As students of the Bible and Mary Baker Eddy’s writings, many of us have found that ideas we feel we don’t fully grasp—as well as those we may think we already do!—can continually yield new, fresh insights as we pray for inspiration. In my own experience, the account of Christ Jesus’ rebuking of the fig tree that bore no fruit (see Matthew 21:18–22) stands out as an example of this. I’ve come to see that the lessons from this fig tree account can bring a great deal to our understanding and practice of Christian Science.
Here we have Jesus coming across a fig tree with leaves but no fruit and condemning it to fruitlessness. The tree withers away, much to the astonishment of Jesus’ disciples. What are we to make of this?
In this case, the tree, which should have borne fruit since it already had its leaves, represented an unproductive manifestation of error, rather than being an indication of God’s reality. After all, Jesus never destroyed good. In fact, at the heart of his teachings and example is the fact that God, good, is all-powerful, and that God’s perfect, spiritual creation—which includes us—is as indestructible as He is. So whatever is not good, whatever would suggest that God is not All or that man could be separated from Him, must be untrue, a mistake.
