The Heart of the Crabapple Tree

 

[Some years ago, I heard a sermon with this story in it. This is my best recollection of the telling of that story. Dale Coparanis]

Just outside the fence which enclosed some of the best apple trees in the county, grew a crabapple tree. This crabapple tree was a very prolific tree and produced much fruit. When some local kids came by they tried the crabapples and spit them out of their mouths. One of the kids said: “How can such a big tree with so much fruit have apples that taste so bitter?” So one day soon after, when the farmer was tending the irrigation around some of the apple trees, the crabapple tree started to cry. The farmer went over and said to the tree, “Are you crying?” “Yes,” said the crabapple tree. “I just want to have nice apples like your other trees. Perhaps if you were to let me share in some of the irrigated water then I could produce nice apples for the kids to eat.” “If that’s what you want,” the farmer replied. So the farmer dug a ditch to bring some of the irrigated water to the crabapple tree. The next year, the crabapple tree’s apples were larger and juicer than ever before. The kids decided to give the tree another try since it was obviously different – at least at first glance. Again, they spit out what they had just bitten, muttered to themselves for repeating the same mistake from last year and then took some of the crabapples and started throwing them at each other for lack of anything else to do. This made the crabapple tree feel even worse than the previous year and it cried out. The farmer came over and the crabapple tree said: “I know you gave me the irrigated water, but that wasn’t enough. Your apple trees on the other side of the fence produce such good tasting apples – I see people coming to them every Fall and eating their apples with smiles on their faces. Perhaps the answer is for me to be on the other side of the fence so I can have people smile when they eat my fruit.” “If that’s what you want,” the farmer replied. So the farmer added a few lengths of fence and enclosed the crabapple tree inside. The next year, the crabapple tree’s apples were even larger and juicer than the year before. When the kids came by again, they thought since the farmer had enclosed the crabapple tree inside his fence that something definitely had to have changed; so they each took a crabapple and took a bite. “Phooey!” said one of the kids as he spit out what he had just bitten. “Nothing has changed. It just looks bigger and juicer on the outside but tastes the same on the inside - bitter.” After the kids moved on, the crabapple tree cried like it had never cried before. The farmer came over, again, and said, “What can I do for you now?” “I just want to have good tasting apples. I want it so badly…I’d do anything for it,” wailed the crabapple tree. “Anything?” “Yes, anything. It means so much to me to have good fruit and nothing I can do has worked.” “Are you sure?” “Yes, please, do what you have to do.” “OK.” The farmer went off, returned with a chainsaw and before the crabapple tree could say anything, the farmer had cut the crabapple tree down to a one and a half foot stump. But the farmer was not finished. After he cleaned up the now dead part of the crabapple tree, he brought some newly cut branches from his best apple trees and placed them in openings he had made in the stump. It took a few years, but the new tree grew and produced some of the best apples for that farmer. He kept the fence very near to the tree so that the kids walking by could eat the apples and when they did, they had smiles on their faces. You see, it is not bigger or better outward appearances or even the best of intentions that make a real difference. The best fruit is produced only when the heart truly changes.

So how does the heart change? We must be willing to die to our old self and be implanted with the righteousness of Jesus. There is no way any effort on our part can achieve what God alone can do - but we must be willing to go through the transformation.

Are you?