Intro: the bible is very illustrative in it’s teaching, many great teachings of the bible are pictures from everyday experience. The other day, Lauri was mentioning to me the importance of roots in scripture. That the life of Christ must take root in our spirits for us to be productive. In looking up the times we see root, roots or rooted, we see how this one picture of a root was used to teach many vivid lessons in the bible.
Do You Know Your Roots
1. Matthew 3:10—the prophet crying in the wilderness, John the Baptist proclaim a lesson on roots. Trees that don’t produce any fruit are cut down at the roots, pluck up and thrown into the fire. This was probably a common practice of the day, but now it is a spiritual analogy. That God expects there to be fruit in our lives, if there is none, we will be uprooted, and thrown into judgment.
2. Matthew 13:24-30—in this story we see that weeds and wheat grow up together. The enemy puts weeds in the harvest. Some suggested that the weeds be rooted up, but the owner of the field said, no way, because if you pluck up the weeds you will pluck up the wheat. The lesson is very practical, that good and evil dwell together in this world, and for God to uproot all the evil, the good would be hurt too, so in time, he will let good and evil take it’s full course, and at the last time, he will take everyone up for judgment, the good will go into blessing, the evil will be cursed.
3. I Timothy 6:10—in this example of roots, we find a practical teaching on money. Over the years I have heard people misquote this verse hundreds of time, they say, you know money is the root of all evil. But money is generic, it is lifeless, it can’t have an evil root. The true teaching on this subject, is when the love of money, takes root into someone’s spirit, into the fabric of their life, it produces all types of evil. There is nothing wrong with God blessing us with finance, as long as we don’t allow finance to become our first love, possessions taking possession of us. Most evil in this world can be traced to a wrong desire or motive, in the area of finance.
4. Hebrews 12:14-15 here is another example in the bible about roots. We are all encouraged to follow peace and holiness in our lives. So that we don’t fail in the grace of God by allowing a root of bitterness to spring up in us, which will defile many. Here is a simple lesson, things try to root into our spirit, we can have roots of peace, and holiness, or we can have roots of bitterness in our soul. We need to watch what is planted into us, so that we don’t allow anything to grow in our lives that would affect (defile) others.
5. Ephesians 3:17—rooted and grounded in love—this is a beautiful picture—that Christ dwells in us, and we are rooted and grounded in his love—
6. Colossians 2:7—rooted and built up in him—stablished in the faith-this is a beautiful picture, that our faith in Christ is rooted, our life has taken root in him.
7. Jude 12—what a terrible picture-clouds without water, carried by the wind, trees who’s fruit has withered, without fruit, twice dead, plucked up by the roots-
Jude is probably one of the most graphic painters in scripture, he never minces any words. He gives a picture of what it is to become worthless, a reprobate, someone who has renounced God and Jesus Christ. It is finalized with two statements, twice dead—it is the sign of a double cursed person, not only are they cursed with physical death, they had now died a spiritual death. Here’s where the roots come in, plucked up by the roots—this is the finality of walking away from God, there isn’t any connection left between this person and God.
Today we live in a world that many have so moved away from God, that there is no connection to God at all.
Close: tonight we have been, spiritual gardeners, we have studied the root systems of life. How are your roots? If they are healthy, they will produce good fruit, if they are evil, they will produce God’s wrath and judgment.
