C, Pent 8 Proper 11 - Luke 10:38-42 & Amos 8:2b-3 "Ripe or Rotten Fruit?"

When God looks at you, does he see ripe or rotten fruit? It’s a scary question; because it invites me to look intently at who I really am. This question is a question we should only ask of ourselves. No one except you and God knows what condition your flesh is in, under your outer skin.

Amos, a shepherd of flocks and a farmer of figs, was shown by God, a basket of ripe fruit. And on seeing it, the Lord said to Amos, “The time is ripe for my people Israel; I will spare them no longer. In that day, the songs in the temple will turn to wailing. Many bodies — flung everywhere! Silence!” (Amos 8:2b-3)

It seems as if the sweet fruit God had sought in his people Israel, had soured in his sight, and he was about to toss out the fruit that should have been sweet and ripe, but rather had fermented and rotted before his very eye.

When God looks at you does he see ripe or rotten fruit? Are you the same as the Israelites, rotten with doubt, worry, greed, and pride? If God were to peel back your outer layers to reveal what’s inside, what would he find? Pure sweet motives pleasing to God or rotten flesh being devoured by the fruit fly of sin and selfishness?

It’s a disappointment when one watches fruit grow on the tree for months and months, waiting in expectation for sweet juicy fruit, only to find after the waiting and the watering and the fertilising that the fruit has been fouled by fly.

God too had watched and waited for his people Israel to bear the sweet fruit, he might harvest for himself. He had led them out of Egypt, placed them in the land of Canaan, gave them a kingdom with kings, and yet they continually turned sour against God.

The kings of Israel turned away from God, and the people too became rotten in their sin, as they turned from God to worship the Canaan fertility gods. And in turning from God they lost their source of sweetness and soured — turning on each other, oppressing the weak, dishonestly cheating each other, and loathing the time they spent in the Lord’s presence on the Sabbath. They would have much preferred to be out doing the self-centred things which increased their wealth and worth.

So they became sour and rotten, against each other, in the presence of God. God had nurtured the people, watered them with his word. Through prophets and priest, he had placed in their presence, he tended them and fertilised them. And now God was about to discard them — cast them out and silence them with his silence. ‘“The days are coming,” declares the Sovereign Lord, “when I will send a famine through the land—not a famine of food or a thirst for water, but a famine of hearing the words of the Lord.’ (Amos 8:11)

When God looks at you, does he see ripe or rotten fruit? Are your actions cutting off the sweet source of God’s word, so that the disease of sin makes your heart sour and suffer?

38 As Jesus and his disciples were on their way, he came to a village where a woman named Martha opened her home to him. 39 She had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet listening to what he said. 40 But Martha was distracted by all the preparations that had to be made. She came to him and asked, “Lord, don’t you care that my sister has left me to do the work by myself? Tell her to help me!” 41 “Martha, Martha,” the Lord answered, “you are worried and upset about many things, 42 but only one thing is needed. Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken away from her.” (Luke 10:38-42)

Martha was sour that Mary wasn’t helping her. In fact Martha had become rotten with worry; she was extremely upset! Martha has become distracted and troubled by all the preparations that needed to be made. She thought it was bitterly unfair that Mary was not helping her with the preparations, saying to Jesus, “Lord, don’t you care that my sister has left me to do the work by myself? Tell her to help me!” But Jesus unmoved by Martha’s concern points to the reality hidden within and says, “…only one thing is needed. Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken away from her.”

Right here at this point we have to discern what was rotten with Martha. Many of us wrongly assume that Martha must sit at Jesus’ feet too; wrongly imposing law on Martha that she must do as Mary was doing. But this thinking turns the gospel into a law. It also justifies Mary by what she was doing, which also wrongly takes the focus from whom it’s rightly deserved.

In fact, the preparations Martha was making were as honourable as Mary’s sitting at Jesus’ feet. The preparations were essential. What Martha was meant to be doing, in preparing what was needed to be done, was the work Jesus required her to do. Just like Martha, we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do. (Ephesians 2:10) So in doing the necessary preparations for Jesus to be at her home, Martha was, in fact, doing the right thing, as was Mary.

However, we hear Martha was distracted by the preparations. She needed not be! These actions if done without the distractions would have brought glory to Jesus in just the same way as was Mary’s devotion at Jesus’ feet. But filled with sinful motives, known to Jesus, Martha seeks Jesus’ help to impose her rotten will on her sister. The fruit of Martha’s works, prepared in advance for her to do in God’s service became sour and rotten in his sight, when she allowed herself to be distracted and upset by her worries and pride.

So when God looks at you, does he see ripe or rotten fruit? Are your actions cutting off the sweet source of God’s word, so that the disease of sin makes your heart sour and suffer? There are two answers to these questions!

When God looks at us he does see rotten fruit? If he didn’t, he wouldn’t have sent Jesus Christ to die on the cross, he wouldn’t have sent the Holy Spirit to show us our rottenness and return us to the vine — where we’re continually grafted into Jesus Christ and his precious lifeblood spilt there for you and me.

So when God looks at you he sees ripe fruit too! Because when God looks at you, he sees Jesus Christ. We then are free from the law to be his people and bring glory to him in what he has prepared in advance for us to do. No longer do we have to be distracted by the preparations, of what you and I should or shouldn’t be doing. But focused on Jesus, we can rest on his preparations, made at the cross, and trust that in him we will do what pleases God.

And the most pleasing thing any of us do is this: Allow ourselves to be led to repentance and forgiveness for our rotten ways, bringing glory to Christ who was cut down in death at the cross. He was silenced outside the city, so we might boldly serve God in the many and various ways he desires, in all peace, joy, and holiness, until he comes to eternally harvest us as his ripe repentant fruitful and faithful people. Amen.

Dear sweet Lord Jesus, give us the will not to burden others with our own rotten motives and desires, but grant us the grace to encourage each other to look to you and glorify you who reins with the Father and the Holy Spirit, one God now and forever, Amen.