ULDAH MINISTRY

No,84　　OCTOBER. 2002

【 SIGN ON THE FIG-TREE 】

　 …But unless you repent, you too will all perish." Then he told this parable: "A man had a fig-tree, planted in his vineyard, and he went to look for fruit on it, but did not find any. So he said to the man who took care of the vineyard. For three years now I've been coming to look for fruit on this fig-tree and haven't found any. Cut it down! Why should it use up the soil?' "'Sir', the man replied, 'leave it alone for one more year, and I'll dig round it and fertilise it. If it bears fruit next year, fine! If not, then cut it down.'"
Luke 13:5~9.

Early in the morning, as he was on his way back to the city, he was hungry. Seeing a fig-tree by the road, he went up to it but found nothing on it except leaves. Then he said to it, "May you never bear fruit again!" Immediately the tree withered. When the disciples saw this, they were amazed. "How did the fig-tree wither so quickly?" they asked. Jesus replied, "I tell you the truth, if you have faith and do not doubt, not only can you do what was done to the fig-tree, but also you can say to this mountain, 'Go, throw yourself into the sea,' and it will be done. If you believe, you will receive whatever you ask for in prayer."　　　　　　　　Matthew 21:18~22.

"Now learn this lesson from the fig-tree: as soon as its twigs get tender and its leaves come out, you know that summer is near. Even so, when you see all these things, you know that it is near, right at the door. I tell you the truth, this generation (race) will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened. Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away. No-one knows about that day or hour, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be at the coming of the Son of Man.
Matthew24:32~37.

It is no exaggeration to say that Israel is always in the news. Why is everybody so often concerned about this small country and why does it stand out so significantly in world affairs? A clear answer is in God's Word: This is Jerusalem, which I have set in the centre of the nations, with countries all around her (Ezekiel 5:5 line added), that is, it is because Jerusalem, the capital city of Israel is God's everlasting holy city, around which history has revolved and from which God's word will proceed to instruct nations in the ages to come. As God has providentially and progressively reflected His prophetic timetable of human history in Israel and Jerusalem as keys to the future, so what happens in Israel and Jerusalem today is very important to comprehend God's will and to grasp things to come over the rest of the world.
Jerusalem is one of the oldest cities on earth, enjoying around four thousand years of history. Layer upon layer of history is said to lie upon its bedrock, ninety feet below the present surface. Since it was inhabited by the Jebusite, followed by the conquest by King David to make it the spiritual centre of the world, it had been handed over to hands of the Gentiles ―Roman, Byzantine, Arab, Crusader and Turkish hands― until its restoration to the Jewish state in 1948. Countless nations have fought for Jerusalem; Assyrians, Egyptians, Babylonians, Greeks, Romans, Byzantines, Persians, Arabs, Crusaders, Turks, Britons and so on and the conflict is still going on as repeatedly prophesied in both Testaments. Many prophets, as well as Jesus Himself yearned for the restoration of both Jerusalem and the Jews. Therefore, Jesus' three parables regarding the fig-tree, quoted at the beginning, are significant in the respect of understanding God's plans for Israel, the Jews.
Fig-trees are interpreted in the Bible as a symbol of 'national and political life of Israel.' The figs denote a symbol of 'fruits of the Israeli nation,' and fig-leaves a symbol of 'self-made covering or self-atonement.' The first parable above was spoken in the context of teachings of repentance, somewhere along the Jordan River in Judea on His last journey to Jerusalem. The tree can be assumed to have been at least six years old by this stage because according to God's law, fruit trees were to be expected to produce their fruit holy enough to dedicate to the Lord after the fourth year onwards. In Palestine, if they were well established, fig-trees were expected to produce fruit for as much as ten months of the year. Accordingly, impatience of the owner of the vineyard was reasonable. Here, the owner is the Father, God of Israel and the caretaker of the vineyard is Jesus. Practising the Father's will is symbolised in the production of fruit, hence, growing leaves alone without fruit symbolically depicts self-dependent, self-conceited effort and work. While Jesus warned the Jews of God's judgment should they go on in their way of ―self-atonement―, neglecting Jesus' message; Unless you repent, you too will all perish, He also revealed His foremost desire to intercede for their redemption by pleading with the Father to extend His mercy upon the Jews, God's chosen ones.
Leaving the first parable unanswered, Jesus, some time later, spoke the second parable. This was a parable Jesus acted out, by cursing the fig-tree, and significantly it followed the other symbolic action of Jesus; cleansing of the Temple. Although both symbolic actions explicitly indicated God's judgment, they also implicitly connoted restoration after a period of cleansing through complete destruction. However, this is only seen clearly after the third parable. Returning to the second parable, Jesus, who felt hungry for the spiritual maturity of Israel that was due her God-ordained vocation; as a witness of God, especially at the time of urgency when the Father's time is about to be full, or in other words, when it was within a week before Jesus' crucifixion, which meant the end of His earthly ministry, desperately sought fruit. However, he found only leaves, i.e., self-made covering, man's attempt of self-righteousness, something that replaced the God-given atonement. No sooner had Jesus commanded the tree never to bear fruit again than it withered. The text may seem to mean that God has finished with Israel. However, some expositors argue that the Greek term used here is 'aion,' which depicts the present age but not forever. To put it differently, the text can be interpreted that the fig-tree will not be able to bear fruit in the present age of the Gentiles or during the church age. But after the duration of the time, the day will come when an unbelievable intervention of God will marvel the nations, but this will not be achieved without persistent and firm faith and also without fervent intercession. Obviously without Jesus' intercession for his own countrymen, the Jews, there will be no way for this be accomplished. Only Jesus, who voluntarily died on the cross for the salvation of all can materialise the Father's plans and hence, those who believe in Jesus and wholeheartedly pray for anything in His name according to the Father's will, will also see His great salvific work in their lives.
The third parable was spoken in the context of Jesus' prophetic discourse on the end of the age. When you see the first sign of the fig-tree sprouting, Jesus said to His disciples, you will know that the day of the redemption is near. Here Jesus presupposed that the fig-tree, representing Israel, still remained alive even if it had been cut down by God's judgment and that its stump would again produce branches. Considering the fact that in 70 C.E. the Jerusalem Temple was completely destroyed and the nation of Israel was scattered all over the world and that since then, Jerusalem had been trampled by the Gentiles until 14th May, 1948, the first sign of the fig-tree can be identified with a sign of the revived Israel as a nation, i.e., the day when the state of Israel was established. The fact that the conflict is still continuing since the regaining of her sovereignty in her land, and that it is not likely to cease, prophetically suggests that it will not end until the Jewish Messiah comes and the final battle is fought against all the nations that come against Jerusalem as foreseen by Zechariah and Ezekiel and Jesus Himself. Until God's supernatural intervention takes place, as we get near to the close of the age, the struggle will be more fierce and universal. However, whatever happens to Jerusalem and the race of Israel ('this race' in Jesus' words), Jesus declared that both will remain to the end and thus, that His own words will never fail in fulfillment, along with lots of prophecies in the Hebrew Bible. Jesus' words underlie plenty of prophecies related to God's unchanging faithfulness to the unconditional covenants with Israel in the Hebrew Bible: He who appoints the sun to shine by day, who decrees the moon and stars to shine by night, who stirs up the sea so that its waves roar -the LORD Almighty is his name: "Only if these decrees vanish from my sight," declares the LORD, "will the descendants of Israel even cease to be a nation before me." … "Only if the heavens above can be measured and the foundations of the earth below be searched out will I reject all the descendants of Israel because of all they have done," declares the LORD. (Jeremiah 31:35~37). On the day, when all the nations of the earth are gathered against her, I will make Jerusalem an immovable rock for all the nations. All who try to move it will injure themselves. On that day I will strike every horse with panic and its rider with madness," declares the LORD. …"The people of Jerusalem are strong, because the LORD Almighty is their God." …They will consume right and left all the surrounding peoples, but Jerusalem will remain intact in her place. (Zechariah 12:3~6).
Concerning the term, 'this generation' in the third parable some Bible text notes give an alternative interpretation, 'this race'. There are three different interpretations: One reads that the term refers to contemporaries of Jesus and of His immediate disciples. Although this interpretation does not appear to be what Jesus intended, the desolation of Jerusalem that Jesus prophesied was indeed fulfilled by what actually happened to Jerusalem by the Roman legions in October, 66 C.E. and finally to the Temple in 70 C.E. Another interpretation reads that the generation of people who were alive in 1948 when the stump of the fig-tree started budding again, i.e., when Israel became a nation, will not pass away until all Jesus' prophecies spoken in that context have been fulfilled. This view that the generation that would witness the re-creation of the Jewish State would live to see Jesus' Second Coming is widely accepted by Christian circles. However, if we direct our attention to Jesus' use of 'this,' instead of the use of 'that' generation, the third interpretation to render it as 'race' seems to be most adequate. The third one reads that the race who would witness the desolation of Jerusalem and dispersion of the nation out of the land, however, would not disappear but survive. To put it another way, the Jews would survive to see their Messiah's Coming. The fig-tree became barren, cut down under God's judgment and indeed, it once withered but the stump remains with its roots, to the end. Accordingly, shortly before Jesus' Coming it would put out branches and leaves again, which might significantly depict a re-birth of the Jewish State as a self-depending entity and not a God- fearing community in the present stage, and yet, finally it would come to produce fruit as the redeemed people, only under the rule of Jesus, their Messiah in the age to come.
However, following the re-appearance of the fig-tree, before the up-coming final fruitful age, Jesus foresaw how terrible these times will be by linking them to the days of Noah and the days of Lot. This will be a time when the whole world would forget God and turn their priority and interest to self-centred pleasure and gain and hence, by the Lord's return, man's wickedness will have increased beyond imagination. Unfortunately, there might be very few who realise that the Christendom to which Christians presently belong, has itself already severely secularised to the degree that its discipline is not different from that of the world where there is no absolute standards and law of God. Therefore, generally speaking, our days have rapidly been moving towards being carbon copies of the days of Noah and Lot. The warning of all Old Testament prophets that spiritual corruption as a result of the rejection of God is the root of all the problems ― moral, social, familial, economic, political, and religious, does not seem to have been taken heed of and therefore, we are undoubtedly heading for the climax of human history as Jesus foresaw.
Clifford Hill gives a sharp insight about our chaotic Godless age: 'In the philosophy of the age it is pointless to say that someone's actions are right or wrong because such concepts have no objective reality. The only values that count are what are right for each individual and the pursuit of his own personal goals and satisfaction.' He also points out pointless political policies in our deeply flawed civilisation: The drugs problem is being tackled by increasing surveillance at strategic points and prison sentences for offenders. Likewise, violent crimes, are dealt with by increasing sentences and the police force, family breakdown, by increasing financial benefits to single parents. Teenage pregnancy and under age sex, by making contraception available to children. Clifford warns us that we are just digging our own graves by hastening the day when our civilisation will crumble, unless we recognise our deliberate rejection of the very God-given values that promise the health and well-being of society (Prophecy Today Vol.18 No.5.).
Whitewashing the real cause by patching over each problem temporarily only when it arises will not bring any fundamental solution, which falls exactly in the same line with what was argued about measures for dealing with disasters such as floods in my last letter.

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This month a money gift has been sent to INTERNATIONAL BIBLE SOCIETY (UK) to support their ministry especially to Europe's flood victims. After the worst floods in more than a century, which is estimated to have affected 400,000 people, the Czech Republic and other flood-devastated areas of Europe have been in the process of clean-up and recovery. Christians, responding to calls to counsel, are helping victims, dealing with their emotional suffering and pain, added to their physical loss. Pray for IBS's effective out-reach with Scriptures and their 'disaster' booklet, "When Your Whole World Changes" to crisis-stricken people.

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