Growth and Obedience

“The fruit of the righteous is a tree of life,” Proverbs 11:30

Growth and Obedience

Tree of Life – If you travel to Disney World and venture into the Animal Kingdom, you can take a walk through the Disney version of the Tree of Life.  It is spectacular, entertaining and gigantic.  But it is dead.  There is nothing living about this concrete structure that pretends to be a tree.

If we think that we can produce vibrant, living growth in our lives without righteousness, we might as well go to work for the concrete design staff as Disney.  We will end up with nothing but dead pretending.

The Hebrew idiom, ‘ets hayyim (tree of life), refers to the results of obedience before God.  If you look at Proverbs 3:18, you will see the same idiom, a description of wisdom.  Wisdom is nothing more (or less) than godly behavior.  The emphasis is on action, not just thought.  This tree grows when we obey God.  And the more we obey, the bigger the tree becomes.  You might even substitute the image of Proverbs 3:18 for the metaphor here.  “The fruit of the righteous is wisdom“.

This proverb pushes us toward critical self-examination.  Wisdom does not come from information, application or insight.  It comes from obedience.  Does anyone lack wisdom?  Let him ask of God who gives liberally to those who serve Him.  Ahh, but that’s the issue, isn’t it?  God does give liberally.  But He waits for our unrestricted, voluntary submission.  He knows that motivation matters.  He knows that shaping us for obedience is not instantaneous.  The fruit of the righteous might be a tree of life, but the growth of the righteous is often accompanied by a good deal of weed-pulling, pruning and digging up the soil.

If you visit the Tree of Life at Animal Kingdom, you won’t find anyone watering it, weeding around it or pruning it.  Concrete doesn’t care.  But the righteous do.  They know that God will never stop being the Gardner of their souls.  If you want the real tree of life, expect God’s attention to your obedience.  He isn’t gong to let anything stand in the way of the fruit He wants to produce.