‘By their fruit you will know…’ what?
How exercise we make our minds upward about complex ethical issues? How can we decide between people we respect—Christians leaders, friends even—who offer conflicting advice about what the right decision is, what God's volition is in a difficult or challenging situation?
An always more common entreatment is made to Jesus' maxim in Matt seven.16:
Past their fruit you will know them.
At its worst, this saying is used to closed down whatsoever discussion of the issue at paw, and functions as a kind of shorthand for 'If they are overnice people, we ought to believe what they say.' After all, if someone is kind, considerate and sounds pleasant—and that is how God wants u.s.a. to exist—how can they exist misleading united states over a decision about Christian life? It doesn't take much thought to see the problem with this.
There are plenty of verses in Scripture alarm us of those who offer 'shine words'; merely cheque out Ps 55.21, Is 30.ten, Dan eleven.32 or Rom 16.18. And in a passage which is well-known in some circles, Paul warns Timothy, as he passes on to him the baton of leadership, that 'the fourth dimension will come up when people will non put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear' (2 Tim 4.3). We simply have to glance at the prophetic tradition to see that, very frequently, God chosen his servants to say some difficult things to his people that they really did not desire to hear. Most of them would not accept passed the 'fruit' test in the mode it is usually used today!
And nevertheless that is only half the story. There are but as many times when the NT implores us to exist gentle with our words and winsome with our speech, avoiding causing unnecessary offence fifty-fifty if nosotros are expressing some hard truths. 'Let your conversation be e'er full of grace, seasoned with salt', says Paul (Col 4.half dozen). 'Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have,' says Peter (1 Peter three.15)—but with a proviso: 'exercise this with gentleness and respect.' And it is equally articulate that Christians oftentimes manifestly fail to do this. I wince inwardly when I remember the times that I acted equally though it was more than of import to win the statement than win the person.
So how does the fashion of our spoken communication relate to the value of our statement? And what did Jesus mean by the saying nigh 'fruit'? There is one matter we can be sure he did non mean: that his teaching would exist uncontroversial and like shooting fish in a barrel to take. 'I take not come to bring peace, merely a sword' he claims (Matt ten.34), to ready people against each other, fifty-fifty within their own family. And, ironically, this saying comes in the context of Jesus sending his disciples out on a mission to proclaim the 'peace' of the kingdom of God (Matt ten.13).
When nosotros read Jesus talking about 'fruit', almost of us read into this Paul's idea of the 'fruit of the Spirit' from Gal 5, that is, personal qualities formed in us past the Spirit. Merely the linguistic communication of 'fruit' in Matthew'southward gospel has a different emphasis. When John the Baptist calls for 'fruit worthy of repentance' (Matt three.seven), he isn't thinking near inner qualities so much as visible actions of obedience to God'due south commands (Luke gives some examples in the parallel passage Luke 3.seven–fourteen). Both John and Jesus link the lack of such 'fruit' to God's coming sentence—John is his teaching, and Jesus in the enacted parable of the withered fig tree (Matt 21.18–xix). In doing this, they are both linking the idea to the OT prophetic tradition, calling for the people to return to obedience to God. Deuteronomy offers two tests of the prophetic; the best known is the exam in Deut 18.22, that if what the prophet has said 'does not come up to pass' then the word is non true. But Deut 13.ane–vi gives a more important examination; even if the prophet'south words do come up truthful, they are to be rejected if they lead the people away from God. Jer 23 applies this to the prophets' own lives; if they don't demonstrate obedience to God themselves, don't listen to their pedagogy.
This doesn't completely solve our dilemma when presented with conflicting views on what is right. But it does help us when looking for 'fruit'; it is equally much about conforming to the teaching of Scripture as it is about character. We cannot split up the 2, and shouldn't utilize the latter to justify compromise on the former.
This article first appeared on Christian Today on 11th May
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