Theme; Profession and Practice
This week's lesson is a warning of dangers of hypocritical thinking and actions.
Scripture
Matthew 21:18-23
In the morning, as he was returning to the city, he became hungry.And seeing a fig tree by the wayside, he went to it and found nothing on it but only leaves.
We are in a section of Matthew’s Gospel that I have titled “The King’s Final Break with Judaism,” and we should be aware of how this is unfolding by now. We have had two symbolic actions: 1) the triumphal entry of Jesus into Jerusalem in which the Lord presented himself as Israel’s true King, knowing that he would be rejected by both the leaders and the masses of the people; and 2) the cleansing of the temple, which would be no more permanent now than it had proved to be the first time. In the verses we come to now we have a third symbolic action: the cursing and withering of the fig tree.