[Note: This sermon expounds Mark 11:12–26. Delivered 8 February 1981, Montreal.]
We are continuing our study of faith, which began at Mark 10:46 and now extends to Mark 11:26. Let us read the passage. "On the following day, when they came from Bethany, he was hungry. And seeing in the distance a fig tree in leaf, he went to see if he could find anything on it. When he came to it, he found nothing but leaves, for it was not the season for figs. And he said to it, 'May no one ever eat fruit from you again.' And his disciples heard it." The account then records the cleansing of the temple, and the following morning they passed the fig tree again and Peter noticed it had withered to its roots. The Lord then gave his teaching on faith and prayer: "Have faith in God. Truly, I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, 'Be taken up and thrown into the sea,' and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that what he says will come to pass, it will be done for him."
This passage presents an immediate difficulty, and it is important to face it honestly rather than sidestep it. The Lord cursed a fig tree for not bearing fruit — but the text itself says "it was not the season for figs." How can it be just to curse a tree for not bearing fruit when the season for fruit had not yet come? Professor Edward Schweitzer, a prominent New Testament scholar, found this passage so troubling that he simply omitted it from his otherwise careful commentary on Mark. He could not explain it, so he left it out. That response is understandable but unsatisfactory. We must deal with what the text says.
Before we explain the agricultural facts of the matter, there is something far more important to address — and it is this: our reaction to this passage is itself diagnostic. When we read that the Lord cursed a tree that was not bearing fruit because it was not yet the season, and we feel that this is unjust, we are revealing something about the state of our own faith. The question we are really asking is: "Did God do something unjust?" And that question reveals that we have not yet fully settled, at the level of our deepest convictions, whether God can be trusted absolutely.
This is the foundation of faith, and it must be settled once and for all. Either God is perfectly just in all his dealings, or faith in him is ultimately unstable — built on shifting ground. Abraham faced this same question when God told him he would destroy Sodom. His response was: "Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?" That is the response of faith. Not blind faith — Abraham pressed the question further and further — but faith that starts from the unshakeable conviction that God will not do anything unjust. If you do not start there, your faith will always be vulnerable to collapsing when you encounter something you cannot immediately explain.
The same principle underlies Paul's statement in Romans 8 that the whole creation has been subjected to futility and groans as in the pains of childbirth. Even the disordering of the natural world — earthquakes, disease, catastrophe — has its ultimate origin in the sin of man. This is not immediately obvious to us, but it is Paul's teaching, and it reinforces the point: nothing that happens in God's world is outside his governance or contrary to his justice. We may not see the full picture. We rarely do. But building our faith on our limited sight is like building on sand. The solid foundation is the character of God: he is just, and he will not deviate from justice by so much as a hair.
Now, what are the agricultural facts about the fig tree? The key is in the detail that this particular tree was already in leaf, while other fig trees were not yet in leaf, because "it was not the season for figs." Why would one tree be in leaf ahead of all the others? Because of its location. This tree was on the south side of the Mount of Olives, sheltered from the cold north wind by the hill itself, and in full receipt of the southern sunshine. It was, as it were, a premature bloomer — forced into early leaf by its unusually favourable position.
[Continues in Part B]
# The Cursing of the Fig Tree — Mark 11:12–26 (Part B) — Agricultural Explanation; Israel's Spiritual Bankruptcy; Bevington's Worm Miracle
[Note: This is Part B of the sermon on Mark 11:12–26, continuing directly from Part A. Delivered 8 February 1981, Montreal.]
Mark saw no problem with the cursing at all — and this is significant. The sentence "for it was not the season for figs" was not written as an excuse for the tree but as an explanation of why the Lord chose this particular tree out of all the others he passed. This tree had leafed out early because of its sheltered, sun-facing position on the south side of the Mount of Olives. Anyone familiar with horticulture will recognise the phenomenon: even in cold climates, trees planted against a south-facing wall or on a warm slope will blossom weeks ahead of trees in open ground — just as certain trees in Calgary have been known to bloom in the middle of a winter warm spell while every other tree around them is still dormant. Because this tree had already bloomed and leafed, it could rightly be expected to have fruit. The theologian who is troubled by the passage does not know his fig trees; the agricultural expert finds no problem at all.
But the agricultural explanation, while settling the surface question, is not the main point. The fig tree is consistently used in Scripture as a symbol of Israel. In Luke 13:6–9, the Lord tells a parable of a fig tree in a vineyard that the owner has fertilised and tended for three years without fruit — and finally says, cut it down; why should it use up the ground? The three years correspond to three years of the Lord's own ministry. In the same way, the fig tree he cursed on the road represents the nation of Israel: a people given every spiritual advantage, showered with blessing, called to bear fruit — and producing nothing but leaves. Religious appearance without spiritual reality. Activity without life.
The temple cleansing inserted between the two stages of the fig tree account is not accidental. Mark has arranged the material with great care: day one, the fig tree is cursed; that same day, the temple is cleansed; day two, the fig tree is found withered. The connection is intentional. The temple at Passover was packed with people, full of activity — pilgrims, money changers, dove sellers. All the outward apparatus of religion was functioning at full volume. But it had become, as Isaiah 1 and Jeremiah 7 both make clear, a den of robbers: a place where people performed religious duty in order to feel safe while living lives entirely unaffected by God's reality. Leaves and no fruit. Luke 18:8 contains a haunting question from the Lord himself: "When the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?" The Greek word for "find" is the same word used in the fig tree account and in the parable of Luke 13 — he came looking, and found nothing.
Paul's warning in Romans 11 is equally pointed: if God did not spare the natural branches, neither will he spare you. The church has often read the story of Israel's judgment as a cautionary tale that applies only to others. It applies to us. A Christianity that is full of leaves — services, programs, meetings, the language of faith — but has produced no genuine inner transformation is in exactly the same position as the tree on the south slope of Olivet. God is looking for fruit, and leaves are not a substitute.
The three steps to genuine, operative faith emerge from this passage. First: settle the question of God's justice completely and irrevocably. Second: change the direction of your life from outward religiosity to inward reality — not a church-going turtle that surfaces when it is hungry and disappears when it has been fed, but a person whose whole life is orientated toward God. Third: pray in full confidence, as verses 22–24 describe. The Lord says: whatever you ask in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours. This cannot be misused as a blank cheque for selfish requests, because step two — the changed life — prevents it. A person who has genuinely turned away from self-seeking does not pray for selfish things.
Guy Bevington, whose story about his broken ribs we recounted last week, gives another remarkable account. A young couple had a six-acre farm and were in great difficulty: their horses had gone lame, and the entire ground had become infested with worms that were destroying the soil. Bevington prayed with them, asking God specifically to deal with the infestation. Shortly afterward, the man went out and searched his entire six-acre property. He could not find a single living worm on the whole farm. This is the kind of faith Mark 11:22–24 is describing: specific, concrete, believing prayer offered by a person whose life is turned toward God and not toward self.
Let us be quiet before God in prayer.