Following Is Becoming

Luke 6:43–49
Sunday, July 1, 2018
Pastor Randy Smith

I spoke with Pastor Barry this week and he informed me that our church “Food Pantry” has distributed approximately 60,000 pounds of food to needy people since the beginning of the year. We are thankful for the many who faithfully serve in that ministry and for so many of you that contribute by bringing in the “Item of the Week.” The Pantry exists to share salvation in Christ through our words and show Christ through acts of compassion.

Yet could you imagine with me the following scenario? Let’s go back a few years when the Food Pantry was only an idea. Let’s say we recruited the volunteers, constructed the display racks, received the refrigeration equipment and put out ads in the local newspaper. Yet when the shoppers arrived, they were surprised to not find any food on the shelves. Imagine a food pantry without any food! To everyone it would be rather frustrating. To us it would be rather embarrassing.

Our Lord asks a related question in verse 46 of Luke 6. “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ and do not do what I say?”

Many people call Jesus the “Lord” and even claim Him as their Lord, but what they fail to realize is exactly what the title “Lord” means. Literally it means “Master.” It implies ownership. It implies obedience. To call Jesus “Lord” and not do what He says is as ridiculous as having a food pantry, but providing no food.

My friends, there is no salvation in receiving a partial Jesus. He is Savior and Lord. We get the Savior part, but do we truly understand and apply the Lord part? We want Jesus to save us from hell, but do we really want Him to be the boss over every decision we make? Yet if He is not your Lord, He is not your Savior. Jesus commands radical grace-driven obedience to His lordship. Lip service does not suffice. As James says, it’s being “a doer…of the Word” (Jas. 1:23). This is such an important issue; Jesus saved this as His final topic in this epic sermon of His.

So before we break for the Lord’s Table, we’ll first see who we become if He is our Lord and then second, the blessings of following Him as our Lord.

Who You Become (verses 43–45)

The first point, “Who You Become.”

One way to know you are truly saved and following Jesus as Lord is that He will produce observable spiritual fruit in your life. As I have said before, countless people who call themselves Christians, possibly even ones who respond to an altar call and faithfully attend church, will have a tragic surprise waiting for them on Judgment Day. Listen to the chilling words from our Savior from Matthew that parallels our passage this morning from Luke.

“Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father who is in heaven will enter. Many will say to Me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles?’ And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; DEPART FROM ME, YOU WHO PRACTICE LAWLESSNESS’” (Mt. 7:21-23).

Is there legitimate spiritual fruit in your life? You see, when Jesus truly dwells in your life through the Holy Spirit and you take seriously His instruction in the Bible, abide in Him, fully submitting to Him as Lord, there will be evidence. You will be on the road to progressive transformation. Your character will be changed. You will become more and more like Christ. You will have observable spiritual fruit.

That takes us to verse 43. “For there is no good tree which produces bad fruit, nor, on the other hand, a bad tree which produces good fruit.”

Fairly straight-forward. Just last Sunday my wife and I cut down several trees growing in our yard. Why? Because the trees were worthless. They are not attractive, nor do they produce edible fruit. However, several other trees we trimmed that they might do even better.

Our Lord’s point, verse 44, “For each tree is known by its own fruit.” The quality of a tree, especially in a culture where your fruit trees sustained your life, was determined by the fruit it produced. If trees could talk it wouldn’t matter what they called themselves. The proof is in the results. You produce good fruit; you are then permitted to call yourself a good tree. You produce worthless or no fruit; you are not permitted to call yourself a good tree.

As one author said, “Empirical evidence makes it possible to give a very accurate analysis of what kind of tree it is and its condition” (Hughes, Luke, p. 241).

You see the parallel? People can run around all they want calling themselves a Christian, but if the spiritual fruit is not there they have absolutely no claim to the title. If you are truly a Christian, you will truly submit to Jesus as Lord. And if you submit to Jesus as Lord there will be evidence of Him in your life. And it is grace that enables true Christians to give evidence of the reality of their salvation by producing good fruit. That’s how they can know they are a “good tree.”

Yes, we are saved by faith alone entirely through the work of Jesus alone, but if we are truly saved there will be evidence of God working in our lives. For as it is in any orchard, the physical fruit of a tree reflects the skill of one’s grower and the spiritual fruit of a Christian reveals the skill of one’s Lord.

Verse 45, “The good man out of the good treasure of his heart brings forth what is good; and the evil man out of the evil treasure brings forth what is evil.” Stop right there. Our Lord just keeps hammering home this simple point, but let’s break it down again.

Jesus references a “good man.” Who is a good man? As Jesus said to the rich young ruler, “Why do you call Me good? No one is good except God alone” (Lk. 18:19). I read this week in my morning devotional from Ecclesiastes 7:20. “Indeed, there is not a righteous man on earth who continually does good and who never sins.” There is only one “good man” and that is God.

Yet when God truly takes over a person’s heart, He makes the person progressively more like Him. He makes that person good. According to Galatians 5, “goodness” is one of the fruits of the Spirit. Salvation results in transformation, transformation from a “bad person” to a “good person.” Salvation is taking on and increasing in displaying the character of God. Or as verse 45 says, this treasure in our hearts (Christ Himself) will result in bringing forth what is good.

To put it the other way, it’s is illogical to say I have a new heart with Christ indwelling me and then act as a bad person, a child of the devil. Again it comes back to observable evidence that Jesus and I have a relationship. There will be fruits of that relationship for all to see. We act more like Him. Yes, we still sin, but we grieved when we do so and desire to repent.

Now no one can see our hearts, including ourselves, but what they and we can see is a changed disposition. Specifically, all people have a window into our hearts by what comes out of our hearts through our mouths. One of the best revealers of a new heart will be our words.

The end of verse 45, “For his mouth speaks from that which fills his heart.”

Our external words are the most direct window to our internal heart. They are such a good revealer of a person’s relationship with the Lord, James could say, “If anyone thinks himself to be religious, and yet does not bridle his tongue but deceives his own heart, this man’s religion is worthless” (Jas. 1:26; cf. 3:2-12).

The change from bad tree to good tree. Foul language to wholesome speech. Complaining to trusting the Lord. Criticism to edifying remarks. Gossip to prayer. Deception to speaking truth. Angry words to kind words. Trivial blabbering to meaningful speech. Worldly philosophy to biblical truth. Praising self to praising God. You get the point. Words that resemble the heart changed by the Holy Spirit. Words that are thus loving, joyful, peaceful, patient, kind, good, faithful, gentle and self-controlled.

What You Receive (verses 47-49)

Let’s move to the second point which I am calling, “What You Receive.”

We just heard that God calls for and expects radical obedience to Christ. At this point we need to make sure we rightly understand the blessing of submitting to Jesus as Lord. Though the world and the devil and even our flesh tempt us to resist the thought of obeying Jesus, following His instruction is truly in our best interest. My friends, ignoring the words of God is like an immature and ignorant child that thinks she’ll be happier by ignoring the loving instructions of a wise parent.

Slavery to Christ is true freedom. Pursuing holiness is true joy. Knowing Jesus is the true meaning of life. Hurtful consequences result when we choose sin. Blessings result when we choose Christ.

Again, from the book of James, “But one who looks intently at the perfect law, the law of liberty, and abides by it, not having become a forgetful hearer but an effectual doer, this man will be blessed in what he does” (Jas. 1:25).

The final three verses of our Lord’s sermon make this clear. Beginning in verse 47, “Everyone who comes to Me and hears My words and acts on them, I will show you whom he is like.” Did you hear that? This is addressed to the one that not only hears His words, but also acts on them. In other words, verse 46 – the previous verse – he calls Jesus Lord and does what He says.

What is he like? Verse 48, “He is like a man building a house, who dug deep and laid a foundation on the rock; and when a flood occurred, the torrent burst against that house and could not shake it, because it had been well built.”

Jesus is saying that acting upon His word gives evidence that one has built his life’s foundation on Him. And when the storms of life come – and they will – such a person (and family) will not be swept away. The storms of life could mean the trials we face on a daily basis or most likely what Jesus has in mind the eternal judgment that every person will undergo. We could say without Christ and obedience to His word we are a cardboard shack on the beach trying to withstand a Cat 5 hurricane both in this life and in the life to come. It comes down to foundation. On whom or what is your life’s foundation built?

The present tense of these participles suggests an ongoing attitude for His disciples. In other words, if Jesus is our Lord, we are always coming and we are always hearing and we are always obeying. This is discipleship. This is security.

Verse 49, “But the one who has heard and has not acted accordingly, is like a man who built a house on the ground without any foundation; and the torrent burst against it and immediately it collapsed, and the ruin of that house was great.”

There are only two types of people in the world. Those who build their foundation on obeying Christ and those, regardless of their profession, build their foundation on something or someone else.

To boil this sermon down and by way of summary I’ll make it as simple as possible. What does it mean to be a Christian? We acknowledge that God is holy and that we are sinners. We come to God by faith, expressing full confidence in the work of Jesus Christ on the cross to remove our sins. We embrace Jesus as Savior and Lord. God gives us a new heart and dwells within us. We read and hear the Bible and do what the Lord commands of us. God makes us more like Himself by producing spiritual fruit in our life, fruit that gives evidence we are truly His. We are assured of our salvation and stand firm in Him during trials in this life and rest entirely in His grace to be saved from the wrath to come.