Turn back to Matthew chapter 21. The title of the message is, The
Fruitless Fig Tree or a Dead Profession. This is a very serious portion of Scripture. that we are going to look at
this morning. When God gives life, when God
gives life, it produces fruit every time. You go back in Genesis,
when God created the heavens and the earth, and when he created
the trees and all the fruit trees and all, they bore fruit. Everything
that God created bore fruit. If a sinner has been given life,
if God has given that sinner life, the evidence of that life
will be the fruit of the Spirit. Love, love to God, love to the
brethren. You can't help but love one another.
You don't have to try to, you can't help it. If the love of
God is shed abroad in the heart, as Henry would say, it's gonna
leak out on you. It's gonna leak out on you. If grace has been
given to you, if you have tasted of the grace of God, it's gonna
leak out on you. If God has given you life, if
he's given me life, The fruit of the Spirit will be evident.
Love, joy, peace, long-suffering, faith, repentance. This is the
fruit of the Spirit. It's the work of the Spirit of
God. It's the evidence of life. Fruit is the evidence of life. Now, if this fruit is absent,
it's because spiritual life is absent. It doesn't matter what
I profess. I can profess a lot of things. But if life is absent, the life
of God in the soul is absent, then this fruit will be absent. Outwardly, a person may look
good. Our Lord said that to the Pharisees. You wash the outside
of the cup. On the outside, you look good.
He said, you are white as sepulchers. On the outside, you're decorated.
But on the inside, you're full of dead men's bones. outwardly a person may look good,
but God deals in the heart. Doesn't he? God deals in the
heart. Salvation is a heart work. It's
God giving a new heart and a right spirit. It's a work of God. Now it says in verse 17 that
our Lord leaves and he heads for Bethany. Bethany. You know, Bethany means house
of depression. It means house of misery. That's
one of the meanings of it I was reading. But it's interesting,
there is one house there where our Lord could find lodging. It was the house of Lazarus,
Martha, and Mary. That's where they lived. Our Lord lodged where He's welcome,
where He's loved. He said this in John 14, 23,
"'If a man love Me, he will keep My words, and My Father will
love him, and We will come unto him and make Our abode with him.'" Now it says in verse 18, "'Now
early in the morning,' our Lord was no slacker, was He? Every
time you read about the Lord early in the morning, at daybreak,
or He prayed all night. But early in the morning, right
at daybreak, He heads back to the city, back to Jerusalem.
He has business there to conduct. His Father's business. He said to his parents one time,
remember when they couldn't find him and they went looking for
him and they found him in the temple and they were just distraught. And he said, wish you not that
I must be about my father's business. Don't you know that I must be,
and this is 12 years old, about my father's business. So he goes
back to Jerusalem on business, the business of redeeming, the
business of saving sinners. This is why He came. He came
to save sinners. He did not come into this world
to entertain sinners. He did not come into this world
to prove who He is. He came to save sinners. And
to do that, He's got to go to Jerusalem, He's got to suffer,
and He's got to die. We looked at this a few weeks
ago. So He's going to go back there. He's got business to do. And as he returned into the city,
on his way to the city, it says he was hungry. He was hungered. He was hungry. This shows his
humanity. Scott Richardson said that he
was as much God as if he were not man, and as much man as if
he were not God. And this part shows his humanity.
He was truly hungry. Scripture says he was bone of
our bone and flesh of our flesh. He had real needs like you and
I have. He was hungry. Being God did
not keep him from being hungry. It did not dehuman him. Is that a word? Well, it is now. You can buy my dictionary. I'm
going to have to write my own dictionary. It didn't dehuman
him. He's God, but He's still a man.
He's still a very real man. Now, if Jesus Christ is to be
our substitute, then He must experience what I experience.
For Him to be a real substitute, He's got to experience what I
experience. Except for knowing sin. He knew
no sin. It says in Hebrews 4.15, For we have not an high priest
which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities,
but was in all points tempted, tried in all points. I can't explain that, but it
says all points. My Lord was tried in all points
as we are, yet without sin. Without sin. You know, it says
in one place that Satan came and found nothing in him. There
was nothing in the Lord Jesus Christ for Satan to get his teeth
into. There's a whole lot in me for
him to get his teeth into, but there's nothing in him. He's
sinless. He's perfect. He's the perfect
lamb of God. That's who he is. Now he was
hungry. This man, the man Christ Jesus
was hungry. And he came, he saw this fig
tree and he came to it. It says in verse 19, and when
he saw a fig tree at a far off, over a mark, this is related,
this story's related. He saw it at a distance. He sees
this fig tree in the way, that means alone by itself, which
means nobody planted this tree. God did. God did, but they didn't
belong to anyone. It wasn't in a fig tree orchard,
or whatever you'd call it. It was by itself. And he came
to it, and he found nothing there on,
but leaves only. You see, at a distance, he sees
this fig tree that's green and full of leaves, and that means
there ought to be figs on it by now, something to eat. And
when he got there, there was nothing on it, just leaves, just
green leaves. And he said to this fig tree,
let no fruit grow on thee henceforward forever. And immediately, presently,
the fig tree withered away. And in Mark it says, it withered
all the way to the roots, I mean to the very roots, it withered
up. Now, in my readings, I've read
this, that when the fig tree begins to bear fruit, it begins
to bear fruit before it does the leaves. And then the leaves
come on and the fruit ripens. That's why when he saw it, it
is said that he expected fruit on it. He was going to eat from
it. Now, what are we to learn from this story? As I said before,
there are no fillers in the Word of God. This has a real deep
meaning here, a real serious meaning here. Here's some things we are to
learn from it. First of all, no doubt this is a prophecy against
Israel. Israel was like this fruitless
fig tree. They had the form of godliness.
They had the pictures and the types and they had the word of
God, but it had become nothing to them. Everything was outwardly,
nothing was inwardly. That's what the Lord said to
the Pharisees. You clean the outside of the cup, but the inside
of the cup is dirty. It's filthy. It's all outward
show. That's all it was, was outward
show. They had denied the power of godliness. Israel had all
the types and the pictures, but they didn't have anything in
them. There was nothing inward. I said
this earlier, salvation is a heart work. It's God doing business
in the heart. It's God giving a new heart,
a new spirit, a new nature. That's a work of God. Look over
in Romans chapter 3. I don't mean chapter 3, Romans
chapter 10, sorry. Romans chapter 10. Religion within was all formality,
it was all ceremony, but there was no heart in it. There was
no heart in it, which means there was no worship. They were just
going through the motions. God forbid that we just go through
the motions here this morning. We have gathered here to hear
the Word of God. We've gathered here to hear from
our Father, to be taught from our Father, and to give unto
Him the glory and the honor due His name, not just because it's
Sunday. but to hear from God and to worship
God. Paul says here in Romans 10,
Brethren, my heart's desire and prayer to God for Israel is that
they might be saved. For I bear them record, that
they have a zeal of God, but not according to knowledge. They
have a real zeal of God, they're religious, but it's not according
to the Scriptures, not according to knowledge. For they being
ignorant of God's righteousness, God's absolute righteousness
that He demands. You know, God is absolutely righteous,
and He demands righteousness. And they are ignorant of the
righteousness provided in Jesus Christ. And because of this,
they've gone about to establish their own righteousness. There's
no heart in it. All they're doing is turning
the next page and say, what are we supposed to do today? There's
no heart in that. There's no heart in that at all. Outwardly, they looked very promising,
didn't they? They looked very fruitful in
the things of God outwardly, but yet, on the inside, they
were dead. Dead. In one place, our Lord
called the Pharisees. He said to them, you're of your
father the devil. If you'd asked anyone in that
day who they thought was the most righteous and the closest
to God, they would have pointed to a Pharisee. And they were
the meanest people in town. The self-righteous are always
the meanest people in town. They are. Just look at history. You look at history and you'll
see that the self-righteous have been the meanest people in history. And that's all they were. Everything
was on the outside. He said, you wear your robes,
your phylacteries, you've got all these things and you're dead. When they should have been the
most fruitful people on earth, Christ came to them, and what
did they do? They turned thumbs down on Him.
He came unto His own, and His own what? Received Him not. They did not have the fruit of
the Spirit. Remember they took that adulterous
woman? And they took her and they threw her at the feet of
Christ. And you know why they did that? First of all, they
wanted to try to entrap him with the law. The law said that if
a woman caught an adulterer, there'd be stoned. So they tried to entrap him.
The second thing is they wanted to see her stoned. You ever watch
these westerns? Everybody dresses up like this
and they show up at a hanging? They want to watch that sucker
hang. It's just in us by nature. It's like a picnic. They used
to, back in the Civil War, they used to stand on top of the hill
with a picnic watching them fight a battle down below. Watching
them kill each other. But our Lord, when that woman
was brought to him, he bent down and wrote on the ground, and
probably wrote some names on the ground. He wrote on the ground,
and he stood up and he said, now you that are without sin,
you cast the first stone. And one by one, being convicted
in their own conscience, and he did that, or they had never
been convicted at all, but at least they had a conscience.
And they left, and there was nobody there but him and her.
And he says, woman, does anybody condemn you? And she said, no.
He said, well, neither do I. Neither do I. Now that same spirit
and attitude is in everyone whom God saves. That's the spirit
of Christ. That's the spirit of forgiveness.
If it's not there, he's not there. What is your hope of glory? What's
my hope of glory? Paul tells us, Christ in you,
the hope of glory. My hope of glory is not that
I straightened up. My hope of glory is Jesus Christ. And the grace of God that's shed
abroad in the heart teaches every one of his children to deny ungodliness. The law doesn't teach me to deny
it. But the grace of God teaches
me to deny it. The law just scares me into denying
it. I don't want to get caught. I
don't want to go to jail. You know, there's a difference.
Listen, there's a difference of obedience because you're afraid
of something or because you love something. You love someone. A difference. One's a grace and one's a spirit
of works. One's a spirit of grace. And our Lord cursed, now listen,
He put a curse. This is no little sweet Jesus
here. You know, the thing, the reason
we have lost the fear of God is from the pulpit. We have made
God so soft. We have made God so grandpa-ish
like that nobody fears Him. The fear of God is the beginning
of wisdom. God has not changed. Listen, God is still a consuming
fire. Outside of Christ, you're going
to find out. In Christ, He's a God of love, a God of mercy,
a God of grace. And He said here, "...let no
fruit grow on thee forever, and no fruit has grown on that tree
since Christ was crucified." Seventy years later, Israel was
laid in the dust, and only recently, back in the 60s, they were recognized
again. Even now, there's no fruit on
that tree. There's no prophet coming from there. The Gospel's
not coming out of that place. The Word of God's not coming
from there. They had the oracles. They had the Word of God. But when the Word of God walked
into town," wrote in the town on that donkey, when the Word
of God was made flesh, walked into that town, they denied the
Word of God. They denied the Word of God.
And there have been no fruit on that tree since. None. Now listen, if fruit is
ever found on them again, they will have to be saved the same
way all sinners are saved, by the grace of God through the
Lord Jesus Christ. Look what Paul says over in Acts
15. Turn over to Acts 15. Acts 15. Let me get to the verse I want
to read first before I tell you. In Acts 15, look in verse 8. Let me go back to verse 6. And
the apostles and elders came together for to consider of this
matter. And when there had been much disputing, Peter rose up
and said unto them, Men and brethren, You know how that a good while
ago God made choice among us that the Gentiles, by my mouth,
should hear the word of the gospel and believe. And God, which knoweth
the hearts, bare them witness, giving them the Holy Ghost, even
as he did unto us. And He put no difference between
us and them, purifying their hearts by faith." He put no difference
between us Jews and them Gentiles. That's what He's saying. Now,
therefore, why tempt ye God to put a yoke upon the neck of His
disciples, which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear? But we believe that through the
grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, now listen, we shall be saved
even as they. We shall be saved in the same
way God saves them, through Jesus Christ and Him crucified, both
Jew and Gentile. If God ever saves them over there,
He's going to save them the same way He saves us, through the
preaching of the gospel and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. They
will acknowledge the Lord Jesus Christ as the Messiah, the Savior. Now, this is also a picture of
a fruitless profession or a hypocritical profession individually. Let's
bring this now individual. This is works religion. That's
all it was. There was no fruit there. There
was no fruit of the spirit. It was all works religion. It
was all green on the outside. It looked good on the outside,
but nothing on the inside. Hypocrites make a fair show in
the flesh. They do. Outwardly, they look
the part. You can make a profession and
you can look the part, but inwardly be spiritually dead. You know, I had made a profession
for about three years before I heard the gospel. And I realized,
I need to be saved. I need the Lord to save me. The fruit of the Spirit is absent. Over in Galatians 5.22, listen
to this. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long-suffering,
gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance. And he
says, "...against such there is no law." And here's what this
is. When kindness is needed, it's
absent. When love is needed, when love
can be shown, when love is to be shown, genuine love now, it's
absent. It's not there. When real faith is needed, It's absent. It's absent. It's
absent. There's a real difference. Now
listen, and I take this serious, because Lord, I do, I pray, Lord,
save me from a false profession. Lord, give me, grant me genuine
faith and repentance. There's a real difference in
a profession in a possession. If Christ possesses you, you're
saved. You're His. I am His, and He
is mine. You remember the story of Simon
Magus? Remember the apostle was preaching,
and many believed, and Simon Magus believed, and then later
on, he tried to buy the gifts of the Holy Spirit, and Peter
said, Simon, and he was baptized. He made a profession. There were
several baptized. He was right there in that group.
And Peter said, Your heart is not right with God. Your heart's not right with God.
Oh God, make my heart right. He's the only one that can. Make
it right. David said that in Psalm 51,
Give me a clean heart and a right Spirit, that comes from you. Now let's notice the power of
Christ to pass judgment here. He said, Let no fruit grow on
thee henceforward forever. And presently the fig tree withered
away. You know what's interesting?
This is the only thing that I know of that Christ cursed, this fig
tree. What was it that Adam and Eve
used to try to hide their nakedness after the fall? What did they
sew together? Fig leaves. Fig leaves. They tried to hide
behind works. And he cursed this fig tree. But what this shows us here is
that the Lord Jesus Christ has all power to execute judgment. Listen to John 5.22 and also
verse 27, "...For the Father judges no man, but hath committed
all judgment unto the Son." All judgment has been put into the
hands of the Mediator, Jesus Christ. And in verse 27 it says,
"...and hath given him authority to execute judgment also." What
he does to this fig tree is a type, it's a picture, it's a story
here. He has the power to cast into
hell. He has the power to save. All power has been put into the
hands of that man, Jesus Christ. And when He said this to the
fig tree, it withered up, as Mark says, all the way to the
roots. All the way to the roots. Our Lord has the right to execute
judgment on this tree because, first of all, it's His. It's
His. It's no accident that it stands
alone. Why does that nation Israel exist over there right now? because
God created it. God created that nation out of
Abraham. And to take the things of God
and to make light of them, to just use them for what we would
call just benefits, is to do nothing but bring a curse on
you. We don't play with the gospel.
Never play with the gospel. You can play with anything else,
I don't care. Go play with a rattlesnake. It'd be better than playing with
the gospel. It'd be a whole lot better than playing with the
gospel. That's the gospel of Scripture saying, the gospel of God's glory. He could execute judgment on
that tree because it's His. And listen, the whole human race
is His. and the whole human race, every
person in this world, ought to give unto Him the glory due unto
His name." As it says over in Hebrews, "...by
Him therefore let us offer the sacrifice of praise to God continually,
that is, the fruit of our lips, giving thanks unto His name." All belong to God. The earth
is the Lord's, the fullness thereof, and they who dwell therein. And
he has the right to expect fruit from it. He has the right. It's his. And notice his power. And presently
the fig tree withered away. It withered away. When he cursed
it, it withered up. It dried up. Someone said this curse here
is most dreadful. Now listen, no matter how much
we may try to cultivate a religious profession, if that's all it
is, it will not produce fruit because there's no life. There's
no life. A fruitless profession, an empty
profession, is nothing more than a curse. And the disciples marveled at
this. They marveled at it. And they said this in verse 20,
And when the disciples saw it, they marveled, saying, How soon
has the fig tree withered away? How soon has it died when He
spoke? He spoke. This is power. Now this is power. When you speak, it happens. It happens. That's power. What they were witnessing was
a demonstration of His power. They had seen, listen, His power
to condemn. They saw, how many times were
they witness to Him raising the dead, giving sight to the blind,
enabling the lame to walk and casting out demons? How many
times did they see that? Time after time after time. And
now He gives them a little glimpse of His power to condemn. That's His also. That's His power
also. All judgments committed to Him.
And He also saw the power of His Word again. Immediately the tree dried up
from the roots. That's what it says in Mark.
He spoke that Word and it was Instant. He just withered. Just withered. And I'm going to close here.
I'm not going to say too much here after this, but He gives
a lesson in faith and in prayers that's connected with this story.
And Jesus answered and He said to them, Verily I say unto you,
if you have faith, and over Mark He says, have faith in God, You
see, it's the object of faith, not just faith. It's the object
of faith, God. And you doubt not, you shall
not only do this which is done to the fig tree, but also if
you shall say unto this mountain, Be thou removed, and be thou
cast into the sea, it shall be done. You see, Israel had no faith.
Why could they not enter into the promised land? The Scripture
said because they believed not, because of unbelief. That's why
they couldn't enter in. And he's saying here that this
connection with fruit has to do with faith in God.
This has to do with trusting Him, believing Him. And he speaks
of it in the matter of prayer. True prayer is always attended
by true faith. Listen, prayer is not a wish
list. It's not a wish list. It's something
that God has moved you to pray and you believe. You know, it's
just, let's throw this out there and see what happens. No, that's
not prayer. True prayer is going before the
throne of God and landing before God and believing, trusting that
He's going to do this. Whatever it is, you're going
to trust Him to take care of this matter. according to His
will, which is the best, which is the wisest." Faith always honors God. And
listen, it's always honored by God because it's of God. And true faith always produces
fruit or results. He says here, in doubt not, that's
our problem. Oh, we say, take your burden
to the Lord and leave it there? We take it there and we bring
it back. We don't leave it there. We really don't leave it there.
It's like we're informing God and we take it back home with
us. Take your burden to the Lord
and leave it there and trust Him to bring it to pass or resolve
the situation. He said, if you believe, if you
trust Him, whatever you ask, and I can't, I'm not even going
to try to plumb the depths of this, but whatever you ask and
believe in, He said He'll do it. But I know this, I know this,
whatever I ask and He does it will have to be according to
His will. And that's where I submit. I submit to His will in the matter. I don't go and pray and if it
goes a different direction, I'm mad at Him. We submit to Him. We submit. Doubt is a death blow to being
fruitful in any good work. You know that? It's a death blow.
The Scripture says that Christ did not make any mighty works
there because of their unbelief. Because of their unbelief. Is
anything too hard for the Lord? He said, if a mountain really needs to be moved and
you pray and you ask God to move that mountain, He will. That's what he said. He said, I don't know about that.
He said, doubt not. See, that's where you and I come
in. We come in on the doubt not part. There's nothing too hard for
our Lord. Nothing that mountain need to be moved. It's in a wrecking
crew over it move that mountain They may think well we need to
move it for this reason or that reason but But what he's saying is whatever
your trouble is whatever your trouble is Take it before the
Lord and trust him and he'll move it. He'll move it God is
still God He's still God And all things whatsoever you shall
ask in prayer, believing, you shall receive." Isn't that a
comfort to know that this is our God who can do all things,
who can remove all obstacles? Isn't it a comfort to know this? Our Lord knew that His disciples
would face a mountain of trouble. They were in for some real trouble.
And He knew what they were about to face. But he said, your faith in God
will overcome all your troubles. It'll overcome them all. And
your faith, if it's of God and it's in God, if it's of God,
it will be in God. It'll produce fruit. It'll produce. If you have God-given faith,
it'll produce fruit and it'll overcome all troubles. And if
you'll notice here, the exercise of faith, it starts with prayer.
It starts with prayer. That's where the very exercise
of faith starts with prayer. Going before God. Whatever you ask in prayer, believing,
you shall receive. Do I really believe this? And true prayer has conviction.
He said, ask believing. That's conviction right there.
That's a real conviction that God Almighty is going to do.
What I ask Him. He'll do it in His way. He's
going to take care of it. Not everyone, here's the lesson,
not everyone who professes to be saved is saved. If the fruit
of the Spirit is not there, He's not there. There will be fruit
where there's life in the soul. And true prayer and faith always
go together. They always go together. And God is able to save us from
all our trouble, just ask him, ask him, trouble, and trust him. Do we really believe this? All right.