Saturday in the 23rd Week of Ordinary Time, September 11, 2021

Luke 6:43-49

Jesus said to his disciples: “A good tree does not bear rotten fruit, nor does a rotten tree bear good fruit. For every tree is known by its own fruit. For people do not pick figs from thorn bushes, nor do they gather grapes from brambles. A good person out of the store of goodness in his heart produces good, but an evil person out of a store of evil produces evil; for from the fullness of the heart the mouth speaks. “Why do you call me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ but not do what I command? I will show you what someone is like who comes to me, listens to my words, and acts on them. That one is like a man building a house, who dug deeply and laid the foundation on rock; when the flood came, the river burst against that house but could not shake it because it had been well built. But the one who listens and does not act is like a person who built a house on the ground without a foundation. When the river burst against it, it collapsed at once and was completely destroyed.”

“A good tree does not bear rotten fruit, nor does a rotten tree bear good fruit.”  The Lord Jesus often taught by laying a foundation of everyday experience and proceeding to draw unexpected — sometimes shocking — observations from it.  The observation Jesus draws from the everyday experience of good and rotten fruit may seem straightforward to us, but probably caused some head scratching among his hearers, and may do so among us if we look carefully at what he says.  He begins by speaking of a “good tree”.  The Greek adjective can also mean “beautiful” and “worthy”.  There is a moral sense here, as in “a good husband”.  Normally when we think of a good object, as distinct from a good person, we only think of it as being useful or well constructed.  Assigning a moral tint to the tree implies an intention on its part.  Jesus does this because he means for the tree to stand for a person.  Now, if a good tree is one which has a good intention and is also “useful”, it will be able to produce good fruit.  The fruit may go bad on a tree if it is not picked while it is ripe, or because of insects, but when the tree produced it, it was “good fruit”.  Conversely, a tree which is not healthy or has a bad intention, as it were, does not produce good fruit, but “bad”, that is, “ugly”, “useless”, and “corrupt”.  It does this even when the weather has been good and the soil rich.  Jesus observes from this that, “Every tree is known by its own fruit.”  That is, a tree cannot be judged as “good” or “bad”, or, “healthy” or “unhealthy”, or even as “beautiful” or “ugly” until it shows its fruit, even if it looks healthy or good otherwise.  Besides this, the type of tree or plant it is may not be known until it puts forth its fruit.  A grapevine in mid-Winter looks like a dead bunch of weeds.  It becomes clear that it is a healthy grapevine when spring arrives and it becomes almost a different plant.  The Lord offers that, “A good person out of the store of goodness in his heart produces good, but an evil person out of a store of evil produces evil.”  Two women may look very much alike: they may look polished, capable, intelligent, and virtuous.  Their actions, however, reveal whether or not this is true.  As with the trees, a good person does not consistently produce wicked works, nor does the wicked person consistently produce good works.  The works tell the health or virtue of the person: “From the fullness of the heart the mouth speaks.”  This helps us to consider other people, but it especially helps us to consider the Lord.  All his works were performed to help other people — his Passion and Death most of all.  By meditating on the words and deeds of the Lord we learn of the goodness of his heart, and its beauty.

“Why do you call me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ but not do what I command?”  This seems like a separate saying, but we can also understand it as the conclusion to the Lord’s remarks on the goodness or wickedness of the heart.  Not only is he truly “the Lord”, but he is a good Lord who has traversed the land of the Jews and performed countless miracles of healing, feeding, and exorcism.  His commands need not be feared.  Since he is a good Lord, carrying out his commands ought to be done simply to please him.

“I will show you what someone is like who comes to me, listens to my words, and acts on them.”  These last couple of verses from the Gospel reading for today’s Mass echo the verses with which the Lord concludes his Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 7, 24-27).  It should not surprise us that the Lord used similar words in his preaching on different occasions.  He gives three steps in discipleship: a person comes to him, listens to him, and obeys him.  First, a person gets up and goes to Jesus.  Save for a few notable exceptions, the sick who sought cures either came to him or were brought to him.  Jesus most often taught outside the cities, so those who wanted to hear him had to go to him.  Coming to Jesus, then, involves an act of the will — a choice.  In coming to Jesus, a person gives up the activity in which he was engaged or changes his plans for the day, and opens himself to the Lord’s message.  This person then listens to his words.  The Greek word for “to listen” also means “to pay attention”, “to understand”, and “to obey”.  This listening is active and discerning.  It is learning what should be carried out.  It is not listening for entertainment or to obtain material for criticism.  The words of the Lord are not background music that one only hears snatches of when that person is not otherwise busy.  Listening is a preparation for full commitment.  Then comes the obedience.  The one who comes to the Lord and listens to him, “acts on his words” in obedience.  This shows a commitment to the Lord as well as trust, in that acting on his words will bring personal benefit to the one who does this.  

The people who heard the Lord say these words must have been thunderstruck by them.  He did not say, as the Pharisees, that these words must be followed because they were of the Law given to Moses by God; he is saying that his words must be obeyed because they come from him, Jesus of Nazareth.  And he further astounded the crowd in comparing the one who obeyed his words to a man who built his house on a stone foundation.  This brings to mind the comment of the Evangelist on a similar occasion that the crowds were amazed “because he spoke as one having authority” (Matthew 7, 29).  The crowds wondered, “Who is this?” in the same way that even the Apostles did.  We should wonder this too, and commit to our response for the answer we arrive at.