Perspective: Leaves and Fruits

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Leaves and Fruits

From everyone to whom much has been given, much will be required; and from the one to whom much has been entrusted, even more will be demanded.

Luke 12:48b (NRSV)

Father, break my heart for what breaks Yours

Give me open hands and open doors

Put Your light in my eyes and let me see

That my own little world is not about me

From "My Own Little World" by Matthew West

One morning, while in Jerusalem, a hungry Jesus spots a fig tree beside the road.  He walks over to the tree and starts looking for some figs to eat, but He finds "nothing at all on it but leaves."  Angrily, Jesus says, "May no fruit ever come from you again!"  The fig tree immediately withers, to the Disciples' astonishment.¹

As I've noted previously, Jesus' cursing the fig tree and causing it to wither is a symbolic act.  The fig tree represented the religious institution of the day.  People had been going to the temple spiritually hungry but finding no nourishment, in the same way that Jesus approaches the fig tree physically hungry but finds nothing to eat.²  According to the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus curses the fig tree the day after He barged into the Temple of the Lord, turned over the tables of the merchants and money changers, and proclaimed, "It is written, 'My house shall be called a house of prayer'; but you are making it a den of robbers."³

Lately I've been experimenting with a method of reading Scripture called Lectio Divina, which is less cerebral and more meditative and contemplative than typical Bible study.  It is less about reading Scripture and more about letting Scripture read us.  In Lectio Divina, a person reads a short passage of Scripture slowly and prayerfully several times until a particular word or phrase grabs her.  The person then meditates on the particular word or phrase, considering why it might have stuck a chord with her.  The practice ends with a time of prayer and contemplative silence.⁴  I don't think I've quite gotten the hang of Lectio Divina, but I think my efforts have helped me to read Scripture with more introspection.

When I recently read the story of Jesus' cursing the fig tree, using this method of "divine reading," the phrase that struck me was "nothing... but leaves."  I wondered if Jesus would find any "fruit" if He were to look at my life.  I wondered if there are any "leaves" in my life I have been using to hide any fruitlessness on my part.

Leaves and fruits are both important to plants, but they have very different purposes.  Leaves are the organs in which carbon dioxide, water, and light are used to construct simple sugars in a process known as photosynthesis.⁵  They are vital to a plant's survival, but they exist only to serve the plant itself.  A fruit, on the other hand, is a structure that contains seeds, the means by which a plant reproduces.  Also, fruits are often edible.⁶  A plant produces fruit not for its own sake, but for the future of its own species and for the nourishment of other species.

A fruitful life, I suppose, is a life that extends beyond itself in some way - a life that involves more than mere existence.  I think it's worth noting that the word generous shares an etymological root with the word generate.  We create - or bear fruit - so that we may have something to share with others.⁷

A tree in full leaf is a beautiful sight, but sometimes a closer look is required to determine whether or not it has actually produced anything that isn't meant to serve itself.  Likewise, a person might appear to have a full life at first glance, but a second look could reveal otherwise.  I am reminded of one king who had it all - wealth, power, accomplishments, palaces, vineyards, and more women than he could keep up with - and, when he looked back, he saw that it was all "pointless" and "a chasing after wind."⁸  A life that does not extend beyond itself ultimately withers into nothingness.

In A Million Miles in a Thousand Years, writer Donald Miller reflects on his experience of turning one of his previous memoirs into a screenplay.  In the midst of the process, he took some time to learn what makes a good story and what makes a good character in a story.  At one point, Miller realized that he had spent far too much of his time dreaming, while others were actually living their lives with actual people.  He realized that he had not been living a meaningful life, as evidenced by the lack of photographs on his mantle and end tables.  He knew that he had to make some changes in his life.⁹

I think that maybe these things have come to my mind because I fear that I'm living a fruitless life.  I wouldn't say that I'm living a "full" life, by anyone's definition, but I try to keep myself occupied.  That said, I wonder how much actual "fruit" I am really bearing in my life.  So often I feel that I spend most of my time spinning my wheels.  I don't believe that life is meaningless, but I fear that I might not be living a very meaningful life.

How can we tell the difference between the "leaves" and the "fruits" in our lives?  How can we pull back the "leaves" to see if our lives have borne any "fruit"?  I have my doubts that we can answer these questions for ourselves objectively.  We might need to allow ourselves to become vulnerable and ask the people we trust to tell us what kind of "fruit" they see in our lives.  I haven't quite figured out what all of this means for myself, but I have given myself some questions to ponder for a while.  I hope that I have given you, the reader, some questions to ponder as well.


Notes:

1. Matthew 21:18-20 (NRSV)
2. Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan.  The Last Week: What the Gospels Really Teach About Jesus's Final Days in Jerusalem.  2006, HarperOne.  p. 56
3. Matthew 21:12-13 (NRSV)
4. Justin LaRosa and James Harnish.  A Disciple's Path Daily Workbook.  2012, Abingdon Press.  pp.46-47
5. Wikipedia: Leaf
6. Wikipedia: Fruit
7. I probably stole this thought from someone, maybe Rob Bell, but I do not have a reference.
8. Ecclesiastes 2:4-11 (CEB)
9. Donald Miller.  A Million Miles in a Thousand Years: What I Learned While Editing My Life.  2009, Thomas Nelson.  ch. 13

The photograph of the fig tree was taken by Wikimedia Commons user Miya in Hyogo, Japan and is used under under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license.  The photographer is, in no way, affiliated with this blog.