Thursday Reflection September 24, 2020 What is in your heart?
Thursday Reflection September 24, 2020 What is in your heart?
“Each tree is known by its own fruit. Figs are not gathered from thorns, nor are grapes picked from a bramble bush. The good person out of the good treasure of the heart produces good, and the evil person out of the evil treasure produces evil; for it is out of the abundance of the heart that the mouth speaks.” Luke 6:44-45
Good day friends!
I want to begin this reflection with a series of questions for self-examination. When you gather at the workplace and join with friends to negatively and maliciously speak about others what type of spiritual fruit are you producing? When you refuse to speak to a brother or sister at church and completely avoid the person what fruit are you producing? When you tell lies on others, especially to save your own self, what kind of fruit are you producing? When you commit fornication, adultery and sexual immorality what kind of fruit are you producing? When you ignore the word of God and the teachings of the Bible what kind of fruit are you producing?
Jesus was teaching a large crowd on a mountain. This is the same mountain that he gave the Beatitudes. This was a series of teaching by Jesus which covered many aspects of life. In his teaching in chapter 6 of Luke, he taught about the fruit in people’s lives. A tree is identified by the fruit that it produces and a good tree cannot produce bad fruit. Jesus gave the following illustration, “Figs are not gathered from thorns, nor are grapes picked from a bramble bush.” So in other words a fig tree will produce figs and grape vines will produce grape. They will not produce fruit such as thorns or brambles. So a good person will NOT produce sexual immorality, quarreling, jealousy, anger, selfish ambition, malicious conversations, lustful pleasures, division and envy (Galatians 6:19-21) . Instead a good person WILL produce love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control (Galatians 6: 22-23). So the good person will produce that which is good and the bad person that which is bad.
As Jesus continued teaching the multitude about the fruit that one produces, He got to the heart of the matter which is the heart. Hear Jesus, “The good person out of the good treasure of the heart produces good, and the evil person out of the evil treasure produces evil”. Your heart determines what type of fruit you will produce. If you are producing bad fruit that mean your heart is at a bad place and if you are producing good fruit your heart is in a good place and all of this is reflected by our speech. The New Living Translation commentary Bible puts it this way, “Jesus reminds us that our speech and actions reveal our true underlying beliefs, attitudes, and motivations. The good impressions we try to make cannot last if we are being deceptive. What is in your heart will come out in your speech and behavior.”
You cannot hide your true nature. You can pretend to produce good fruit, but the bad will come out, because of what is truly in your heart. EXAMINE YOUR HEART TODAY and determine what is in your heart. Don’t just assume it is good, because you do not kill or rob. No examine how you treat people and how you treat God.
Shalom
Christopher Euphfa