Barometers of Faith ...

How great is your imagination?  What kind of pressure does reality put on it?  The two-year-old set is unburdened with the day-to-day pressures of survival / life / death; social loneliness; concerns about their health; and for most, whether they are loved.  They simply do not live under that kind of stress or strain.  Most are able to completely trust that whatever issues may exist out there in the world, mom and dad will handle them.  Thus the toddler is fully capable of enjoying life, all the while, just knowing mom and dad have a handle on the rest of it.  This is so true, that toddlers do not even “think” this way.  They just live in it.  It takes the perspective of an adult, to understand what “reality” is like in the world that surrounds your given toddler child.  It is only the adult that has the wisdom and perspective to really understand what is going on, and what “could” happen.  Most of the admonitions we hand out then to our children are designed to be preventative, to keep the bad stuff from entering their reality.  When the accidents do occur, we are there to demonstrate a love to them, that will comfort in spite of the boo boo that life has somehow introduced.  A model of family, a picture we should be extending in our thoughts and faith towards our God.

But what is the net effect of nearly zero stress, and absolute trust; a mind free to imagine nearly anything.  Toddlers will gladly draw you a picture of nearly anything that enters their own thoughts or ideas.  Objects in the pictures very rarely resemble what they “are” – instead they represent how a child sees that object – and accounts for the lack of Michelangelo prodigies.  They are proud to have their “work of art” displayed on the refrigerator with magnets sold for this purpose.  They take joy in having mom and dad make a great deal production when the art is submitted for its gallery spot on the fridge.  They also take note when mom and dad share the work with grandparents, and highly tolerant friends, who seem to be in on the idea of making a big production of how great it is when the artist is nearby.  While Picasso might be hard pressed to identify any of the objects in the art-work, in the mind of the child, they are as clear as day.  Imagination, can nearly completely take over the point of view of the artist, allowing them to see renaissance paintings, where others only see crayons on construction paper.  It is only age, and the stress it brings, that can cause the artist to lose the memory, of what he/she was trying to convey.  While still young, and unencumbered, the masterpiece is easy to decipher.

Imagination is not just limited to expression, it is boundless in ideas.  Children “invent” new animals, generally by combining characteristics they enjoy from the ones they are familiar with, and coming up with something entirely new.  Who says you cannot put wings on a frog?  Or give him a nice long furry tail.  I don’t hear the frog complaining.  And if you listened closer you might hear the frog tell you what to do next.  The kids hear it.  They hear stuffed animals talk as plain as mom and dad.  They assign life like characteristics to many an inanimate object, and then expect you to join in on the journey of imagination.  When adults refuse, play comes to an abrupt halt.  A piece of plastic molded into the shape of a doll is a lifeless rock, without any imagination to bring it to life.  A $20 waste of money, if you cannot play with your child, in the way your child wants to play.  The fact that the box it came in, cannot be thrown away, as it is serving as a doll castle, is yet another testament to the idea that children can play with trash as quick as they can play with treasure, and find them both equally appealing under the same imagination.

So we understand our kids can make stuff up, and believe it is real.  It is a function of their age, but deeper than that, it is a function of a mind free from the burdens of reality.  Now lets talk about you and I.  Is it possible for you to ditch that adult perspective for a moment, and embrace the boundless creativity of the mind of a child – then take it a step further.  Let your adult mind, truly believe it is possible to make it real.  This is a trick nearly no adult has mastered.  We just do not believe it is possible.  Reality and history argue with that idea quite successfully.  But they are wrong.  Case in point; Matthew recalls in his gospel picking up in chapter 21, an unusual story of things that just do not happen “normally”, but “did” anyway.  This story is not just your typical Jesus miracle.  It begins with a hungry man, or more accurately with Jesus being hungry.

Picking up in verse 18 the story begins by saying … “Now in the morning as he returned into the city, he hungered.”  To set the context, this verse refers to Jesus, who is returning to Jerusalem near the time of His pending betrayal, and right after His triumphant ride into the city.  It is the next day.  Jesus has spent the night, likely at the home of Lazarus in Bethany.  Why Mary and Martha did not prepare Him a breakfast banquet we don’t know – maybe they did.  But nonetheless, Jesus got hungry again.  Now keeping in mind, that Jesus did a 40 day fast in the wilderness to start His ministry, the idea that He got that hungry after breakfast, or since dinner the night before seems hardly noticeable.  More likely, Jesus told the disciples about His hunger, because He had a lesson to teach them, and us.

Continuing in verse 19 it says … “And when he saw a fig tree in the way, he came to it, and found nothing thereon, but leaves only, and said unto it, Let no fruit grow on thee henceforward for ever. And presently the fig tree withered away.”  OK that qualifies as the weirdest scripture in the book in my opinion.  First of all, Jesus is the creator of ALL life.  If He found a barren tree, He could have just as easily made it fruitful.  That is kind of His thing.  He takes our barrenness and makes us produce worthy fruit as we submit ourselves to Him.  But that is not what happened.  Instead He sees a tree in the distance that looks like it should have lots of good fruit, likely hidden in the bountiful leaves.  But when He gets there, it has only leaves.  A whole lot of camouflage, nothing good to eat.  So instead of a lesson in self-sacrifice, Jesus curses this tree and says in effect, you are not going to fool anyone else, from now on and forever more going forward, no fruit will ever grow on you.  The net effect to the tree, is that is withers up and dies right in front of all the disciples, like if you have a time-lapsed view of a plant dying.  But instead of days or weeks, this entire tree dries up to nothing and falls away within minutes of what He says.

The disciples are freaked out.  Matthew writes in verse 20 saying … “And when the disciples saw it, they marvelled, saying, How soon is the fig tree withered away!”  Nobody had ever seen a tree wither up and die in minutes instead of months.  No famine.  No chainsaw.  Just one negative pronouncement from the Creator and this tree is history.  Object lesson #1 – you don’t ever want to find yourself on the wrong side of a negative pronouncement of Christ.  Like say … when you have forgotten to visit those who are sick, or in prison.  Or perhaps when you were too worried about safety or inconvenience to invite home a person with no place to live or stay.  Or perhaps when you thought donations could substitute for actually loving someone else.  That kind of thing.  Also coming a time when the pronouncement let he who is unholy be unholy still – that one is particularly ugly.  Makes you think for a minute huh?

Object lesson #2 – destruction is as real as salvation, and as permanent.  Jesus speaks this way to a tree, not a human, because for us there is still hope while we draw breath.  There is a chance we may still submit ourselves to Jesus and find that He recreates who we are from the inside out.  If Jesus had done this to a human, even say Judas, the same level of destruction would have ensued.  The person would likely have died.  So instead, Jesus speaks this way to a tree, to an object of life without a soul.  But the demonstration is breath taking.  And it can illustrate the permanence of destruction, as easily as His miracles of restoration to us, illustrate the permanence of salvation.  It is we alone who can tear ourselves away from the love of Christ, by our choice to do so, and our ultimate rejection of Him.  But even though we may choose to focus on these kinds of object lessons from what took place, they were still not the point Jesus was trying to make.

Fear, was not the object lesson Jesus had in mind.  The story continues in verse 21 saying … “Jesus answered and said unto them, Verily I say unto you, If ye have faith, and doubt not, ye shall not only do this which is done to the fig tree, but also if ye shall say unto this mountain, Be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea; it shall be done. [verse 22] And all things, whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive.”  Ahh, here is what Jesus was trying to convey.  The impossible is “not” really impossible.  So I ask again, how great is your imagination, how much pressure has reality inflicted upon it?  Trees do not just wither up and die in an instant.  But on the scale of things, that is pretty small next to the idea of speaking to a mountain and telling it, you have a better location for it, out in the sea somewhere.  In our age we would have to enormously careful with that one, as nearly the whole planet has people on it given the explosion of our population across the earth.  But that is not the point.  Reality is not the point.  Faith that truly believes IS the point.  Toddlers have it right.  We are the ones all messed up in our thinking.

We speak to God like we are trying to make Him aware of our problems, you know, just in case He might, maybe, want to do something about them.  We are ALL sure He “can” do something about them.  We are completely UNSURE if He “will” do something about them.  That is not faith that truly believes, that is barely faith at all.  I see a whole lot of leaves, and very little fruit.  No limits; was the message of Jesus.  Do not pray with the idea that there is a limit to how big a thing you can ask, how impossible it looks to you, how ridiculous it sounds to everyone else – be a toddler – show that crappy picture to Jesus anyway cause only He understands the weird shapes and crayons of your life to begin with.  He will take your ridiculous prayer picture and hang it on His refrigerator and hold a parade in heaven so everyone else can come see it.  He longs for us to trust Him just that much.  To be able to bring Him anything, and like a toddler does with earthly mom and dad, just to KNOW, that whatever it is, our heavenly Father has it handled for us.  We need do nothing.  We need not worry about anything.  He has it.  Only He really understands it, we just do not have the perspective.  We are toddlers, He is the only adult in the room.

So what can you imagine?  And before you start thinking like an adult with an imagination – gee, could I be rich, and perfectly healthy, and in need of “nothing”.  Scratch that and think like a toddler who does not worry about those things – now exercise your imagination – and what do you come up with.  Giving a frog wings, and a long furry tail, does not seem like something to waste our prayer energy on.  But if we actually believed He would do it – there would be a new species of frog discovered this afternoon that would baffle scientists for years to come.  (though they may believe “they” discovered a missing link in their silly theories of evolution, so perhaps that is a bad example).  The point is not to focus on the limitations, but to live and pray as if there are none.  Because there are none.  Becoming like a little child so you can enter the kingdom of heaven, looks a lot like this. 

We should not just pray for something, cause maybe, if the winds are right, and if we have done enough to “deserve” the answer we want, we may get it.  We should pray for what we truly need, knowing He answers our prayers every time, even when they sound crazy.  We should perhaps start praying in earnest not for what we need, but for what others need.  Remember toddlers already KNOW their parents will meet whatever needs they have.  This would free up Jesus to pour out His love on others, even when they refuse to ask for it themselves, or even recognize He is our God, the only God.  People who do not know Jesus this way are unlikely to ever pray to Him for what they need.  Why not do it ourselves on their behalf.  We may pray someone else to salvation doing this and never even know it.  When Satan yells at Jesus for trying to influence the life of someone who is not asking for it, Jesus can respond that He is simply answering the prayers of someone else who asked Him for that very interference in the life of someone who needs Him.  This kind of prayer frees up and unleashes the power of our God.

If you are too timid to start moving mountains around.  If you are too scared to ask for the cure to cancer.  Then start small, ask for the salvation of Jesus in your own life, and in the life of someone who you know needs Him.  Then sit back and watch what happens.  If you need to pray again because you are not sure if it worked, pray again.  Do what it takes to build trust in your prayers and certainty in the God who really is your Dad.  Before you know it, you will start making crazy prayer paintings that only those in heaven can understand.  You will come to KNOW you are heard.  YOU are HEARD.  And Jesus moves mountains for you anytime you need it.  That is the thought that should scare you.  Unleashing the power of your God should make you a little nervous.  Because His power is truly unlimited.  Not the idea that His power is never poured out on your behalf.  That is a lie Satan tells.  And you need to ditch it, in favor of understanding how powerful your Dad is, what He is longing to do for you.  Know it.  Don’t just have faith, Know it.  And the word impossible will lose all meaning to you.  And winged tailed frogs will appear on mountains on their way to the sea, or perhaps something more meaningful in the topic of salvation, will become evident between you and God.

 

The Death of Figs ...

Does anyone know what death is?  Can anyone truly tell you what it means to experience death?  Jesus said He was the Way, the Truth, and the Life.  While perhaps I cannot tell you what death is, I can certainly tell you, you will know more about it, the farther you are from the source of Life, the farther you are from Jesus.  In fact, this is my definition of hell, to be living, but to be far from Jesus.  Those who would say that Satan is in hell may have a point.  You don’t need perpetual fire to have hell, you only need to be alive, but as far from Jesus as you can choose to be.  It only makes logical sense.  Jesus is the source of Love, the source of Life.  The farther we get from Him, the farther we are from the source of those two things.  It is not a beating heart, and normal brain waves, that constitute life.  It is experiencing what it means to truly live in Jesus.

But despite this truth, there are many who think Jesus is optional.  Some consider Him a last resort.  The idea goes something like this.  You live your life, “your way”, then when all the “fun” is over, and you are old ready to die, you go ahead and find Jesus just in case.  The flaw in the logic of course, is that this premise believes sin is fun, and obedience is boring (if not impossible).  When the truth is just the opposite.  Imagine any sin, then consider the consequences.  No, not just the going to hell thing, instead how about the being in hell thing.  No matter which sin you consider, what might seem like fun to you, inevitably hurts someone else.  Most of the time, it hurts the people you claim to love most.  Sin is built on the idea of “you loving you” most often, at the expense of someone else.  Sin therefore does have a cause and effect.  We commit it, thinking we risk a punishment from God.  When in reality, we commit it, and find it is we who are punishing ourselves, and everyone who loves us, and everyone we love.  It is behavior that ultimately only hurts us.  Like cutting ourselves with a knife, over and over again.

But how do you illustrate something like this?  How do you get people who are stubborn in their beliefs to see what the ultimate cause and effect of sin really is?  How about a test case?  How about making a physical illustration of what the choice to leave Jesus could really do in the here and now.  Perhaps this was the motive that lies behind the murder of figs, or more accurately the suicide of figs.  Peter recalls the object lesson to John Mark in his gospel in chapter eleven picking up in verse 12 saying … “And on the morrow, when they were come from Bethany, he was hungry: [verse 13] And seeing a fig tree afar off having leaves, he came, if haply he might find any thing thereon: and when he came to it, he found nothing but leaves; for the time of figs was not yet. [verse 14] And Jesus answered and said unto it, No man eat fruit of thee hereafter for ever. And his disciples heard it.”

The story begins with a need.  Jesus was hungry.  It is a hunger in all of us, that drives us to look for something more, for something better.  When our lives are not what they could be, when despite our best efforts tragedy takes hold, when everything is great, but not great enough:  it is a hunger that drives us to look, to seek for something to fill this need.  The story is not about Jesus being hungry, this is the same Jesus that spent 40 days in the wilderness without food.  The story is about hunger itself, a need, a longing for something more.  Jesus begins His search and finds a fig tree.  But it is not the season for figs.  It is the time for leaves, not for fruit.  This is the nature of all of us who live apart from Jesus, we are full of leaves, but not fruit.  We offer a pleasing appearance.  From a distance it may look like we can meet the needs of the seeking, but on close inspection, we are full of leaves, and nothing else.

It is impossible to grow fruit, in or out of season, if not connected to Jesus Christ.  For He is the source of Life and Love.  We do originate these things, we reflect them.  There was nothing special about this tree.  It was an ordinary tree doing ordinary things, living an ordinary life.  The point was in the illustration, that this tree could be any one of us.  We too are ordinary, living ordinary lives, and when disconnected from Christ, producing an illusion of beauty, but unable to meet anyone else’s real needs.  After all, the leaves of the tree are intended to nourish the tree alone, not to feed others.  Bugs may steal them, but if left alone and unmolested, the leaves do nothing but sustain the tree.  They make the tree appear appealing, but that is all.  When not connected to Christ, we cannot obey.  We can perform actions that look like obedience, but our motives, and our hearts remain unchanged.

What happens next to this tree is something that Jesus does not say to us, hence the use of a tree to illustrate his point.  Jesus curses the fig tree and proclaims that from that day forward, no man will ever eat fruit from the tree ever again.  This is the same thing we say to Jesus, when we treat the freedom He offers as if we can delay getting it for some other day.  Where it comes to humanity, Jesus is always hoping we will accept His gift.  But some of us don’t.  We make another choice.  But before you know it, our choice becomes the last one we ever make.  Before you know it, we come to a point where we do not want to choose Christ, and our choice is permanent.  The deception of the enemy of souls takes hold in our eyes, and we delay and delay, until we die before we plan to.  At our death, our lives and our choices become unalterable.  There is a permanence to rejection.  Jesus needed to show us this.  So He rejects this tree Himself, to show us what would happen next.

There is an interlude that occurs in scripture we will focus on in our next study.  For now, we will skip down to the results of this incident in Mark, picking up in verse 20 saying … “And in the morning, as they passed by, they saw the fig tree dried up from the roots.”  The result of permanent separation from the source of Life and Love is death.  The same tree who only one day earlier was full of leaves that nourish the tree, looking for all intents and purposes as if it were a healthy tree, is now dead from the roots up.  Normally it would take years for this to occur, and only under punishing circumstances.  But a lack of hope, when there is no more chance to be connected to Christ, can produce this result far faster.  The cursed tree is fully dead.  It is not just colored leaves falling, or a branch that has decayed.  It is a full on death from bottom to top, nothing left of it.  It is only useful for firewood now.  What is left can be burned up and consumed, and it will be gone forever.

How like us.  Peter recalls pointing this out to Jesus in verse 21 saying … “And Peter calling to remembrance saith unto him, Master, behold, the fig tree which thou cursedst is withered away.”  This stark object lesson has caught the eye of Peter.  It is a miracle in itself, but not a good one.  It may be the only miracle with a dark outcome in all of scripture.  Especially a miracle, that was performed by Christ, that resulted in a death of something that looked alive.  All the other miracles Jesus performed were happy-stories.  All the other miracles ended in someone being brought back to life, being restored to life.  This one ends in death, death from a curse.  Jesus had used a fig tree to symbolize what life disconnected from Himself was really like.  This was truth.  It was unpleasant truth, but truth.

This tree was living its own life.  We, like the tree in this vignette, might consider we have all the time in the world, and the complete freedom to live as we choose.  This is only partially correct.  We have the time of today, but to choose to live away from Jesus carries with it consequences.  The punishments do not come from Christ, they come from us.  But the effects are real, eventually the death is real.  And it does not have to be this way.  Christ used a fig tree because He does not curse humans.  Even Judas could have been redeemed, Peter was.  Jesus even interceded with His Father for the Romans and Pharisees that were putting Him to death.  No human would ever be beyond the love of God.  So Jesus used a tree to show us what happens when we put ourselves in that place.  This is what happens when we refuse the love of God, and cling to our own wisdom and common sense.

But the object lesson was not over.  Jesus responds in verse 22 to this sight saying … “And Jesus answering saith unto them, Have faith in God.”  The response of Christ to this tragedy is not to focus on the suicide of figs, but to look upwards instead and to have faith in God.  What is impossible in us, is child’s play in our God.  The fig tree was not in season, not expected to bear fruit, but God can do the unexpected in us.  He can save us from loving only ourselves, and reflect a great harvest of fruit through us, no matter the time of our lives.  Then Jesus takes the object lesson up to an entirely new dimension, He expands our thinking way out of the box as He continues in verse 23 saying … “For verily I say unto you, That whosoever shall say unto this mountain, Be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea; and shall not doubt in his heart, but shall believe that those things which he saith shall come to pass; he shall have whatsoever he saith.”

We are no longer talking about a single tree folks, we have moved up to an entire mountain that may have many trees on it.  Those mountains that stand in our way, be they physical (that’s right real physical mountains), or be they spiritual (that’s right sin’s the size of Everest that we have never been able to beat) can be moved into the sea, just through a single prayer to God to make it so.  Jesus asks us to have faith in God, we are not trusting to our own power, wisdom, or common sense.  Common sense says history will repeat itself.  If we have been beaten before, we will be beaten again.  But faith says, forget your history, focus on Christ, and let Him write you a new history.  Let Him move the mountain you cannot move.  Be careful moving the physical ones folks, because many hikers might be at risk, plus all the animals, you get the idea.  But those spiritual mountains, you can move those out of your life, by praying to God as many as you want, as often as you want.  The sky is the limit on those buggars.

The remainder of these texts we will focus on in our next study.  The response of this illustration with the fig tree is as important as what happened to the fig tree.  Ordinary lives are just not good enough, nor should they be.  What God has planned for you is not a death from the roots up.  It is an explosion of life from the roots up.  What God wants for you in your life is not a sacrifice of fun on the altar of obedience, but rather an explosion of joy that comes within the protective bounds of obedience.  You have lived too long already with the pretense of leaves that nourish only yourself.  Be free from them.  Be free from the pretenses of your life, and make joy a reality of your life.  As you connect to Jesus Christ you do not find gloom and despair, if that is what you are finding, you need to look for Jesus somewhere else.  Jesus is not about gloom and restriction.  He is about the unbridled freedom to love others, with imagination, and without limits.  Don’t get caught up in the deceit of Satan, our enemy of souls, who would drag your life down in the ordinary under the guise of a freedom he cannot offer.  Instead look up.  Instead cast aside the ordinary, and find the extraordinary.  Find Jesus now.  Why would you live in misery another second by a choice you can easily change?  Find Jesus now, and find an explosion of life you can barely contain in the limits of your imagination.