This morning I felt led to read from Mark 11. The section that caught my attention was the story of the cursed Fig tree. I know I have reflected on this before, but I thought it was worth reviewing this morning. At first blush it seems out of place in the Gospel's for Jesus was most often speaking of the Kingdom of God, preaching, teaching, healing or working signs and wonders. As far as I know this is the only instance that Jesus curses anything or anybody, and thus it stands out. Here are the verses followed by what David Guzik, one of my favorite Bible commentators, says:
[12] "Now the next day, when they had come out from Bethany, He was hungry. [13] And seeing from afar a fig tree having leaves, He went to see if perhaps He would find something on it. When He came to it, He found nothing but leaves, for it was not the season for figs. [14] In response Jesus said to it, “Let no one eat fruit from you ever again.” And His disciples heard it."
a. Seeing from afar a fig tree having leaves, He went to see if perhaps He would find something on it: Essentially, the tree was a picture of false advertising, having leaves but no figs. Ordinarily this is not the case with these fig trees, which normally do not have leaves without also having figs.
i. For it was not the season for figs: It wasn’t that the fig tree didn’t have figs because it wasn’t supposed to. The problem is that it had leaves but didn’t have figs. The leaves said, “There are figs here,” but the figs weren’t there.
ii. There were many trees with only leaves, and these were not cursed. There were many trees with neither leaves nor fruit, and these were not cursed. This tree was cursed because it professed to have fruit, but did not.
b. In response Jesus said to it, “Let no one eat fruit from you ever again”: The tree was cursed for its pretense of leaves, not for its lack of fruit. Like Israel in the days of Jesus, it had the outward form but no fruit. In this picture, Jesus warned Israel – and us – of God’s displeasure when we have the appearance of fruit but not the fruit itself. God isn’t pleased when His people are all leaves and no fruit.
i. In all works in the ministry of Jesus, this is the only destructive miracle. The Old Testament is filled with miracles of destruction and judgment, but Jesus most perfectly showed us the nature of God. If this was the only miracle of its kind, we must see there was a great and important lesson in it. God doesn’t approve when there is profession without reality, talk without walk.
As I was just thinking through these comments, I was reminded of something that John Wimber (One of the founders of the Vineyard churches) related concerning his questioning his church leadership, after reading the Gospels himself. His question was simple yet profound, he asked the leaders when they "Did the stuff", as in miracles, healings, etc. that he had been reading about in the Gospels. Their reply was that the things he was reading about 'only happened back the bible writers time, not today.' In John's mind, having a church patterned after the life and ministry of Jesus, you would obviously also experience the fruit of Jesus' ministry. It made no sense that the church didn't regularly see miracles, healings and the like.
This seems related to David's comments about having leaves (advertising the fruit) without actually having any fruit. Unfortunately, I think this is the state of many of our churches today! Oh Lord, let it not be so!
The same is probably true for many of us who profess faith in the Lord Jesus! We have plenty of talk, but very little walk! Oh Lord, we pray for an outpouring of the desire for prayer! Help us to produce fruit in keeping with repentance! Help us to show the world that You are alive and well! Help us to effectively represent Your ministry on earth, in our lives and the lives of our families and friends. Help us to be able to say, 'not only do we talk about healing, miracles and other wonders, we regularly see these in our midst'!
Amen and Amen!
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