Life from a Dead Tree

Rev. Matt Idom filled the pulpit this past Sunday, preaching from Luke 6:43-45. Read the passage now. If you don't have a Bible within reach, click the Scripture reference to read on line.

Being the Superintendent at Lakeview, he told us stories of trees growing on the campgrounds and used them as pictures of people's lives, just like Jesus did in this teaching.

Rev. Idom reminded us we all have potential to produce good fruit. And in Christ, this is completely true. But apart from Him, we have no good thing.

I said to the Lord, "You are my Lord;

apart from you I have no good thing."

Psalm 16:2 NIV84

And sometimes I think we forget, we have nothing good to offer, no potential for good fruit or works apart from Jesus.

Isaiah tells us: All of us have become like one who is unclean,and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags... (64:6)

Jesus Himself says no one is good --- except God alone (Luke 18:19).

Only in Christ, through His death and resurrection, do we have the potential to bear good fruit. 

"A good tree can't produce bad fruit,

and a bad tree can't produce good fruit. ..."

Luke 6:43 NLT

Jesus, being God, could only bear good fruit. And as Rev. Idom told us on Sunday, He brought forth His best work from a dead tree.

He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree,

that we might die to sin and live to righteousness.

By his wounds you have been healed.

1 Peter 2:24 ESV

No one but God can bring life from a dead tree. 

Each one of us enter this world spiritually dead, sinners conceived by sinners, all the way back to Adam and Eve's offspring.

We are dead in our trespass and sin... dead trees...

The Life God brings forth from the dead tree, He offers to you and me.

On receiving life in Christ by faith, we receive life in the Spirit. Then, moment by moment, we have the choice to walk in that life, and there we find the potential to bring Life to others and bear good fruit.

Father God,only in Your Son, Christ Jesus, 

do I have the potential and power to bear good fruit. 

Help me to walk in step with the Holy Spirit 

and not according to my own desires and understanding. 

I want to bear good fruit for You and Your kingdom.

"...The Spirit gives life; the flesh counts for nothing.

The words I have spoken to you are spirit and they are life. ..."

---Jesus

John 6:63 NIV84