If you open your Bibles to Matthew
chapter 21, that's where we'll begin looking this morning, continuing
our study in Matthew chapter 21. Before we begin, let's look to
our Lord in prayer. Our Father, which art in heaven,
holy and reverent is your matchless name. Father, how our hearts
are thrilled at this opportunity to meet together, to open and
read and study your word, to learn more of our Lord Jesus
Christ, and we pray to be enabled by thy spirit to worship thee.
Father, how thankful we are. How richly and abundantly you
have blessed this congregation. Father, I pray that this morning
that you would enable us with thankful hearts to truly worship
worship and praise your matchless name. Let us learn more of our
Lord Jesus Christ and grant faith to believe him and trust him
and rest in him. Will we pray for ourselves in
this class this morning, we pray for our children's classes, that
Father you bless richly, that you bless our teachers and our
children both in teaching and hearing, that you use this time
to plant the seeds of faith in the hearts of our young ones.
Father, how we thank you for them and pray that you would
protect them from this wicked generation in which they grow
up, protect them, their bodies, their minds, and especially their
hearts, Father, that you might enable them to hear and believe
the things of our Lord Jesus Christ that you would enable
us to teach them. And Father, we dare not forget
to pray for the sick and the afflicted. It seems right now
that there are so many that Father, we hold them up to thee. We're
thankful to know that you are the great physician, that you're
the almighty, that there are no hard cases with thee. Father,
we pray for healing and comfort for your people, that you'd provide
a way out. All these things we ask in that
name which is above every name, the name of our Lord Jesus Christ,
amen. I've titled the lesson this morning,
the lesson of the cursed fig tree. You see where I've got
or where I picked that title up from Matthew 21 beginning
in verse 17 and he left them and went out of the city into
Bethany and lodged and he lodged there. Now in the morning as
he returned into the city, he hungered and we saw a fig tree
in the way. He came to it and found nothing
there on but leaves only and said unto it, let no fruit grow
on the hands forward forever. Presently the fig tree withered
away and when his disciples saw it they marveled Saying how soon
is the fig tree withered away? Now my question to us this morning
is why did the Lord curse this fig tree? So that it died almost
immediately. I mean was he just mad at it
because he woke up in the morning He was hungry. He came to the
fig tree didn't have any any fruit on it that would satisfy
his hunger So he cursed it. Is that why just because he was
mad? No, that's not The Lord cursed his fig tree to preach
the gospel to us. To preach the gospel to us in
a picture and to show us that salvation is in him. It's by
faith in him, not by our works of the law. Let's see if I can
make good on that. I know that's the lesson from
his fig tree being cursed. Let me see if I can make good
on it. First, I want us to look at the fig tree. And that fig
tree is a picture of salvation by man's works. What's the first
thing that you think about when you hear about a fig tree or
fig leaves? I would imagine about everybody
here immediately thinks of Adam and Eve in the garden after the
fall. You think about they fell and they knew that they were
naked and they made themselves aprons of fig leaves. I'd say
that's what everybody thinks about. And Adam and Eve made
those aprons of fig leaves because they'd fallen in sin and they
were ashamed. Now they knew that they were
naked and they thought that their shame was because of the nakedness
of their bodies, so they tried to cover their bodies. But what
they discovered is they couldn't cover the guilt, the shame of
their guilt, the shame of their sin. Even though they made themselves
aprons to cover their nakedness, their guilt, the shame of sin
was still there. And that attempt to cover their
nakedness by what they could make from those fig leaves You
know that that's a picture of salvation by works. Fig leaves
all through scripture represent man trying to cover his shame,
trying to cover his guilt and hide it from God. But that's
impossible for you and me to do. We can't take, and our sin
just doesn't need to be hidden. It needs to be taken away. And
we've got this shame and guilt of our sin, but we can't take
it away because we don't have pure blood to wash it away. We
can't make an atonement for that sin because we don't have the
pure, precious blood that's required to pay our sin debt to God's
justice. We can't make an atonement for
the soul. We're doing fleshly things. That
can't make an atonement for the soul. The best thing that we
can try to do is cover our sin, try to hide our sin, try to hide
our guilt from God's sight. And that can't be done. God sees
everything. He's got an all seeing eye. He sees everything. Our
problem is we're trying to hide our sin instead of put it away.
We're trying to hide our sin instead of beg forgiveness from
it. That was Adam's problem. Our problem today too, because
we got his nature. And our works to try to cover our sin or try
to make up for our sin in some way will never get the job done. Any more than Adam and Eve's
aprons of fig leaves could hide their shame before God. They
were wearing those aprons. When God came walking to them
in the cool of the day, where were they? Why didn't they just
go out and meet God? They were hiding in the bushes.
Well, they had their aprons on. Why didn't they go out and meet
God, talk to Him, walk with Him in the cool of the day like they'd
always done? Because their fig leaf aprons didn't work. It didn't
take away their sin. It didn't take away the shame
of their guilt. They knew their fig leaf aprons
didn't work. And more importantly, God knew those fig leaf aprons
didn't work. God saw through those things
because God went looking on the flesh. You and I look on the
flesh. That is so much of our problem.
We look on the flesh. God looks past that to the heart.
He looks past those fig leaves to the heart and that's where
the issue settled. And those fig leaves on the flesh
couldn't hide the sinfulness of the heart. Couldn't find how
the soul was, was defiled. Couldn't hide the deadness of
the heart. And that's what those fig leaves represent. And we
try to cover our sin with the fig leaves of our works, we'll
be like this tree, we'll get cursed every time. God will curse
us every time, because he won't accept it. I learned something
interesting about fig trees this week that makes fig trees different
from pretty much every other fruit tree I know about. I'm
no botanist, but this was information to me. Fig trees produce their
fruit first, then they grow the leaves. Most trees grow leaves
first and then the fruit, right? Fig trees produce the fruit first,
then the leaves grow in. So the Lord came to this fig
tree, woke up, he was hungry, came to this fig tree. Now he
knew, already knew, there was no figs on it, but a person would
naturally think he's gonna find fruit on that tree, right? Because
the leaves are all grown in. If the leaves are grown in, the
fruit must have already grown in, because the fruit grows first.
But the Lord got to the tree is full of leaves, but no fruit
is full of leaves, but there's nothing there to give her to
sustain life. The tree was useless. It was
lifeless in that sense. It could produce leaves, but
it couldn't produce any fruit. It couldn't produce anything
that was sustained life. So the tree was useless. And
since the tree was already useless, the Lord cursed it. And it died. And the disciples were amazed
at this tree. The Lord curses it. And then
it just almost immediately withers and dies. And they were amazed
at it. Now that fig tree with its leaves, but no fruit. That's
a picture of you and me trying to earn salvation by our works
instead of by trusting Christ. Our sinful works are those leaves.
They cannot produce any life. Our sinful works can't produce
any fruit. They can't produce any fruit
of righteousness, fruit of the spirit, fruit of spiritual life. Our works do produce fruit. And
you know what scripture calls it? The fruit of death. Romans 7, 5. The apostle Paul
calls our works fruit unto death. Our tree, us, if we call ourselves
a tree, by nature we're full of leaves and no fruit. The leaves
are just for show. When somebody tries to produce
all those fig leaves of their works to show everybody how righteous
they are. This is the evidence of my salvation.
This is the evidence that I know the Lord. Those leaves are just
for show. There's no fruit. There's nothing
to give life. There's nothing to sustain life.
And we may have lots of leaves. And men might be impressed. They
say, oh, look at that tree. It's got lots of leaves. But
there's no fruit that God requires. And you know people like that,
and God forbid that we would be like that. Somebody that's
got lots of leaves, but it's just a religious sham. It's somebody
that's trying to produce all those leaves, but they can't
produce fruit by themselves. We'll get to that in a minute.
They're just trying to produce lots of leaves to impress people.
It's just being a hypocrite. It's just all that is. That's
the only thing you can call it is a religious hypocrite. They
have a profession of religion. with no knowledge of Christ.
They have a profession of religion and no profession of Christ.
They have a profession of life, but no spirit. They have a religion
of works without faith in Christ. And here's why they have no fruit.
They're trusting themselves instead of trusting Christ alone. And
the Lord will curse that every time. Now, the Lord Jesus, Jesus
of Nazareth, had slept out in Bethany that night, come back
to town. He saw this tree. This fig tree had leaves and
no fruit. And he cursed that tree. This
man, Jesus of Nazareth, did that. Now that shows more than he has
power over nature, over trees, over things like that. When he
cursed that tree, this man, Jesus of Nazareth, showed he's God.
He's God. And it wasn't just to show he's
God over nature and over trees and over those kinds of things.
Remember in a picture, he's preaching the gospel to us here. He showed
that he's God who has the power, the right to judge and to curse. He's got the power and the right
to condemn. It's his because he's God. And
this, him cursing the fig tree, is an illustration of his justice
in condemning the useless. He did it to the tree, and the
day is coming, this man, Jesus of Nazareth, God's given all
judgment to him. He'll do the same thing with
useless people someday. They've got all the leaves of
religion, no proof. They'll be condemned. Now that's
the fig tree. But as the Lord goes on talking
to his disciples, the story doesn't end there. He shows them not
only does he have the right and the power to condemn and to judge,
he's got the power to give life. He's got the power to bless and
to forgive. So second, let's look at salvation
that's in Christ, that's received by faith. Now, since salvation
cannot be earned by our works, salvation has got to be earned
by the works of another. Got that? It's got to be earned
by the works of another. Somebody's got to earn it. God in justice
can't give something that's not been earned. If we can't earn
it by our works, somebody else got to earn it. By his works,
he's got to do it for us. So we need a representative.
We need a representative to come and obey the law for us. The
representative has got to do something for us. We can't do
it for ourselves. It's the only way a sinner like you and me
can be made righteous. It's through a representative.
By somebody else keeping the law for us. And that representative
is the Lord Jesus Christ. Now the Lord Jesus Christ, Mary's
firstborn son, this man, this man who walked the earth and
the Pharisees, all they ever saw, the religious people, all
they ever saw was a man. He was a man. He's a real man. What they didn't see is he's
a son of God. John, when he wrote the gospel,
John talked about this man being God, wasn't he? God was made
flesh and dwelt among us. God's people see it. He's a real
man. He was a real man who got tired.
Since he's a real man, he can be our representative. He got
tired. He had to sleep. I mean, just
his body had to sleep. You know, that's why he went
to Bethany. Now here he is in town, everybody's out there shouting
Hosanna and throwing their coats and throwing these palm leaves
down in front of him as he rides that ass into town. All those
people just hailing him and oh boy, they sound religious, shouting
Hosanna to the son of David, right? Shawn, you know not one
person offered him a place to sleep. Not one person said, You
got some place to eat tonight? Why don't you come over to my
house? I'll have dinner. Not one person said, you got
a place to sleep? I got a spare bed. Not one person
said that. That's why he went to Bethany.
He didn't go to a house in Bethany. He had a camp. He slept outside
in Bethany. But he did it. He wouldn't sleep
because he was tired. He was a real man who got tired.
He was a real man who got thirsty. That's why he sat on a well and
asked that Samaritan woman, give me a drink of water. He's thirsty.
Can you imagine walking around for however long that took him
to go through Samaria and not have anything to drink? You'd
ask somebody for a drink of water, wouldn't you? He did too, because
he's a real man who got thirsty. Out there in Bethany, he's got
that camp. He's out there sleeping. He woke up. He's hungry. I was
too. I woke up this morning. Man,
I was hungry. I was so glad to be able to have
some eggs and some toast and some milk and some coffee. Lord
didn't have that. So he walked back to town. He went to that fig tree to get
something to eat because he's hungry. He's a real man. He suffered
all the weakness and all the need of this flesh, just like
you and I do. The difference between him and
us is he did it without sinning. That's the difference. And that
makes him the representative we need. He's got to be a man.
He's got to be bone of our bone and flesh of our flesh so that
he can be our representative. But he's also got to be God so
he can be holy and righteous and establish righteousness for
his people. And that's exactly what he did
during his earthly ministry. And sinners are saved through
faith in him. See, he did all the work. All
we do is believe him, that he and his work is enough to save
us. Verse 21, this is what he's telling them. Jesus answered
and said unto them, verily I say unto you, if ye have faith and
doubt not, ye shall not only do this which is done to the
victory, but also if ye shall say unto this mountain, be thou
removed and be thou cast into the sea, it shall be done. In all things whatsoever ye shall
ask in prayer, believing ye shall receive. Now the Lord here tells
his disciples about the power to perform miracles and they
will, they'll perform great miracles in the future after the Lord's
resurrection and ascension. It was apostolic power that was
given to these apostles and to some others in the early church.
And just let me give you a note on these miracles. These miracles,
these men were able to perform these miracles to heal the sick
and even raise the dead and do things like that. While the scripture
was being written, the Old Testament was written. These were the men
who would be writing the New Testament scriptures. So while
they were writing the New Testament scriptures, they had the power,
the ability, God gave them to perform these miracles so that
when they performed a miracle like that, people would sit up
and listen. They'd sit up and pay attention.
This person just performed a miracle that only God could do. Could be he's got a message from
God, maybe I ought to listen to him. That's why the apostles
had those miracles. But now nobody's doing that today.
Nobody's performed miracles like that today. And you know why?
Somebody doesn't need to perform a miracle of healing or tongues
or, you know, moving a mountain into the sea. Nobody needs to
perform miracles like that today because those miracles were given
as an evidence. This man sent from God. This
man's got a message from God. This man's preaching the gospel.
You and I don't need somebody to perform a miracle to tell
us if they're preaching the gospel or not because we got the completed
word of God. We've got all the, those scriptures
that these men were writing. If you want to know if a man's
preaching the gospel or not, Check him by the word. See, does
his message match the word? If he's saying what God's saying,
he's preaching the word. You don't need miracles. Let
me show you that. First Corinthians. First Corinthians chapter 14.
Verse 22. Wherefore tongues, the miracle
of being able to speak in tongues, and that applies to all these
other kind of miracles. Wherefore tongues are for a sign. Not to them that believe. Those
that believe don't need that sign. They've got the word. But
it's a sign to them that believe not. But prophesying, preaching,
preaching Christ, preaching the word, serveth not for them that
believe not. No, they need a miracle to be
able to listen. But preaching is for them which believe. And
so that's the way it is today. We don't need somebody to perform
a miracle to know if they're preaching the word of God. Preaching
is all that it takes for somebody. Preaching Christ is all it takes
for somebody that believes. They check it by the word of
God, say that's the gospel, that's what God says, I'm gonna believe
it. Now, I suppose, I don't, if we're
honest, I mean, you know, we may be, so well taught about
this thing about miracles that we may want to appear just, you
know, real religious to one another, but, uh, that we might not admit
it. But if we're being honest, I just bet you most of us would
like to be able to perform these miracles, you know, like the
apostles did healing and those kinds of things. Um, we think,
you know, it'd come in mighty handy to be able to heal the
sick, wouldn't it? To give sight to the blind, to,
to, to make the lame walk, you know, it'd be pretty handy. The
thought crossed my mind Friday, Jan and I spent some time up
at the ICU, and there were several families there, and you know
how it is, you're there in the ICU, and the person's in the
ICU, you're sitting in the little chairs in the hall, and you can
just see on their face and their body language, they're so grieved.
And it just, it made me sad to see that, that grief on the end,
it was so sad. And I thought, boy, if I could
just stroll in that room, and take their loved one, touch them,
and heal them. Wouldn't that be something? Just to relieve that sadness
on them. I mean, you know, you think, well, that could have
been pretty handy. But we can't do it. We can't do it. And I'm
also pretty convinced of this. If we had the power to do that,
we'd be doing it showing off. We'd be doing it to get glory
and credit for you. Everybody say, oh, you know,
look at Frank. We've got to remember the whole
point of this thing is people say, look to Christ. It's a good
thing that we can't do that. I mean, it's best left in the
Lord's name. But anyway, what the Lord is
really telling us here is all of his people, not just the apostles,
all of his people are gonna be enabled to perform a miracle
more powerful than cursing a fig tree and it dying immediately.
All of God's people are gonna be enabled by the Spirit to perform
a miracle greater than healing the sick, greater than walking
into the ICU and healing somebody. And the greater miracle that
all of God's elect are gonna perform is faith in Christ. That belief in Christ is a greater
miracle than moving mountains and healing people and speaking
in tongues. And every one of God's people will be able to
do that miracle. It's not like performing a party
trick. If you can move a mountain into
the sea, I mean, you know, it's kind of showing off. It's a party
trick. But you know, through faith in
Christ, the mountain of your sin, I mean, the mountain that
you can't see the top of it. I mean, the mountain is so much
greater than anything we can begin to imagine. By faith, the
mountain of your sin is going to be moved to a place where
God can't see it. Now God can see everything. We
talked about that earlier, right? That's why the fig leaves of
our works don't work. God has an all-seeing eye. God
sees everything. So if your sin has been taken
to a place where God can't see it, you know what that means?
It means it's gone. It means it doesn't exist. God's
not just pretending it doesn't. It's gone. It disappeared completely
because the blood of Christ made it to disappear, made it to not
exist anymore. And we lay hold on that by faith.
And some of them might say, but that's impossible. That's impossible
to believe on Christ and then the mountain of my sin is gone.
Well, you're right, with me it's impossible. But with God, all
things are possible. And believing Christ, that's
the greater miracle than physically moving a mountain or cursing
a tree and making it die. It's the power of faith in Christ
which is a miracle we cannot perform by our own power. I know I can tell you by experience,
and I bet everybody who believes Christ here can tell you the
same thing. I spent how much time trying to make myself believe
and couldn't do it. I mean, just utterly, I could
not do it. And then one day I found myself
believing and could not believe anymore. Where'd it come from?
How'd it go? Well, it's the Spirit. He blows
where He listed. He blows through. You don't know
where He's come from, where He's going. All you know is He's been here.
The evidence that He's been now, I believe. That's a miracle that
only God the Holy Spirit can perform, to make you believe
on Christ. You think of that. It's an utter
miracle that a sinner like you and me believes. I mean, believes
and trusts and rests in the Lord Jesus Christ. It's a miracle.
It's a miracle. to believe the gospel in complete
foolishness to the natural man. And yet it feeds your soul. That's
by faith. That's a miracle. It's a supernatural
miracle that a person in the flesh can believe the spiritual
that we can't see. That's a miracle. It's a miracle
that a sinner would believe Christ, believe on him and love him. It's not seeing him in the flesh,
is it? Not seeing him with these eyes. Most people saw him with
these eyes, despised him, rejected him, didn't they? The flesh can't
do that. You can only love Christ and
believe Christ like that by a miracle of faith when the Holy Spirit
gives it. And you believe him and you can't not believe him.
You love him and you can't not love him. It's a miracle for
you and me to believe on a man that we've never seen. to believe
on Him so much, so completely, that will hang the entirety of
our eternal soul on Him and Him alone. Now that's a miracle,
isn't it? And it's a miracle that a sinner
believes Christ. And I'm telling you, what else
is a miracle? That they keep believing on Him. That they keep
believing. When you first believe Christ,
I think of this. Often, someone comes to me and
they ask to be baptized, they want to confess the Lord, and
they're so happy, they, oh, I see, I believe, oh, they're so happy.
And I'm happy with them. I mean, I'm just overjoyed with
them. But you know, it's in the back of my mind, brother, sister,
your troubles are just starting. They're just, we've all been
so blessed since I've been a pastor, several of our young people,
people that, I saw them born. I held them when they were babies.
And they grow up and they want to confess Christ. I'm so happy
and they're young and they're so full of life and physical
strength and those things. And I think, oh, your troubles
are just starting. And when those troubles come,
Troubles from your, I'm not just talking about the war, I'm talking
about from your own flesh. Oh, the wickedness of unbelief,
the deadness, that old man, you gotta carry around with you,
he's gonna grieve you so long, oh my goodness. And the Lord's
gonna try his people. He says, you believe on me. What
a sales pitch this is, I don't think it's worked on him. Believe
on me, but boy, it's gonna give you trouble. It's hard to sell
that, isn't it? And God's people believed. And
he sends him trouble. And you want to know a miracle?
Listen, I'm not talking about just something little. I'm talking
about shaking you down to your very core. And when it's over,
you know what you find yourself doing? I believe him even more
than I ever did before. I trust him more than I ever
did before. That's a miracle. It's a miracle that trial didn't
run you off. It's a miracle. It's a miracle of God's grace.
It's a miracle of faith. Why haven't you and I just gone
off into, I mean, outer left field chasing idols just as crazy
as you can possibly imagine? The miracle of faith. It's the
only reason, what a miracle. I tell you what, I'd a whole
lot rather have that miracle, be able to perform by God's grace
that miracle and believe Christ a whole lot more rather than
speaking in tongues and moving mountains, wouldn't you? I would.
I'll tell you another miracle, and it's still, it's through
faith, the power of prayer. A believer has power, power in
prayer. We have power so that the Father
hears our prayers. He promised that he would. And
you'll notice it doesn't say there that he'll grant you everything
he has, he says he hears. What condescension that the Almighty
would hear the prayers of a speck in his creation like me. That's
power. That's amazing. There's power. And I'll tell you why there's
power. The believer has power in prayer. It's through the blood
of Christ. There's always power in the blood
of Christ to cleanse. To cleanse and forgive sin and
make us accepted to the Father. The Father always hears a prayer
that's for the sake of, on the basis of, the blood of His Son. The blood of God's Son is so
precious to Him, always hears a prayer based on the merits
of that prayer, always. The father always hears a prayer
that's for the sake of and the glory of his son. And like I
said a minute ago, you'll notice now the Lord's not saying you're
gonna get everything you ask for in prayer here. Remember
the topic. Remember the topic of this message
as Lord's preaching to us by cursing this fig tree. The topic
is saving faith. The topic is not getting trinkets
in this life. The topic is saving faith. Sinners
are always saved by the Lord Jesus Christ through faith in
Him. Every sinner that believes on
Christ, that believes on Him as their all, to be their all,
to be everything that they need, and they believe it so fully
that they don't think they've gotta add one thing to it. Everyone
that believes Christ like that is saved. It's through faith
in Christ. It's not the fig leaves of our works or the law, it's
through faith in Christ. So this is what the Lord's saying.
that whoever asks, prays in faith, he says, believing, fully believing,
fully trusting on the Lord Jesus Christ. When we pray, whatever
spiritual blessings it is we ask for, spiritual blessings,
believing, whatever it is we ask for, the Father will always
give, always by faith in Christ. We ask for forgiveness, forgiveness
of our sin for Christ's sake, because of his blood, And the
father hears that and he forgives. Because the blood of his son
is so precious to him. We ask for righteousness for
Christ's sake. This is based on his obedience,
not mine. For his glory and the father
always gives it. We ask for spiritual life for
Christ's sake. Because Christ died the death
that I deserve. The father always hears that
prayer because the death of his son is so precious to him. We
ask for salvation. I read in scripture, the Father
determined to save a people. He elected a people to save.
I read that the Son died for those people. He shed his blood
to put their sin away. I read the Holy Spirit comes
and gives life to them. You know what I cry? Father,
save me. Save me. Apply the blood of Christ
to me. Choose me. Save me. We ask for
salvation based upon the doing and the dying of the Lord Jesus
Christ. Not because I'm asking, not because I got the right doctrine,
not because I did this, that or the other, purely based upon,
in spite of me, in spite of everything that I've done, purely based
upon the doing and the dying of the Lord Jesus Christ, the
father always saves because his sons are precious to him. We
ask that the father accept us for Christ's sake, that he would
accept us in the beloved. Not because of what I've done,
Not because I preach, not because you're faithful to attend and
faithful to give and support the gospel and you live your
life a certain way. Father, accept me for Christ's
sake. Purely, totally, 100% for Christ's sake. The Father always
says accept it. Come on on, accept it. Now again,
I'd a whole lot rather have that miracle. Oh, I would have loved
Friday afternoon, be able to heal some folks, I would. But
if I did, you know what? They'd die again later. I'd a
whole lot rather have the miracle, faith in Christ, to be able to
believe Him and come before the Father in prayer believing than
the ability to do mountains. I hope you do too, because that's
the very lesson that the Lord's teaching us here in this curse
victory. All right, I hope the Lord blessed
that to you.