Seizing the Kairos! - Planting Godly Trees

PLANTING GODLY TREES

 Luke 6:43-45
43 “No good tree bears bad fruit, nor does a bad tree bear good fruit. 44 Each tree is recognized by its own fruit. People do not pick figs from thornbushes, or grapes from briers. 45 A good man brings good things out of the good stored up in his heart, and an evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in his heart. For the mouth speaks what the heart is full of. 

One of the keys for living a Christ-like centered life is to have your mouth and your heart in agreement. No matter how good we are in keeping what's inside of our heart, eventually our "mouth speaks what the heart is full of".

If we dig deeper and look at passages leading to Luke 6:43-45, we can see that the Word of God is talking about how we have to love our enemies and how we shall not judge and condemn others to live a Christ-centered life. Loving our enemies means that we have to live our life in full forgiveness and mercy as a lifestyle. 

Luke 6:35-36
35 But love your enemies, do good to them, and lend to them without expecting to get anything back. Then your reward will be great, and you will be children of the Most High, because he is kind to the ungrateful and wicked. 36 Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful. 

To connect the dots, it seems that the Word of God is teaching us that in order for us to be more like Christ, we have to live in agreement with our mouth and heart, and in order to do that, we have to live in full forgiveness as a lifestyle. 

Forgiving people is not always easy. Some of us walk around in our life with big scars and bitterness. That is why too many of us is no longer able to live in harmony between what is inside our hearts and what we say to others. God's commandment is not impossible to do. Creating forgiveness as a lifestyle might be the hardest thing that we could ever done. In fact, there would be moments where we can release forgiveness easily and there would be moments where we have to fight with our flesh and mind to forgive someone. That is why the Word of God tells us that we have take up the cross and truly work on our salvation. Because at the end, what matters the most is to become the real children of the Most High (Luke 6:35). God will always with us (Immanuel), but we have the ultimate responsibility to train, discipline, and shape ourselves so that we would live as Christ has lived. 

Trees mentioned in Luke 6:43-44 are describing the habits and characters that have been rooted in our life. If we have started our life as bad trees produces bad fruits, it is time to cut down our trees and take out all the roots in our life, and start sowing new seeds of Godly characters with our quality relationship with God and His Words. It is our duty to make sure that this amazing and miraculous seeds that contains Godly characters are properly sown and well taken care of in a daily basis. Yes, we have to work on our salvation to make sure that these seeds will grow and eventually become strong trees that produce good fruits. 

 - JH -