Luke 6:43 “For a good tree does not bear bad fruit, nor does a bad tree bear good fruit.”
Jesus uses the illustration of trees to bring up the subject of nature. The nature of something is an intrinsic set of characteristics that are true about that thing in its very existence. The difference between an apple tree and an orange tree is intrinsic.
The same applies here. The good tree and the bad tree are intrinsically different. But are any of us intrinsically good? How can this help illustrate anything real? Are people right when they say we should just try to be ‘good’ and that this will earn us a place in heaven? Or is Jesus telling His hearers something more?
Jesus is speaking of something that is true of the tree from day one. It isn’t an orange tree one day and an apple the next. But, yet, we would say that the Christian is made the righteousness of Christ. By the blood we are cleansed and made to be ‘good’ trees in spite of our great and many sins. So do we then become that which is intrinsically different? Keep the result with the cause. We are what we are by the grace of God. If you become a child of God, this is retroactive. Though you wandered in sin lost without hope, yet you have been sanctified if you have tasted of that heavenly gift. And thus you are manifested forth as a good tree from the outset, and will bear good fruit.
Just as the orange tree or the apple, it will take time for the fruit to show. But if it is a healthy tree, the fruit will show. And it will be consistent with the type of tree that it is.
Heavenly Father, thank You for Your great mercy! Though we would all have been justly condemned before You, You have in Your great love made it possible for us to be good trees. Oh You are so wise! You are so much smarter than we are, or than the old devil. You alone understand the true measure of Your grace. We sing of it like we think we understand it, but we do not yet see it fully. You are truly magnificent Father! In the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ I pray and praise You, Amen.