The Country Church Bourbon Indiana

Introduction: Announce Baptismal Meeting after Sermon

Verses 27-36 = hardest to apply

Verses 37-42 = some of the most often understood

Verses 43-49 = some of the most convicting, but also great news to people who are fed up with their sin.

Text: Luke 6:43-49

Theme = A tree is known by its fruit. Whenever you sin, it is because there is a problem inside of you. And that problem has to do with how deep and firm your relationship with Jesus is. You want to know the key to godliness? It’s not a change in circumstances and it’s not found in blaming other people. It’s digging deeper and laying your foundation on Jesus.

Verses 43-45

Jesus states something obvious about trees and fruit and connects them to something about people that is not so obvious, especially because of how blinding sin is.

Since the Garden of Eden, people have been blaming their behavior on things outside of themselves. When Adam and Eve ate from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, Eve blamed it on the snake and Adam blamed it on God and Eve.

When God confronted Cain about murdering Abel, Cain tried to dodge the question by shifting the focus and trying to say that Abel is not Cain’s responsibility. He famously said “am I my brother’s keeper?”

The common religious thought of the day during Jesus’ time was also that things outside of the self are what lead to sin. That’s why the Pharisees were so preoccupied with cleanliness and avoiding sinners. They felt their hearts were basically good and they just needed to avoid bad external situations.

The idea that sin is something caused by things outside of ourselves is still alive and well today. Road rage is a good example of this. Something frustrating happens on the road; a person blows up about it and drives dangerously and in a hostile way because of it. But in their eyes it’s the fault of whoever made them angry. Their anger isn’t their own fault.

If you were to walk into a counselor’s office, there is a high probability that they will teach you to blame your sins on someone else. First, they are unlikely to even call the issue a sin. And then, they are likely to dig into your past and circumstances to find things to help you blame. A frequent scapegoat for many counselors is to blame your parents for your sin.

An extreme example of this, in certain countries and cultures in the world, it is even considered OK to rape someone because of how they dress. And the rapist is excused from their behavior because it’s the fault of the woman for dressing as she did. They also believe it is OK to murder someone because their beliefs are different from their own. At least most of us can recognize how reprehensible it is to blame the victim for being victimized, but it happens a lot.

But consider trees and plants. Figs don’t grow on thornbushes. Grapes don’t grow on bramble bushes. If the tree is healthy it will bear good fruit. If the tree is bad it will bear bad fruit.

Thorns come from thornbushes. Grapes come from grapevines. Tasty fruit comes from a good, well-nourished tree.

This is very basic knowledge and easily observable, and yet, when people sin and engage in badbehavior, they continue to evaluate themselves as being totally fine. Their heart is basically good.

“The bad fruit doesn’t mean I’m a bad tree, it means my parents are bad trees. Or my spouse is a bad tree. Or my neighbor is a bad tree.”

It is easy for us to see that figs don’t come from thornbushes, but extremely difficult for us to see that sins don’t come from a pure heart because sin is so blinding.

As we talked about in last week’s sermon. The person with a log in their eye doesn’t even know they have the log in their eye. The blind man leading a blind man thinks that he is perfectly qualified to lead the other blind man.

I think, when we consider how obvious it is to us that fig trees don’t come from thornbushes, and yet how very difficult it is for us to accept that our sinning means there is something wrong with our heart, it just goes to show how true Jeremiah 17:9 is, which says “the heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?”

Now, to be sure, it would be naïve to totally neglect external and environmental factors. A tree in good soil with good sunlight and rain has more going for it to become a good tree than a tree in bad soil with bad sunlight and rain.

And yeah, your circumstances do affect you. Maybe Adam and Eve would not have sinned if the snake had not tempted them. Maybe the angry driver would not have caused an accident if he hadn’t become so angry because of a nearby driver.

But do you see that in each of these situations the sinner made a choice? No analogy is perfect, and there is a fundamental difference between trees and people, and that is the power of exercising one’s personal will. Adam and Eve were tempted by the snake, but they had a choice and the snake did not make them choose to sin. Cain was in an upsetting situation that God was pleased with Abel and not him, but Cain made the choice to sin. He could have chosen not to. Neither God nor Abel forced Cain’s hand to murder Abel.

So while it is true that bad fruit means the tree is bad. It is even truer for us that our bad fruit means that our hearts are bad, because unlike trees, we have personal wills.

Link: Jesus addresses the concept of circumstances causing our sins in the following verses. Through his words, we see that ultimately circumstances are not an excuse for sin. If we build a deep and firm foundation, the house will not break though a flood crashes against it.

Verses 46-49

I don’t know if you ever learned this song, but there is a kid’s song about these verses.

“The wise man built his house upon the rock, the wise man built his house upon the rock, the wise man built his house upon the rock. And the rains came tumbling down. The rains came down and the floods came up. 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.”

When I sang it as a kid, and when you did too, if you know it, you probably had no idea what it meant beyond the obvious meaning. A smart person builds their house on rock and it won’t fall over like the house built on sand. When I sang it, I actually imagined a literal rock on top of the ground. Like, the house was on a big boulder. And I always wondered, wouldn’t that make the house slide more easily? Haha! I eventually figured that probably the house on the rock did better because it was higher up than the one on the sand, by virtue of being on top of a boulder.

That song and these verses really teach something extremely important in our pursuit of godliness. And it is this:

Godliness is not a product of circumstances, but is a product of how deep you have deep and what foundation you have built upon.

There are two houses. Same circumstances. They have been hit by a flood. One house stands firm and the other house falls. The different outcome is not a result of different trials. They both face the same flood. The different outcome is because one was built well and the other was built badly.

Every day, there are people who face trials. But people respond to it differently. Same trial, different results.

You have two people driving. Both of them have someone cut in front of them. One person becomes furious and decides to play bumper cars with the car in front of them. The other person remains calm and prays for the person who just cut them off.

Every marriage has its frustrations. And yet some marriages daily erupt into shouting matches and others practice patience and forgiveness.

Most people have been propositioned to engage in illegal behavior from one time or another. Maybe to steal something or use drugs. One person chooses to do so and the other doesn’t.

The circumstances are the same, but the response is different. The answer: one heart is unhealthy and the other is healthy.

And the reason: one heart has sand as its foundation, and the other has rock.

Alright, I’ve explained that long enough. Let me get to the point:

Whenever you sin, it is because there is a problem inside of you. And that problem has to do with how deep and firm your relationship with Jesus is. You want to know the key to godliness? It’s not a change in circumstances. It’s digging deeper and laying your foundation on Jesus.

The one who produces good fruit. The one whose home stands firm. They really own Jesus as their Lord. His love; His teachings; His words; they have integrated deeply into their lives. Their lives and their hearts are molded and shaped by Jesus. Jesus is their Lord. It doesn’t matter what the circumstances are, they behave godly through it because Jesus is their Lord, they hear Him, they obey Him, and their life is built deeply and firmly on that reality. They believe what Jesus says. They admire Him. They feel they owe their lives to Jesus due to Jesus’ sacrificial death on their behalf. They are motivated to please Him. They believe Jesus’ ways are better. And so, their hearts are good, pure, and healthy. And their homes are built on the solid rock. And it doesn’t matter how much rain comes or floods come. The house on the rock stands firm.

The secret to being a more forgiving person. To not giving into sin. Is to go deeper with Jesus. For Christians, every moral failing is ultimately traceable back to a shortcoming in one’s relationship with Jesus.

“Why do you call me ‘Lord, Lord’ and not do what I tell you?” – Jesus asks. It is because you aren’t really treating Him as your Lord.

Verses 27-36. Very hard verses to apply. But, if Jesus is your Lord, which involves building your life on Him and His teachings, then you can apply them.

Application:

This is one of those sermons where all or most of us are going to be convicted. I am too. I’m not above blaming my circumstances for my house falling. Verse 46 is one of the hardest hitting verses in the Bible for me too.

But though it is convicting, it also extends out toward us hope and relief. There is no sin you currently struggle with that Jesus can’t help you with. If you have spent years struggling with a sin and failing, hallelujah! You now know the problem and you now know the solution. And what a relief that is. Problems are at their worst when you don’t know the cause and have no idea how to fix them. That is the worst kind of problem.

But the answer to our unfaithful hearts is clear: adopt Jesus as your Lord and build your life on Him and His teachings. Don’t beat yourself up any more about your sin. It doesn’t help. Absolutely don’t blame other people for your sin. That doesn’t fix it either. Stop reading self-help books all day. It’s not the answer. Your psychologist is wrong. It doesn’t matter how many doctorates they have, your parent’s didn’t make you sin and you know it.

Strengthen your relationship and your allegiance to Jesus. Fall in love with His truth. Love what He loves. Look longingly and expectantly toward His coming. Spend extra time in His Word and pray with Him. Think about His love for you. Think about how perfect He is. Think about how there is no one or nothing more worthy to be your Lord than Jesus. Pursue this path vigorously and radically, whatever it takes. Pledge yourself to Him in fealty and service. And at last, you will find relief.

Out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks. Fill your heart with Jesus.

Announce Baptismal Meeting after Service