Testing Conduct by Its Usefulness

Ezekiel 15:1-6; Matthew 5:13-16; 7:16-20; I Corinthians 10:6,7

GOLDEN TEXT: “By their fruits shall ye know them.”—Matthew 7:16,20

OUR LORD’S words in that portion of our Scripture lesson from which our Golden Text is taken, were evidently intended as an illustration and warning to impress upon His hearers the importance of carefully analyzing the teachings of those purporting to be shepherds of the flock, but whose purpose is to deceive and mislead them for their own ambitious ends; for He says, “Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep’s clothing.” It is evidently not evil surmising if we are on the lookout for false teachers, who our Lord declared would come among His sheep to mislead them. The Master and the apostles foretold their coming and warned against these false prophets.

We may distinguish them in the manner which our Lord and the apostles clearly indicated, i.e., “by their fruits.” However smooth, polished, educated, gentle, they may be on the surface, we must get to really know them before we dare trust them as leaders of the flock—we must become well acquainted with them, their motives, ambitions, private life.

We are to balance the matter, however; and while vigilant to detect and resist the wolves in sheep’s clothing, as well as in their natural garb, we should remember our Lord’s teachings on the other side of the question—that those who are not against us are on our part, and that we should neither reprove as wolves nor disown as brethren those whose hearts, whose characters, give evidence that they belong to the Lord, even though they follow not with us in respect to His service, the promulgation of His message, etc.

Anticipating our query respecting how we may know the true from the false our Lord says, “Ye shall know them by their fruits.” The thought is that the Lord’s true people are of such a kind that the fruit of their lives is nourishing and refreshing toward all those who have fellowship with them, compared in our Lord’s parable to grapes and figs. On the other hand there are persons who, thistle-like, are always scattering seeds that will cause trouble—false doctrines, evil surmisings and errors. Some, like thorn-bushes, instead of bearing refreshing fruit, are continually reaching out to impede, to irritate, to annoy, to vex, to poison, to injure those with whom they come in contact.

The intimation clearly is that the Lord’s people ought to have little difficulty in distinguishing between the false teachers who would mislead them and the under-shepherds who gladly lay down their lives in the service of the flock. The one class are continually mischief-makers, underminers, destroyers. The other class are helpers, builders, strengtheners, peace-makers.

Not content with giving us a word-picture distinguishing between wolves and sheep, between injurious plants and fruitful ones, our Lord next institutes another illustration still more searching—contrasting a healthy fruit tree with a diseased or evil one, contrasting a healthy Christian with a perverted and misguided one. In this illustration our Lord seems to refer to the fact that those who are His disciples, sound and proper enough to begin with, might become evil, might lose their spiritual strength and fruitfulness—their usefulness.

Lack of nourishment in the soil might make a tree more susceptible to disease or blight. And without pruning the tree, it would develop suckers, or go to wood which would reduce and ultimately destroy its fruitfulness. Applying these principles to the Christian life, we see that God has supplied the good soil of Truth, refreshing showers of grace, the nourishment of precious promises, but it is for each of His people to use them and thereby to grow in grace, knowledge and love. We cannot, then, blame the Husbandman if we come short, and become unfruitful from lack of nourishment. None of His good promises can fail; whatever failing there may be, must be in ourselves.

Likewise with the pruning—the Lord will send the chastisements, trials, difficulties; but with our independent will it is possible for us to be wrongly exercised thereby fail to profit from them, fail to correct our weaknesses and short-comings. It is possible for us, notwithstanding all the nourishment supplied and pruning given, to set our affections on houses, lands, or earthly aims, objects or individuals, which, like the suckers in the illustration would draw away our vitality and hinder the bearing of acceptable fruit.

QUESTIONS:

Is it evil surmising to be on the alert to protect ourselves and others against false teachers?

What is one of the divine methods of ascertaining the true character of these whom we accept as teachers?

Is it possible for a Christian to lose his spiritual standing through neglect of the means of grace?

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