I had that whole bag of soil, so I poured a generous mound of it into the pot, added more plant food, then watered the plant. That basil plant’s health turned around in a matter of days. We have come to mutually agreeable terms: I essentially ignore it, and we get to harvest its abundance for basil pesto and basil infused tomato sauces.
The Scriptures often use the illustration of a plant, fruit and people’s relationship to God. The nation of Israel is likened to a grape vine that God planted. Despite God’s faithful and attentive provision for Israel, Israel produced “wild grapes,” not the fruit of righteousness God desired. In contrast, righteous Jesus says, “I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinedresser.” Jesus is the beloved One with whom the Father is well-pleased.
Jesus presented fruit-bearing as that which exposes a person’s true nature. You may not be able to identify an apple tree by its leaves or the shape of its canopy, but you will know what it is when apples start sprouting from its branches. People can claim to be a Christian, but Jesus cautioned, “You will know them by their fruit.” Anyone claiming to be a Christ follower should bear the fruit of righteousness.
Not bearing fruit is another matter. I once had a neighbor who replaced all the ornamental plants in his yard with fruit-bearing plants. He saw no sense in tending a plant that gives you nothing in return. In the passage where Jesus described himself as the true vine, and his Father the vinedresser, he warns, “Every branch in me that does not bear fruit, (the Father) takes away.” In that scenario, the fruit seems to be obeying the command to love God with the whole of your being, the evidence that a person is rightly connected to Christ, the life-giving vine.
In our day of malleable truth and people claiming to be whatever they want to be, God’s assessment of a person is thought irrelevant. But God knows men’s hearts, his assessment is true, and as the judge of all mankind, the only one that matters. Scripture warns, “Bear fruit in keeping with repentance.”
