matter how much we desire to produce good fruits, it is impossible to produce them from our wicked hearts.

And our hearts only are transformed, not through hard work, not through good deeds, but only through the gospel of Christ. Our hearts change the moment we trust that there's nothing that we do, but everything that Christ has done that has purified our hearts.

It's only by believing that no amount of charity or generosity or service can make us good, but only believing that only Christ and his good deed on the cross when he sacrificed himself for our sin, that removes the wickedness and sin in our hearts.

It's only by believing that Jesus, the Son of God, took our sin and faced the punishment that we deserved so that he could purify our hearts. From that, our hearts are actually purified. Only Jesus can change hearts, not our good deeds.

Only Jesus can cleanse our evil desires, not behavioral modifications. And after trusting in Jesus, good fruits in believers' lives are inevitable because of their transformed hearts. That's how we evaluate our spiritual health.

Are we becoming less self-centered? Are we becoming more patient with others? Even the ones who are very difficult to be patient with, are we becoming kinder? Are we becoming gentler? Are we more at peace despite the storm?

Are the words that come out of our mouths still harsh and bitter as when we first believed? Or are they more compassionate? Are they more compassionate and understanding? Now, again, I want to mention the good fruits do not save you.

The good fruits do not change your hearts. However, if the good fruits are not present, there's some self-evaluation that need to be done. If you're not seeing good fruits over time, I'm not saying you got saved yesterday and you still struggle with cursing or something.

That could be just a work in progress because sanctification is a process, not an instantaneous event. But if you've been a Christian for years, but you live just like you have been doing before you knew Christ, you speak like a sailor, you lavish yourself with sinful things, and your desire is for yourself and self-gratification, there's some self-evaluating to do.

Hearing and Doing the Words of Christ

Second, Jesus' disciples are unshakably rooted in Christ when they respond faithfully to his words. Jesus' disciples are unshakably rooted in Christ when they respond faithfully to his words. After discussing the fruit of his disciples, Jesus finishes his sermon with their genuine response to his teaching.

But why do you call me Lord, Lord, and not do the thing which I say? This is an important question regarding the genuineness of each believer. It is not just what they claim, but how they live that reveals one's allegiance to Christ.

All too often, there are just empty words and no substance to back them up. This is another theme of true Christians cannot be hypocrites. You can't just say that you believe in Christ, but not live for Christ.

Living for Christ, it is the natural outworking, the natural response to one's faith in Christ. That's because if you believe something, that's how you will live. If you believe it's raining outside even though it's sunny, if you really believe it's storming outside even though it's sunny, you'll still grab your umbrella out.

People will look at you funny, but that's why you believe, and that's how you lived. If you truly believe in Jesus, you will live for Jesus. It's the natural outworking of it. Now, from verses 47 to 48, Jesus depicts how his true disciples respond.

Whoever comes to me and hears my sayings and does them, I will show you whom he is like. Verse 47 shows the correct order of response to Jesus. A true disciple not only approaches and hears Jesus, but also follows his teaching.

Jesus is making an important distinction between the crowd and the disciples. Remember in verse 17, a crowd of his disciples and a great multitude of people from all Judea, Jerusalem, and from the sea coast of Tyre and Sidon who came to hear him.

And how Jesus finishes his sermon is by emphasizing that coming to hear Jesus is not enough to make you a disciple because true disciples respond. They respond in faith. They follow Jesus. Following Jesus is not a passive spectacle as in going to the movie theaters.

Oh, let's see what it's like. It is an active lifestyle. The crowd in front of Jesus now has a choice to make. Now you came and you heard. What will you do with it? You came to hear. You heard the full sermon.

Will you follow? Will your lifestyle be any different? And in one sense, any teaching that says you don't have to do anything as a Christian is a false teaching. Now, no, I didn't say you don't have to do anything to be saved.

You don't have to do anything to be saved because it's done for you by Christ. But to say that Christianity is that you don't have to do anything, you don't have to change your lifestyle, you don't have to walk faithfully with God, you don't have to despise sin, that's a lie.

In fact, to say that you don't have to change, to say that you can still enjoy the sinful desires of your past life is to cheapen God's grace. Now, what did Jesus really die for if you're gonna still be enslaved to sin?

There's no freedom in that. Now, verse 48 illustrates the true disciple's response. He is like a man building a house who dug deep and laid the foundation on the rock. And when the flood arose, the stream beat vehemently against that house and could not shake it for it was founded on the rock.

Jesus compares the faithful response of his follower with the solid foundation of a well-built house. Those who hear his teachings and follow is not exempt from the difficulties of the world. But what is promised is that they will not be shaken by the trials of the world.

They will not be overcome by it because following Jesus' word, following Jesus, establish the solid foundation. On the other hand, those who hear and not follow through are like this. But he who heard and did nothing is like a man who built a house on the earth without a foundation against which the stream beat vehemently and immediately it fell and the ruin of that house was great.

Hearing Jesus and rejecting him is as foolish as building a house on a flimsy foundation. Without Jesus' teaching as the foundation, the house collapses immediately. It's not just unstable, it's unstable and temporary.

Everything comes crashing down and there's a great loss. And in real life, the loss is more precious than the house. It's someone's life to hear and to not follow Jesus. And despite what the prosperity gospel proponents say, Christians are not exempt from facing trials.

Just as non-believers do, Christians will also experience poverty, loss, crisis, trauma, and death. And add to the list persecution for their faith. However, Jesus tells us that our faithful obedience to him will make us unshakable when we face trials.

If your life is ordered according to Jesus' standard, no matter what pushback you get, you will be at peace. No matter how many people curse at you, if your life is aligned with Jesus' teaching, you are standing on a secure ground.

And some of the questions we must ask is, does my obedience to Christ take priority no matter what the cost? If I obey Christ, I might lose my job. Which foundation are you gonna build your house on? If I follow Christ, I will lose my friends, family, and my loved one.

Which foundation are you gonna build your house on? If I trust that Christ's way will ultimately be better for me, even though it will be difficult in the moment, which foundation am I gonna build my house on?

If the answers to these examples are, I'm gonna build my house in Christ, my life will follow Christ's standard. My behaviors will go along with Christ's teachings. My heart will desire Christ's heart.

Then you have built your house on a solid ground and no amount of temptations, trials, from the world, Satan, and your own flesh can shake you. That house will stand. And for those who make that decision, it's a daily decision.

It's not something you do it today and it just lasts for all eternity. We have to make daily choices on where are we building our house. Now, if the answers to these scenarios are, no, I'm not building it on Christ, then you have to go to Christ and listen to him.

And you have to ask him to help you trust his word more. You have a decision to make every day. Are you going to look to God who has a perfect track record of faithfulness and protection and security for his people?

Or are you going to trust yourself with less than perfect track records? The decision that you make determines what you will lose and what you won't. It determines one's eternity. Are you going to choose Christ or are you going to choose yourself?

And thus the sign of our genuine faith comes from what we produce because we are rooted and identified with Christ. That's how you know you're a genuine disciple, not because of that one prayer, not because of that one generous event, but are you a transformed individual who actively grows and who actively trusts in Christ alone?

Let us pray. Father, we're thankful that Christ is our sure foundation and whatever he teaches is sure and secure. Help us to see that. Change our foolish minds whenever we decide that our way is better.

Help us and guide us to choose Christ all the time so that we may be found secure in him. And Father, help us if our hearts are not transformed. Help us to trust Jesus for everything. There's nothing good that we bring, but we trust and hold firmly to what Christ has done for us on the cross and that he's risen and he's ruling from above.

Help us to trust him daily. In Jesus' name, amen.

Stand together with me as we sing for the Lord to purify our hearts. That be our prayer as we go through this week to ask the Lord to purify our hearts, make us that good fruit, make us establish our house on solid ground.

You are dismissed.