It Matters Who You Serve

February 23

The Two Fruit Trees
A farmer one planted two fruit trees on opposite sides of his property. One he planted to hide the unsightly view of an old landfill; the other to provide restful shade near a cool mountain stream which ran beside his fields.

As the two trees grew, both began to flower and bear fruit. One day the farmer picked some fruit from the tree nearest his house -- the one used to provide a hedge from the landfill. He noticed the fruit was a little deformed but it looked edible. Hoping for a quick snack, the farmer bit into the fruit and immediately spit it out. It was extremely bitter.

Curious, the farmer walked across his field to the other tree and harvested some of its fruit. A smile drew on his face as he sampled it and found it sweet and delicious. He gathered several more pieces of fruit and took them to the house. What had made the difference?

Both trees were the same type of fruit. The quality of the fruit was greatly affected by the nutrition at its roots. Just as the tree by the landfill grew to be bitter, while the tree by the stream produced sweet fruit, so we, children of God, have a choice.

We can either put down our roots in the soil of the landfill of fleshly pursuits, or into the cool refreshing stream of the person of Jesus Christ. The fruit of our lives is the outward evidence of our inward motivation. – Anonymous



The Bible tells us that every person who is ever born is going to serve someone. In Matthew 6:24, Jesus states very clearly that nobody can serve God and mammon. None of us can be humble servants of our good Master as well as being arrogant servants of our self-interests.

If we plant ourselves in the soil of self-aggrandizement, of personal accomplishment, of temporal gain, the fruit of our lives will ultimately become bitter to our taste.

On the other hand, if we allow our lives to be uprooted from the dry dirt of self, and transplanted into the rich soil of the divine, we will become like “trees of righteousness,” Isaiah 61:3.

In fact, the passage states in full, "To appoint unto them that mourn in Zion, to give unto them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness; that they might be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the LORD, that He might be glorified."

When our lives have been transplanted from the godless soil of unbelief to the Christ-centered soil of faith, we know we will be uprooted from death and replanted to life. We know the ashes of our broken lives will be exchanged for the beauty of our Lord. We know we will have the oil of joy poured over our heads and our mourning shall cease.

We know that as we praise the One who causes us to thrive, all heaviness will lift and our spirits will flutter ever closer to our Savior on the wings of angels. As we serve Jesus instead of self, we will rise in confident anticipation of the abiding joy of serving the Lord who loves us forever.