Fruit Trees, Wolves, and the Will of God: Part I

It would be difficult to find a passage in Scripture that scared me more as a child than Matthew 7:21-23. Every year or two, a good old-fashioned Baptist revival would roll through my hometown, and the visiting preacher would read those verses from the pulpit—his sermon conjuring images of hellfire and brimstone. His voice would boom,
 “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.’ “ 
I would go home unrefreshed and anxious, suddenly unsure of my salvation and the state of my soul, despite having been saved and baptized for years. I would pray in my bed at night for Jesus to “come into my heart” and save me over and over again, just in case I somehow did it wrong the first time. I mean, better safe than sorry, right? It wasn’t until years later, when I matured in my faith, that I realized the glaring issues with the way so many Christians interpret this difficult passage. What if the heart of Jesus was not to terrify his new followers with these words of judgment but to protect them by offering a gift of discernment? What if this was not a passage of condemnation, but one of glorious assurance and freedom?

Who Is the Passage Really About?

Just like all the other complicated passages in the Bible, context is everything. If we back up just a few short verses, we will quickly see that this is not a message directed at growing disciples but at false teachers who intentionally try to distort the Word of God. Matthew 7:15-20 says, “Beware of false prophets who come to you in sheep’s clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves. You will recognize them by their fruits. Are grapes gathered from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? So, every healthy tree bears good fruit, but the diseased tree bears bad fruit. A healthy tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a diseased tree bear good fruit. Every good tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Thus you will recognize them by their fruits.”

What is this “bad fruit” that false teachers tend to bear? 1 John 2:18-23 expands on this idea by equating the term ‘antichrists’ with human representatives of Satan. It is important to note that ‘antichrists’ are not some scary, mythical, all-powerful beings; rather, it is a catch-all term for anyone who denies Jesus is the Christ. The passage reads, “Children, it is the last hour, and as you have heard that antichrist is coming, so now many antichrists have come. Therefore we know that it is the last hour. They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us. But they went out, that it might become plain that they all are not of us ... Who is the liar but he who denies that Jesus is the Christ? This is the antichrist, he who denies the Father and the Son. No one who denies the Son has the Father. Whoever confesses the Son has the Father also.” 
These ‘antichrists’ are the same people that Jesus calls ‘false prophets’ in Matthew 7. 
They are people who use the Church and the message of the Gospel for their personal gain—either to accumulate power, amass wealth, take advantage of the vulnerable, or glory in their own fame. Think of the modern-day pastors and religious leaders who peddle the “prosperity gospel” and the “faith-healing” movement to exploit their congregants, all while having private jets, fabulous island homes, and insidious influence. Or, on a smaller scale, think of the people you have encountered who echo those words of Satan in the Garden of Eden when they argue, “But did God really say…?” 
Jesus also calls these kinds of people “ravenous wolves”. A ravenous wolf is a hungry wolf, willing to do whatever it takes to have a nice, tasty mutton dinner. They will use cunning, aggression, and a direct attack to find a sheep and kill it. These wolves may be in sheep’s clothing, but they are not under the guise that they are real sheep. They do not have the heart or the mind of a sheep, committing their lives to the ways of a sheep, only to be shocked when they suddenly realize that they were wolves all along! In a similar way, most false teachers distort the Gospel intentionally, acting like the Pharisees in Matthew 23 who Jesus describes as “whitewashed tombs which indeed appear beautiful outwardly, but inside are full of dead men's bones and all uncleanness.”

 If you were to get close enough to a wolf in disguise, you would eventually see its fangs, take in its unusual size, or hear its snarl—no matter how much wool it was hiding under. Similarly, no matter how extravagant and beautiful a wealthy crypt may be, you cannot enter it without immediately being met with the signs of decay, ruin, and death. However, there are also false teachers who have been genuinely misled. They are not necessarily spreading a false gospel with malicious intent but from a real misunderstanding of who Jesus is and what He came to do. Whichever it may be, there is no room for neutrality in the kingdom of God. We are either with Christ, or we are against Him. So, what does all of this mean for us as followers of Jesus?


Follow along for Part II and III of this article series to find out!