Bear Fruit and Don’t Fall 1 Corinthians 10:1–13; Luke 13:1–9; Ezekiel 33:7–20 

Grace, mercy, and peace to you, from God our Father, and our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, who helps us to bear fruit and keeps us from falling.

Our message is taken from the parable Jesus teaches us in today’s Gospel:

“A man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came seeking fruit on it and found none. 7 And he said to the vinedresser, ‘Look, for three years now I have come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and I find none. Cut it down. Why should it use up the ground?’

 8 And he answered him, ‘Sir, let it alone this year also, until I dig around it and put on manure. 9 Then if it should bear fruit next year, well and good; but if not, you can cut it down.’”

From this we get the first part of our theme for today: Bear fruit!

From our Epistle we get the second part of our theme: Don’t fall! 

12 Therefore let anyone who thinks that he stands take heed lest he fall. 

Bear fruit and don’t fall! They go together.

If we bear godly fruit, we don’t fall from God. 

It’s that simple; and yet so impossibly difficult. We can’t do it without the Holy Spirit.

It isn’t bearing fruit that keeps us connected to God, it’s faith in Christ.

And from that connection of faith, comes our ability to bear fruit, to be like Christ to the world.

If we’re going to do the work of our God in this world, we can only do it with His help, and through His power. 

If we fall from Him, we lose the power to bear fruit and be like Christ, and we rob our neighbor of the godly love that God created and redeemed us to have and to share. 

In John 15, Jesus told His disciples: 5 I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing. 

Nothing godly, unable to share a Christ-like love with others.

And so falling away from Christ is the ultimate act of selfishness. 

All sin is selfish. When I sin, always when I sin, I’m putting myself before God and my neighbor. 

If I fall away from Christ, I’m only being selfish, because then I lose the ability to serve my neighbor with a true and godly love, now and in Heaven.

Refusing to be saved is the ultimate act of selfishness, because it’s a refusal to serve God and others in eternity. 

Because God loves the world so deeply, He sent His Son to redeem the world, so that all who believe in Him would not perish, but have everlasting life.

Having salvation, everlasting life, we will love and serve others forever; and they will love and serve us forever. 

And together, we’ll love and serve God forever; and in that perfect loving and serving, we’ll all be happy and cared for.

So bear fruit, and don’t fall away, so that you can serve and love God and others, now and forever.

As we said, the second part of today’s Gospel shows us the necessity of bearing fruit.

The first part of today’s Gospel warns us of the consequences of selfishly falling away, and stubbornly refusing to repent and believe and bear fruit.

How tragic it is for us to insist on our right to sin. Its’ tragic because we have no such right; and all kinds of hurt and harm come from us thinking we do.

We may not consciously think that way, but if we’re unrepentant that’s how we’re living.

When we’re stubborn and unrepentant, our minds are too closed and clouded to see that all we’re doing is harming our neighbor, and hurting ourself.

Our Epistle warns us not to make that deadly mistake; to not repeat the stubbornness and foolishness of our forefathers in the wilderness.

Paul says, For I do not want you to be unaware, brothers, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea, (the cloud that descended on Mount Sinai, and God was in the cloud; and God parted the Red Sea for them to pass through and be saved from Pharoah’s army)

2 and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, 3 and all ate the same spiritual food, (the manna, bread from Heaven) 4 and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank from the spiritual Rock that followed them, and the Rock was Christ.

5 Nevertheless, with most of them God was not pleased, for they were overthrown in the wilderness.

In their stubbornness, they kept resisting God and falling away, many times complaining that they should go back to serve the gods of Egypt. 

How soon they forgot how they had been so badly mistreated in Egypt; and how it was always God who saved, from the plagues, from the Egyptian army, from dying of thirst and starvation.  

God loved and treated them like His own dear children, and they responded like spoiled, selfish children who thought they were entitled to God’s blessings.

They weren’t grateful; they didn’t trust and obey Him; they cared only about themselves. 

Paul says, 6 Now these things took place as examples for us, that we might not desire evil as they did. 

It may sound as if we’re being hard on them, but if we are, then we’re being hard on ourselves, because we have the same sinful, selfish nature they had.

And there’s only one way to deal with it – to repent with the help of God.  

The softer and more tolerant we are toward sin, the more it will steal from us;  the more it will take away from what God has given us through His Son and His Spirit: the gifts of faith, forgiveness, life, peace, joy and salvation; and the desire to do good, to be like Christ unto others.

Paul says, 12 Therefore let anyone who thinks that he stands take heed lest he fall. 13 No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. (The troubles and struggles we all go through in life.)

God is faithful, and He will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it.

The answer to our temptations, and the power to not fall away, but to bear fruit, is found in the faithfulness of our Heavenly Father to us; in the love of His Son for us; and in the power of His Spirit for us.

We might foolishly think the temptations of the world are too strong or enticing for us to resist; that we can’t help but follow along. That’s what the devil wants us to think.

But that’s not how God teaches us to think, and not what He promises. 

He provides the way out; He gives us the things that empower us to walk away from temptation.

Or to stand and look it in the face and say, “No! You leave, temptation; you walk away; I walk with Christ!”

God’s way out for us, is His Word of truth to overcome the devil’s deceit, and temptation’s lies.

And our Baptism to wash away our sins, to remind us who we do and don’t belong to, who we trust and who we don’t trust, who we follow and who we don’t follow.

And in Christ’s body and blood, to forgive and comfort and strengthen us.

And our way out of temptation is in and with, His fellowship, our brothers and sisters and friends and family in Christ, to encourage and help and support us, and to pray for us, and to pray with us.

May God always keep us from falling from Christ, so that today and tomorrow and forever, we may bear an abundance of godly fruit, to His glory, and for our neighbor’s good.

And as we remain faithful and bear fruit, His peace which passes understanding, will guard our hearts and minds, in Christ Jesus, whose love we share with all. Amen.