LifeWay Explore the Bible Series for April 1: Christianity 102: Live to benefit others

This week, I want to look at a few verses the Sunday school lesson actually skips over. Jesus’ words in Luke 6:43-45 can teach us a lot about the relationship between our mouths and our hearts, between our words and thoughts. If you’re anything like me, your words can get you in trouble faster than just about anything else.

In Luke 6:43, Jesus talks about fruit trees: “No good tree bears bad fruit, nor does a bad tree bear good fruit.” I’m no expert on fruit trees, but I do have some citrus trees in my yard—orange and lemon trees and cumquat bushes.

Those orange trees are incredible. They bloom and smell so sweet. Then tiny green bulbs form at the ends of the branches. And finally, months later, I have hundreds and hundreds of the sweetest oranges to enjoy. But you know I’ve never gotten a single lemon?

Jesus didn’t turn to the topic of fruit trees from nowhere. Verse 43 is connected to the verses proceeding it by the Greek conjunction gar, which means “for, since or because.” Jesus warns against hypocrisy and commands the removal of the plank from our own eyes before we point out the specks in others (v. 42) because of the truth of the fruit trees.

Just looking at the trees in my yard this afternoon, you’d have know way of knowing some are great fruit trees and others are terrible. I only know that some are good and others are bad by the fruit they produce. In the same way, people will only know my character by the fruit of my life. Before I can correct another person, I need to inspect my own fruit.

Jesus continues: “Each tree is recognized by its own fruit. People do not pick figs from thorn bushes or grape from briers” (v. 44). Jesus reinforces the point of the previous verse. My orange trees never have made a banana, and they won’t. Bananas don’t grow on orange trees.

Remember that Jesus’ point here is not that we should constantly worry about other people’s fruit, but we should be undergoing continual self-examination (v. 42). He brings home the message in verse 45: “The good man brings good things out of the good stored up in his heart, and the evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in his heart. For out of the overflow of his heart, his mouth speaks.”

Nothing gives me away like my words. I’m usually pretty good at keeping my mouth shut in committee meetings, at pastors’ fellowships and the large gatherings that include my more extended and eccentric family. But those times when I’m with my close family and friends, the ones who know me a little more and who I feel more comfortable around, I can say some things that are just plain mean.

The truth is, those mean words are merely reflections of a mean heart. My heart is the same whether I express those thoughts or not.

I remember hearing a preacher tell the story of attending a family reunion as a child. As afternoon turned into evening, one of his uncles, who had been helping himself to adult beverages all day, made some very inappropriate comments. The mother heard what he said, gathered her children and took them to the car to leave. When they got in the car, she told them, “Alcohol never made a man say anything that wasn’t already in his heart.” True.

In these verses, Jesus teaches us a way to discover whether or not there is a plank in our own eyes (vv. 41-42). The Bible tells us our hearts are deceptive, a mystery even to ourselves. Yet while we cannot directly know our own hearts, we can know the fruit that comes from the heart’s overflow.

So take the test. Consider your speech. What do you say about others, especially to the people who you’re most comfortable around? How do you respond when you’re plans are disrupted, when you don’t get your way, when you feel slighted or ignored?

In this modern technical age, we have some additional types of “speech” we should consider. What kinds of emails do you send? Do send any messages in chat rooms? What do you post on virtual bulletin boards and forums?

Many people ask me what I think about social networking sites like Facebook. Some are convinced Facebook is terrible, evil, no good. But technology is neither good or bad. It merely is a platform for us to see the state of our own hearts.

I’ve seen Facebook used for great purposes—sharing the gospel, bringing awareness to humanitarian crises and raising funds for missionaries. And I’ve seen it used for sinful purposes as well—the spread of pornography, slander of other people and promotion of worldly values. What’s on your Facebook wall? The answer reveals something truth about your heart.

No oranges come from banana trees. Pecans don’t fall from cedar trees. And godly fruit doesn’t come from a sinful heart.

Apart from God’s grace, the best we can hope for is to just hide our character, not bear any fruit that would reveal the inner self. But by the power of the gospel, applied by the Holy Spirit, God changes our hearts.

He promised he would: “I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh” (Ezekiel 36:26).