Kingdom Fruit

Read: Matthew 21:28-46

I tell you the truth, corrupt tax collectors and prostitutes will get into the Kingdom of God before you do. . . . I tell you, the Kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a nation that will produce the proper fruit. Matthew 21:31, 43

IN WORD

It was one of several heated encounters with the religious leaders. At the end of this one, the authorities began plotting ways to arrest Jesus without incurring the wrath of the crowds. Essentially He told them that these gatekeepers of the Kingdom would have it taken from them and given to, of all people, the sinners who surely had forfeited any right to the Kingdom long ago. Jesus made this startling claim to their faces, not to encourage them to be more kindhearted and godly, not to remind them of their role as gatekeepers of the Kingdom, but to declare that a decision in heaven had been rendered. They would no longer be allowed to exercise authority in their prominent clerical roles. Their prestige and power, at least in God’s eyes, would be given to the spiritual rabble. The lowlifes of society could, by faith, step into the high life of the Kingdom—ahead of those considered most qualified.

That’s because God defines “qualified” far differently than we do. Truth be told, there isn’t much difference between a religious leader and a prostitute or tax collector. One sins outwardly, the other inwardly. Both are trapped in the human condition—not the original one we were given in Eden, but the fallen one we inherited afterward. That condition cannot produce Kingdom fruit, either in the life of an upstanding citizen or a marginalized undesirable. The Kingdom can be manifest only in someone born of the King.

IN DEED

That’s why some of the least likely candidates end up as prominent Kingdom citizens, and why the Kingdom is ripped from the hands of false leaders and given to those who bear Kingdom fruit. Jesus’ warning to one generation of Jewish leaders applies to all Kingdom people throughout the ages. Know the source of your fruit and flourish from His strength. It’s the only way the Kingdom grows.

ADDITIONAL READING: Luke 14:15-24

We have no power from God unless we live in the persuasion that we have none of our own.

JOHN OWEN