By What Authority

By What Authority

(Malachi 3,4 and Matthew 21)

By what authority 

Do you do these things?

In their robes of power

They question the one who brings

Refining fire, cleansing water,

True righteousness to purify

And to be a witness

Against those who terrify 

Widows and orphans, strangers

And those oppressed 

By self-righteous men

In their purple robes dressed

Now to find fault with

The messenger of the covenant 

Was the way

To prove that He wasn’t sent

In the name of the LORD

“Hosanna in the highest!”

The crowd had shouted

From tyranny they wanted rest

To prove that He had no right

To enter the temple and flip the tables,

And call them thieves

He wasn’t able

To heal the lame,

Give sight to the blind

He had no authority

To be this kind

To sinners!

Mere infants and babes

While calling chief priests

Robbers and knaves

So now they had him 

Who gave you authority?

They haughtily asked

Breathlessly waiting to see

I’ve a question for you 

He said to them

Knowing their hearts

He exposed their sin

I do the will of the father

But I say to you

That tax collectors and prostitutes

Will see God's Kingdom before you

The land owner’s Son is here

But in your pride and arrogance 

You’ll capture and kill Him

And seize His inheritance 

The Father’s kingdom

Will be taken from you

And given to sinners

Who produce the fruit

Of faith in the Son

They repent of their pride

They fear His name

And from their sin don’t hide

Elijah the prophet has come

The children’s hearts to restore

The arrogant Pharisee

Will be no more

Like chaff in the wind

They fly away,

God’s chosen like the sun

Will shine on that great day

Christ, the True Fig Tree

The fig tree is another of the incredible types and shadows in the Scriptures pointing to Christ our only hope in life and death.

Rather than the story of the fig tree causing one to examine themselves by their own standards and think that they are safe, I believe the message of the fig tree is the same that Jesus was always teaching which was this…

“Who then can be saved, with men this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.”

You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; it is these that testify about Me;

— John 5:39

Then beginning with Moses and with all the prophets, He explained to them the things concerning Himself in all the Scriptures.

— Luke 24:27

I am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing.

— John 15:5

When the first Adam fell,

Against God did rebel,

With fig leaves he’d tried

His sin to deny.

Ever since, the fig tree’s a teacher,

It’s fruit a preacher,

Pointing to the one;

A shadow of the Son.

God promised to crush the serpent

By a Son who was sent

To suffer God's anger

And save his children from danger.

Ever since, his children are known

By fruit that is sown,

Grown, and reaped 

In the heart of God’s sheep.

Chosen by God, as trophies of grace

Only the blood bought can see His face.

Fruit born of God, so that no man may boast,

So the fruit of the fig tree represents those

Who were born not of the will of flesh or of man

But of God who alone can

Make the fig tree bear fruit

Or curse it, and kill its root

So the Scripture’s always pointing to Jesse’s root

Who alone would bear the perfect fruit

Required of man to with God be

In fellowship, and perfect harmony

They (the Scriptures) with the fig tree

Preach that He

Can alone create light out of dark

And soften the hard heart

The one who holds all things together,

By His powerful word and controls even the weather 

Gives one tree its figs, curses another

Life to His sheep, while others still weep

Israel, planted by God’s hand

And given a land

By its own strength could not bear,

Cursed works of their hands, no fruit was there 

But the promised Son 

Forever the one

Who alone 

For sin could atone

Makes the fig tree bear, 

Makes the sinner wear

His righteous robes,

And fruit then shows

Fruit like humility, mercy, and peace,

Mourning, gentle, and merciful are these

Trees that God planted and caused to bear 

The fruit of His Son in them to share

Life everlasting, His grace alone

In His children has shone

In our hearts, His light

Our fruit, His might.