A Word for the Church: Capped-Off Roots

My Christmas cactus has taught me many lessons over the years I've managed to keep it alive. Yesterday, Palm Sunday (ironically, because it's a Christmas cactus, heh), it taught me another one.

This week is my favorite week of the year. I may have mentioned that once or twice, but here we are again. I love Christmas, I love the Christmas carols and the luminescent lights and the fun and joy and family and festive feel of the season, not to mention the story of the birth of the One I love more than anything or anyone. It's a hopeful season.

But Easter week is a victorious one! It's full of power and magnificence. It's the reason why any of this makes any sense at all. I still hear Sandi Patty's beautiful soprano around this time each year: Was it a morning like this when Peter and John ran from Jerusalem? And as they raced for the tomb, beneath their feet was there a tune? Did the grass sing? Did the earth rejoice to feel You again? Over and over, like a trumpet underground, did the earth seem to pound: "He is risen!" Over and over in a never-ending round, "He is risen!" Hallelujah! Hallelujah!!

And yesterday, as our children's director waved a palm branch on camera and spoke about the difference between "Hip-Hip-Hooray" and "Hosanna," it hit me that the cry of the people's hearts when they lined the road with palm branches and cloaks wasn't unfettered joy that their King was coming into Jerusalem, but was rather a joy eking out of pain: "Save us!" they cried. Save us!

And Jesus says, I am. Not in the way the crowd expects, but in a far greater way that they don't understand. Doesn't He always do that? He always upends our expectations, turns over our tables, moves aside our careful scripts and says: "Let Me show you what I want to do in you."

Back to my Christmas cactus. It's around twelve years old now. A friend gave it to me as a gift when my son was born. I've been worried about it for a while now. I guess "worried" isn't the right word, but I've been wishing I knew what I was doing wrong. It was looking a little dry and beginning to brown. Also, it's been maybe two years since it has sprouted its gorgeous bright pink flowers. 

I kicked up my watering routine, gave it lots of drinks, and made sure it was positioned in the warm sunshine that filters through our front window. 

With this new treatment, I looked for signs of improvement -- sprouting buds, greener leaves -- but no such luck. Now the leaves, instead of looking dry, began to look wrinkled, and I thought maybe I was giving it too much water. 

So I backed off.

Yesterday, it occurred to me that after years and years of using the same soil, without refreshment, the roots had sucked the nutrients dry, and the plant has suffered as a result. 

So I repotted it. We'll see what happens.

This morning, my Bible fell open to Mark 11, which gives us Day 2 of Holy Week. I decided the Lord had something to teach me, 'cause that timing was just... spot on, since today is, you know, Day 2 of Holy Week. :)

"The next day as they were leaving Bethany, Jesus was hungry. Seeing in the distance a fig tree in leaf, He went to find out if it had any fruit. When He reached it, He found nothing but leaves, because it was not the season for figs. Then He said to the tree, 'May no one ever eat fruit from you again.' And His disciples heard Him say it" (Mark 11:12-14).

My little cactus still has leaves, but over the last two years that it has refused to sprout flowers, I've decided I'm doing something wrong. Every year until two years ago, it had sprouted gorgeous flowers... but then, it stopped, and I can't help but draw the parallel between this Scripture and my plant.

That tree was alive, it sported leaves and greenery... but there was no fruit. A fruit tree that doesn't bear fruit, no matter how many pretty leaves it's got, is not fulfilling its intended purpose.

When I read the Mark passage, I thought: That's not exactly fair; it's not fig-fruiting season. And the Lord said, "Look at 2 Timothy 4:2." So I did: "Preach the Word; be prepared in season and out of season..." In other words, Jesus was teaching a little lesson here, and I was getting snared by the details. Always fulfill your intended purpose. There's no off-season here.

Mark leaves the fruit tree hanging in the balance for another couple of paragraphs, and he goes on. "On reaching Jerusalem, Jesus entered the temple area and began driving out those who were buying and selling there. He overturned the tables of the money changers and the benches of those selling doves, and would not allow anyone to carry merchandise through the temple courts. And as He taught them, He said, 'Is it not written: 'My house will be called a house of prayer for all nations'? But you have made it 'a den of robbers'" (Mark 11:15-17).

It took me a bit to see this paragraph as a commentary on the previous paragraph, since they're in two completely different settings with different imagery, but that's how I saw it this morning. 

Jesus sees a tree not fulfilling its intended purpose, and He says: "May no one ever eat fruit from you again." Jesus sees His Father's temple -- the place where people come to pray, seek the Lord, ask for forgiveness, atonement, worship -- turned into a marketplace, and He makes whips (which requires some forethought and preparation. This is not a fly-off-the-handle temper tantrum. This is calculated, specific reproof). He drives out the buyers and the sellers and overturns tables and benches. 

He clears the temple.

"Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, Who is in you, Whom you have received from God? You are not your own; you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your body" (1 Corinthians 6:19-20).

And this is where Jesus led me to today. 

We are not our own. We are bought at a price. Redeemed and marked with a seal. "He anointed us and set His seal of ownership on us, and put His Spirit in our hearts as a deposit, guaranteeing what is to come" (2 Corinthians 1:22).

Our temples are not there for the purpose of our own enterprises, are they? They're not set up to cater to what the world says belongs inside them. They aren't made for the purpose of our own business ventures.

We are bought at a price, and when our temples begin to look fruitless, when we have only leaves to show for our efforts, the Lord steps in and calls us to holiness -- sometimes in an attention-getting way. "Just as He Who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do, for it is written: 'Be holy, because I am holy'" (1 Peter 1:15).

Three days ago, the Lord showed me a vision of a plant in the ground. I had a cross-sectioned perspective; I could see the plant above ground, and I could also see the roots where they burrowed deep into the soil beneath the layer of turf. 

At the end of each root finger was a round bulb. As I watched the plant begin to wilt, I realized that because the roots were capped off by these bulbs, they weren't able to draw in the nutrients they needed to feed the plant. They had closed themselves off to the life-giving soil, and as a result, they were slowly starving themselves.

That vision has stayed with me for the last three days as I've been praying: Father, show me what You're saying here.

And this morning, when my Bible fell open to the story of the fig tree, it became clear. If we close ourselves off to growth, to the work of the Spirit, if we allow the world's agenda with its money-changers and its vendors and its ungodly influences to clutter up God's holy temple --

We are going to be fruitless. We are capping off our roots at the point of life. We are refusing the refining work of the Holy Spirit, and we are allowing the enemy's agenda to overtake God's house.

Jesus shows us what He does when His temple is no longer a fit dwelling place for Him. He overturns tables. It's not pleasant. On-site, I might have ducked for cover to see an angry man throwing money trays across the floor and cracking whips in the air.

Refinement is never easy, or pleasant, or comfortable.

The Lord doesn't say He'll be our snuggly lovey, although He's got His moments. He is far more interested in the conditions of our hearts (His temple) than He is in the care of our comfort-level. He is interested in holiness. He is interested in right relationship, in fruit-bearing.

Paul gives us a nice list of the fruits of the Spirit in Galatians 5:22-23: "But the fruits of the Spirit are love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control." 

But may I say, not one of those fruits can hang from our tree with wholeness and sweetness, without a healthy root system. Not one of those fruits can genuinely come from a temple that has not cleared space for a Holy God to live and work. If we cap off our roots, block out our nutrients, refuse to intake life-giving water...

We shoot ourselves in the foot.

Y'all, we are at a sensitive place in our global climate. We, as the church, are barraged by the elements: political elements, racial elements, conversations about what the Word says about our temples, and what we're supposed to fill them up with. 

Many, many have capped off their roots. It's too difficult to suck life from dry soil, so we've stopped trying. We're a plant, right? We've made it thus far; we'll be fine. Obviously, plants die when their roots die. 

So my question is this: Where are we rooted? Y'all, where are we getting our nutrients? From the news? From the neighbor up the road? From our circles of friends who give us all the latest gossip? From the entertainment industry? From alcohol, drugs, or other emotional emollients? 

Where. Is. Our. Focus?

Here's the thing about the Word -- Jesus, the Son of God, the One Who was in the beginning, and the One Who is now, and the One Who will be in the end, the Alpha and the Omega, the Lamb of God Who takes away the sins of the world, the Lion of Judah, the High Priest Who stands before His Father's throne and mediates for us, for us (whew!): 

He. Is. Our. Focus! He is the Word that is sweeter than honey and sour in our stomach, because He is a Consuming Fire (Hebrews 12:29), a Refiner of precious metal (Malachi 3:3). "So I went to the angel and asked him to give me the little scroll. He said to me, 'Take it and eat it. It will turn your stomach sour, but in your mouth, it will be sweet as honey" (Revelation 10:9).

My cactus had sucked the nutrients dry from its home soil of almost twelve years. It was high time for a repotting. This means -- removal from the comfort zone it has known for years, an uncomfortable tug free from its container. It means a loosening of the dirt around the roots and fresh soil added. The roots will now have fresh nutrients, but the process of repotting is a little stressful for the poor thing. It looks kind of wilty and sad this morning.

But I fully expect it to perk up in the next few days as the life-giving soil does its work.

We need to watch where our root system is planted, and stay open to the work of the Spirit. Don't get dredged down and distracted by the world's agenda. "You are not your own; you were bought at a price."

He paid the highest price. We owe Him open roots.