We shall now turn to Matthew's Gospel, chapter 7, and our text for tonight is verse 17. Matthew 7 and verse 17. Even so, every good tree bringeth forth good fruit, but a corrupt tree bringeth forth evil fruit. Jesus' Sermon on the Mount is a very searching sermon. It's not abstract theology, nor is it a lecture in cold morality. It's practical. It's experimental. It deals with our Christian experience. It speaks to the heart of his hearers. Here he says, a tree is known by its fruits. Last month, everyone would know what kind of tree it was that was in the middle of our back garden. It was covered with plums, so it was easy. You knew it was a plum tree. At the end of our street, there's some waste ground. Thorns and thistles grow there. You don't go to the thorns looking for grapes, do you? We wouldn't go along to that waste ground looking for figs, would we? No. Thorns and thistles don't produce grapes and figs. A good tree brings forth good fruit. And an evil tree, a corrupt tree, brings forth corrupt fruit. So there's a question for us here tonight. What kind of tree are you? Are you a good tree, bringing forth good fruit? Or an evil tree, bringing forth evil fruit? Well, what is evil fruit? Paul talks about this in Galatians chapter 5. He talks there about the works of the flesh, the evil fruit that our sinful human nature produces. And what is that? The works of the flesh are adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, sedition, heresies, envies, murders, revilings, revelings, such like. These are evil fruits. Do you bring forth evil fruits? Are you an adulterer, unclean, lascivious, an idolater? Are you involved in hatred, falling out with people, wrath, heresies, envies, murders, drunkenness, Revelations? Do these things describe you? These are the evil fruits that mark out the unconverted tree. What then is the good fruit? Again, in Galatians chapter 5 we're told, the fruit of the Spirit. What is the fruit of the Spirit? Love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance. Against such there is no law, and they that are Christ's have crucified the flesh with its affections. What kind of fruit do you produce? The Lord's people bring forth good fruit. And if we're going to sit at the Lord's table, we're marked out by good fruit. But if we're producing evil fruit, we've got no right to think of ourselves as the Lord's people. And we've no right to sit at the Lord's table. So I'd like us to look tonight at some of the good fruit. And we'll really, we'll just look at the first four of these fruits of the Spirit mentioned in Galatians 5. And the first of these is love. Love is one of the great fruits of a born-again Christian. Love for God is not natural to us. By nature, we hate God. Remember Adam. Once he had sinned and God came into the garden. What did he do? Did he run up to God? No, he went away to hide. Adam, where art thou? Hiding in the trees, himself an Eve. You see, when sin comes into the world, when Mankind fail. They run away from God. They hate God. They don't want God there. Man by nature is conscious of the wrath of God abiding on him. We have, every one of us, a conscience. And the conscience tells us that we do things wrong. And the unconverted would wish that there was no God and no Judgment Day. Are you like that? Would you wish that there's no God, no Judgment Day? But then, once you're born again, things are so different. Born once, you hate God. Born twice, you love God. You love God. because he first loved you and the love of Christ constrains you. You come to the cross of Christ and there you see the Son of God dying in your womb and place. He loved me and he gave himself for me and you think how amazing, I've got hope, I've got heaven before me because God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. God sent his Son, sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through him might be saved. God's amazing gift to us. God spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all. How amazing. He loved me and he gave himself for me. God commendeth his love toward us in that while we were yet sinners and rebels, Christ died for us. And now we love him. When we're converted, when we're born again, when we know that our sins are forgiven, Everything's different. We're drawn by the chords of his love. He woos us to himself. We cannot but love him. And every Christian is distinguished by this. If any man love not the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be anathema, maranatha. Anathema, accursed. If you don't love Jesus Christ, you're cursed. Maranatha, the Lord is coming. The judgment day is approaching. Make sure, make sure you love the Lord Jesus. and everyone who's born again, born of the Spirit, born from above, something amazing happens. God, the Holy Spirit, comes to live in our hearts. The enmity towards God is taken away and we love Him. And we love Him particularly because we know our sins are forgiven. It's a wonderful thing to discover that God is no longer angry with you, no longer cursing you, no longer threatening to cast you into hell, but that God has adopted you and he loves you. Behold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us that we should be called the sons of God. How amazing You and I, children of the devil by nature, sons of God by grace. And when you know that you've been forgiven, and you know the mountain of sins that has been forgiven, your heart goes out in love towards God. I remember when I struggled with assurance, people would say to me, do you love God? I found it so hard to say I did. And then one day, I had assurance of my salvation. And I knew I loved God. I loved God because He first loved me. I loved God because the Son of God had died on the cross of Calvary for me. He was wounded for my transgressions. He was bruised for my iniquities. The chastisement of my peace was upon him. By his stripes, I am healed. How amazing! Isaiah 53 becomes personal to me. He made His soul an offering for my sins. How amazing, all that Christ endured, all the pain, the misery, the suffering, the agony, for me. And we love Him because He first loved us. So love, love is a great mark of a Christian. Fruit of the Spirit is love. Where the Spirit comes to dwell, He stirs up love in the heart. Do you love God? Do you love Jesus Christ? Is He special to you? Is He precious to you? Do you love your Heavenly Father? Do you love the one to whom you're engaged, the Lord Jesus Christ, betrothed. Do you love the comforter, the helper, the encourager, the sanctifier, the one who's come to live in your heart? The Spirit of God assures us that we are the children of God, enabling us to cry, Abba, Father. The Spirit witnessing with our spirit that we are the children of God. We love God. And we love, because we love God, we love God's Word. Do you love the Bible? Love to read it, every day reading it, meditating upon it, thinking about it. Do you love church? You come to church tonight not because you have to, because you love to come, you want to come, and you want to join in worshipping the one you love. And you love the people of God, they're the best people, your fellow Christians, they're so important to you, your brothers and sisters in Christ. Do you love to pray? Do you love to sing psalms to praise God? Do you love to talk about God and the things of God and to have fellowship with Christians? Do you love the Sabbath day? Or is the Sabbath day a long boring day and you prefer every other day of the week? Well that's the unconverted. They have no love for the Lord's day. But the Lord's people love the Lord's Day, the best day of the week, to engage in public and private exercises of worship. Here then, we have the first great mark of the Christian. It's love for God, love For all that belongs to God, for the word of God, the law of God. Oh, how love I thy law! It moves my study all the day. It makes me wiser than my foes, for it doth with me stay. It's sweeter than honey, it's more desirable than fine gold. You love the law of God. I delight in the law of God after the inward man. Deep down inside us, though we sometimes sin, yes, we still sin, but we delight in the law of God. We know it's good. The unconverted, they see the law of God as threatening and heavy and hard and difficult, and they wish it wasn't there. But the Christian loves God's commandments. We love the Lord. We love his law. We love his day. We love his home in heaven, and we look forward to going to heaven. Not a sensual heaven, but a spiritual heaven. To see the king in his beauty, to hear our beloved, to fellowship around the throne of God, feeding upon the heavenly manna of the truth. There then we have a great mark of the Christian. But then secondly, the second fruit that the Christian bears is joy. Now that maybe surprises many people. And the unconverted sometimes think, well, the Christians are a miserable lot. What a boring time they have. I often wonder what our neighbours think of us, seeing us going so often to church. They see us with our Bibles there and they talk about it sometimes. What do they think? What a miserable life these people have. But no, as a Christian, you have great joy. The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, joy. You see, Yes, we grieve over sin and we sorrow for it. And Jesus said, blessed are they that mourn. And we do mourn. But it's not a hopeless mourning and a grievous mourning. It's, as Rabbi Duncan said, a joyous mourning. and a mourning grief, and a grievous joy and a joyous grief. The two go together. There's a mourning for sin, but there's a rejoicing. All my sins are forgiven. Everything I did in the past is forgiven. And not just that, but the sins of tomorrow and the sins of the rest of my life, they're all pardoned, forever gone. And there's joy in that. How wonderful. Whatever I ever did or will do, it's pardoned, washed away with the blood of Christ, being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Peace, justified, sins pardoned, and we rejoice in our Saviour. We rejoice in forgiveness for our sins. We rejoice in the presence of the Holy Spirit in our lives. We're actually the happiest people in the world. You know, the unconverted, they're always looking for happiness, striving here, striving there. Ezekiel puts it like this, they're going to broken cisterns that can hold no water. They're running to drink, and they're running to drugs, they're running to sex, and they're going to parties, and they've got this great holiday in front of them, and they think they're going to be so, so happy, and they're always striving, and they find that when they come to it, the bubble bursts in their hand. There's always sickness, bugs, troubles, things going wrong because we live in a cursed world and every pleasure has an emptiness in the middle of it. But the pleasure of the Christian is a fountain of living waters, a well of joy bubbling up forever. Rejoice in the Lord always. Always, in every situation. And again I say, rejoice. There's no reason to stop rejoicing. Whatever you're going through, rejoice. Whatever the situation and circumstances, rejoice. Be glad. Yes, all people clap your hands to God. With voice of triumph, shout. Rejoice. Be glad, we have a fountain of living water. This Spirit fills our heart, and as He fills our heart, He fills us with joy unspeakable and full of glory. Some people think that refers to heaven, but it doesn't. It's referring to this life. The Christian has joy unspeakable and full of glory. rejoicing in the Lord, being joyful in the God of our salvation. We rejoice in church. I joyed when to the house of God, go up they said to me. We joyfully sing Psalms, we joyfully pray to God, we joyfully read his word, we joyfully hear the promises of scripture preached to us, we joyfully hear the instruction that is given to us. We joy in the promises of God's mercy and his love and his keeping. We joy in the great things of God. And we joy in the victory that is ours. We are more than conquerors through him who loved us. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. More than conquerors. And you know, Even a little moment of the felt presence of the Lord is a greater joy than anything this world can give. I'd rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God, standing at the door getting a little glimpse than dwelling in tents of sin in the tabernacles of the wicked and lying about on the sofas of their luxury. A little joy from the Lord, so beautiful. And if a moment of God's presence here on earth is so sweet, how wonderful it will be to be in heaven where the joy is never broken. Joy. The Holy Spirit, when he comes into our hearts, gives us joy. When sin reigns, grief reigns, misery reigns. But when we rejoice in our justification by faith, our sins forgiven, when we rejoice in the promises, when we rejoice in Calvary's cross, The world think we're daft. Joying on the cross, a man suffering and dying on the cross, and yet that fills our hearts with joy. We see our Saviour crying out, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? And our hearts are thrilled because we know He was forsaken for me. How amazing, Christ, the Son of God, forsaken for me. Dying in my Roman place. Joy. Joy in the Lord. What a wonderful God we have. What a wonderful gospel we have. Glad tidings of great joy. The way of salvation for miserable, perishing men and women. The way to joy. The way of salvation is the way to joy. Happy, happy art thou, O Israel, who is like unto thee, a people saved by the Lord. Are you a happy Christian? Happiness and joy, joy in God, that's another great mark of a Christian. And the third fruit is peace. The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace. And here we have another great fruit from the Christians' tree, peace. Peace is rare in this world. Even in Europe, with all its civilization, we find war, Russians, invading Ukraine, three miserable years of war, of death and misery and destruction of property and of lives. We look in the Middle East, there we see Israel fighting against the Palestinians and the Iranians, the Hamas and the Houthis and the Hezbollah and all these other groups, the Muslim Brotherhood and the Iranians and so on. War. Go to Africa and you find the Islamic jihadists causing devastation and destruction in so many countries. Go to Afghanistan, you see war and violence. And then you go back to our own country and you see political parties at war with one another. You see war in the workplace, strikes. You see wars in families, people falling out and divorces and all the rest of it. Wars in the school. I was hearing tonight about little children, five year old children spitting in the face of their teachers. So much That is so evil, all this lack of peace, people troubled and disturbed and fighting and aggression. And war in the hearts of the unconverted. The Bible tells us that the wicked is like a troubled sea, casting up mire and dirt. I'm sure you've all been down at the seaside and in rough weather, where there's a gale blowing, and you see all the rubbish being thrown up by the sea, a troubled sea, casting up mire and dirt. Well, that's the heart of the wicked. There's no rest, no peace for the wicked. Always turmoil, always sin, always wickedness, always disturbed. But the Christian, We have peace. First, we have the most basic peace, which is peace with God. Galatians 5, verse 1, being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. God is angry with sinners every day. The wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, but we have peace with God. real peace. God is at peace with us and God has reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ. Christ is our peace. He offered himself to God as a sacrifice to make peace between God and man. He propitiated the wrath of God, turning it away from us onto himself. And you and I have peace Through Christ, being justified by faith, we have peace with God. And that's a wonderful thing. Some people have peace with God and they don't know it. They lack assurance. It's great to have peace with God, whatever. But having peace with God, we should strive to have assurance. Strive to make your calling and election sure. Make sure that you're one of God's people. Look for these marks of grace and look for the spirit, witnessing with your spirit that you're a child of God. Seek from God the assurance that he gives. so that you not only have peace with God but you have peace in your heart because you know that Christ is your peace and you have the Holy Spirit testifying that you're in a state of peace. So peace in the heart, a great thing. Peace, the peace of assurance, it's a wonderful thing. Conviction of sin, a sense of guilt, miserable. We don't want to be in that situation, but having peace. And then, when you become a Christian and you have peace with God, you also have peace with your neighbour, because Christ taught us, love your enemies. Be like your Father in heaven, who sends his rain upon the just and the unjust, who causes the sun to shine upon the righteous and the wicked, Love your enemies. When you become a Christian, yes, you do love your enemies. You can love them and you overcome enmity. Because you argue, as Paul does in Romans chapter 13, vengeance belongeth unto me. I will repay, saith the Lord. You leave it to the Lord. You don't have to take your revenge on anyone. Whatever they do to you, you can leave it. You can forget about it. Leave it to God. If your enemy hunger, feed him. If he thirst, give him drink. And in so doing thou wilt pour coals of fire upon his head. So don't worry about enemies. No, we are at peace. The Spirit of God gives us peace. Peace with her. Yes, with our Christian friends, of course. We know that we have passed from death into life because we love the brethren. But, peace with the unconverted too. Peace with those who are nasty to us. We don't have to be nasty back. We can leave God to sort that out. It's not our business. We love our enemies. And then, peace in our circumstances. When things go wrong and when there's troubles and when everything's looking so threatening, we remember a wonderful promise in the scriptures, Romans 8.28. All things work together for good, to them who love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose. All things, not just some things. When things go wrong for the unconverted, they're all upset and worried and anxious and stressed. They feel that they've had bad luck and something's gone wrong and it's terrible and they're all stressed, but the Christian says no. All things work together for good. God's in control. So peace with circumstances. God's in control. Your heavenly father cares. He's providing for you. Take no thought what you shall eat or what you shall drink. What you shall put on, consider the fowls of the air, they sow not, neither do they reap, and yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Consider the lilies, they don't spin or sow or make clothes, and yet Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like a lily, not so beautiful as these wild flowers. God looks after you. You have peace because you can trust God. I have been young, said the psalmist, and now I'm old. Yet have I never seen the just man left, or that his seed for bread have beggars been. You won't be a beggar because you're God's child. Be at peace and rejoice. Don't worry. Whatever burdens you have, come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, leave them with me. Take my yoke upon you, for my yoke is easy, and my burden is light, and you shall find rest unto your souls. And whatever we're going through in this life, soon over, and then the great eternity, eternal blessedness, your treasure is in heaven. So whatever losses you suffer here, well, one day we're going to lose everything anyway. But your treasure is in heaven. And you'll never lose what's in the heavenly bank. It's safe and secure. A safe deposit forevermore. Peace. Peace with God. Peace in your heart. Peace with people around you. Peace with your circumstances. peace in your situation. Godliness with contentment is great gain. Tremendous words, isn't it? Godliness with contentment. That's the best life. Godly and content. Because your great father in heaven is looking after you. And then, fourthly, longsuffering. The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering. In nothing does the Christianity of a true Christian shine more than in longsuffering. You see a Christian who's sick, they're lying on their bed, they're in pain, they're in weakness, they're in distress, and there's a smile on their face. I've often seen it. I've often seen the Christian die and the face smiling with the radiance of heaven. It's a wonderful thing. How different is the deathbed of the wicked, screaming and cursing. But oh, the Christian, the Christian is long-suffering. Whatever we have to endure in this life, whatever sicknesses, whatever pains, whatever troubles, we can smile. We can be radiant in the midst of it all because There's a purpose in everything that happens. God's in control. When things go wrong, we say, well, God's maybe chastising me. There's something I'm doing that's wrong. I have to search my heart. And if there's something wrong there, I must repent of it. And it's wonderful that God doesn't spoil me and lead me to spoil and destroy myself. He corrects me. And I thank God for his chastisement. Whom the Lord loves, he chastens, and because he loves us, he chastises us. And therefore we respond positively to chastisement, to correction and discipline. And sometimes when he sends troubles to us, We can't see any specific sin for which it has come, like job of old. It's come really as a trial, not as a correctional chastisement, but so that we'll be better Christians. And when I am tried, I shall come forth as gold. God is purifying us so that these hard things in our lives And they're in order to make us better Christians, more godly, more devout, more holy, more zealous, more beautiful. You know, if our life here was always easy, we wouldn't want to leave this world. We'd be so earthly-minded. But God sends things to trouble us. A bit like a bird when its little ones are ready to start flying, the bird steers up the nest so it's a bit prickly and not very comfortable for the little ones. And so God makes our nest here below quite prickly so that we want to get out of it. And we look forward to going to heaven. Blessed are the dead that die in the Lord from henceforth. Yea, saith the Spirit, they do rest from their labours, and their works do follow them. Long-suffering. No, when wicked, when things go wrong with them, they fume, they're angry, they're seeing their bad luck, they think it's all chance, but we're a Christian. A Christian knows there's a purpose in everything. And nothing has happened that's bad luck. Because nothing happens by chance. It all happens by the will of God. The God who loves us with an infinite love. infinite, eternal and unchangeable love. He always loves us and always will love us and therefore we can rejoice that there's a good purpose in everything that happens. He's keeping us from destroying ourselves by going astray so he corrects us and disciplines us. He's purifying us so that we will shine as the stars in heaven forever and ever. When we make mistakes, we need Him to spare because God is there and God picks us up and He sorts things out. God never gives up on us. We think He should, but no, God never gives up on any of His children. David sinned terribly, adultery. And murder, did any of you commit murder? David did. The sweet psalmist of Israel, a man after God's own heart. You know, we can fall and we can rise again. Though I fall, I shall arise again. Though I sit in darkness, the Lord shall be a light unto me. Hallelujah. There's a purpose in everything. God knows what he's doing. God cares for us. He's our father. And he loves us more than any earthly father ever loved his children. And so we're long-suffering. We bear with troubles and trials and so on without complaining. That's a fruit of the Spirit. So a good tree brings forth good fruit. An evil tree brings forth evil fruit. What kind of fruit do you bear? Now, I'm not asking you, are you perfect? None of us are. But do you have some love for God? Do you have some rejoicing in Christ? Do you have some peace with God through the Lord Jesus Christ? And do you have some long-suffering as you depend upon Sovereign God as your Father to care for you? These are the good fruits that the Lord is looking for in our lives. And these are the things that mark us out as good trees. And these are the things that are marks of grace so that we can come to the Lord's table rejoicing in our Lord, remembering his death till he come, thinking of all he endured for us on the cursed cross of Calvary, and seeing it is a wonderful privilege to remember the Lord's death till he come. Let's pray. O Lord our God, we thank Thee for this glorious gospel of God's redeeming grace. We thank Thee, Lord, that Thou has not left us as Thou has left so many of mankind to perish in their sins. We thank Thee, Lord, that Thou didst enter into our experience and Thou didst transform us from being corrupt trees into being good trees. And by Thy grace, we are enabled, even in a small way, to bear good fruit. Help us to be more fruitful. Help us more and more to love Thee and to love everything that belongs to Thee. Help us more and more to rejoice in the Lord and in the gospel and the good things of God and the presence of the Lord and the Spirit of God. Help us more to have peace, peace of assurance, peace of conscience, peace with our fellow man, peace in our circumstances. Help us, Lord, to be more long-suffering, more enduring, rejoicing in tribulation, because tribulation works patience, and patience, experience, and experience hope. and that hope is not made a shame because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost who is given unto us. So bless us then each one and encourage us in thyself and bless this communion season that it might be a precious time to thy people here for Jesus' sake. Amen.