t
or in the lowly valley: all will resolve itself into the _one
question_--Where is your _fruit_? What evidence is there that you have
profited by My admonitions, listened to My voice, and accepted My
salvation? Where are your proofs of love to Myself, delight in My
service, obedience to My will? Where are the sins you have crucified,
the sacrifices you have made, the new principles you have nurtured, the
amiability and love and kindness and generosity and unselfishness which
have supplanted and superseded baser affections? See that the leaves of
outward profession be not a snare to you. You may be lulling yourselves
to sleep with delusive opiates. You may be making these false coverings
an apology for resisting the "putting on of the armour of light." One
has no difficulty in persuading the tenant of a wretched hovel to
consent to have his mud-hut taken down; but the man who has the walls of
his dwelling hung with gaudy drapery, it is hard to persuade him that
his house is worthless and his foundation insecure. Think not that
privileges or creeds, or church-sect or church-membership, or the
Shibboleth of party will save you. It is to the _heart_ that God looks.
If the inner spirit be right, the outer conduct will be fruitful in
righteousness. Make it not your worthless ambition to APPEAR to be holy,
but _be_ holy! Live not a "dying life"--that blank existence which
brings neither glory to God nor good to men. Seek that _while_ you live,
the world may be the better for you, and when you die the world may miss
you. Unlike the pretentious tree in our parable-text, be it yours rather
to have the nobler character and recompense, so beautifully delineated
under a similar figure three thousand years ago--"He shall be like a
tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in
his season. His leaf, also, shall not wither, and whatsoever he doeth
shall prosper."[34]

Let us further learn, from this solemn and impressive miracle, how true
Christ is to His word. We think of Him as true to His _promises_, do we
think of Him, also, as _true to His threatenings_? Judgment, indeed, is
His strange work. Amid a multitude of other prodigies already performed
by Him, this "cursing" of the fig-tree formed the alone exception to His
miracles of _mercy_.[35] All the others were proofs and illustrations of
beneficence, compassion, love. But He seems to interpose _this_ ONE, in
case we should forget, in the affluence of benig