WMPC – Men’s Bible Study
Sermon on the Mount Study – Fall 2016
Lesson 10
Read Matthew 7: 15 - 23
3 Questions:
Q1: False prophets. Right out of the gate at verse 15. What makes a prophet false? Do you know one
when you see one? Take a few minutes and write your definition of a false prophet. Take another
moment and write down the names of three historical or current figures you think are false prophets. Be
prepared to share. While sharing, remember: the people you share with might disagree with your
selections. That’s OK, friends. It just may be that the disagreement proves the difficulty of the exercise.
Q2: Good trees = good fruit. Bad trees = bad fruit. Are you a good tree? Is it ever OK for the Christian to
believe that he is a good tree? Is it ever OK to think that as a Christian you have borne enough good
fruit? Inversely: is it fair to judge yourselves too harshly and thereby not recognizing the good fruit you
do bear? To get stuck in the cyclical belief that a bad tree you have been and a bad tree you will always
be? What is it that makes a bad tree a better tree?
Q3: Verses 21 - 23 are among the most difficult in all of scripture. You might want to read them 3 or
more times. We would recommend reading them out loud as well. Take some time and write a
minimum of 3 to 5 sentences on this question: What do you think verses 21 -23 mean to us in the 21st
century? How does it feel — if you put yourself in the place of one who is rejected — to have Jesus say,
‘Go away from me?’
Remember: if you have a study bible that gives you interpretations of the verses in the notes, try not
to read the editor’s thoughts before you record your own. ALSO: please don’t read insight number 3
— I3 below — before you record your own thoughts. What you think as a reader of scripture is
important! It is equally important to the experts who write study Bible notes and lessons like this one.
3 Insights:
I1: It is always interesting to us that Jesus — immediately following the Golden Rule (7:12) and his
thoughts about the difficult way of the Christian life (the narrow gate and the hard road, 7:13-14) —
with a warning about false prophets. Why? Our best guess is that Jesus is validating his teaching. If we
look back at the entire Sermon on the Mount (and by the time we reach our verses this week he is
nearing the end) we remember that Jesus has made many huge claims: turned the order of the world
over on itself in the beatitudes; declared that he did not come to eradicate the law but instead to fulfill
the law; taught them how to pray (the Lord’s prayer). He has, in a real and tangibly prophetic way,
begun a reinterpretation of the original listeners entire way of following God in the world. If he was a
false prophet, then what he has done in the Sermon on the Mount would be dangerous to the faith of
his followers. By naming the falsehoods of others and validating his teachings in verses 15 - 20 (e.g. his
teachings are the source of the good fruit and makes good trees) Jesus is declaring himself as a true
prophet through a lesson about the fruits of false prophets. It is an amazingly “cool” periscope and
critical portion of the larger Sermon on the Mount.
I2: Tom Wright, also known as N.T. Wright, jumps right into the true prophet/false prophet/good
fruit/bad fruit conversation in his book Matthew for Everyone (page 77).
“In the Old Testament, the test for true and false prophets was: wait and see! If the prophet
tells you that something is going to happen, you will discover whether they are truthful by seeing
whether it does. Jesus has a more graphic, and perhaps a quicker, method of detection. Look at the life
of the person who is offering you advice. Think of it like a tree. Can you see healthy, tasty fruit on this
tree? Can you see other people being genuinely nourished by it? Or is it, in fact, producing a crop of lies,
immorality and greed?
Within the Christian church there is always a temptation to ask different questions about
people, ‘Is he one of us?’ people enquire. ‘Does she belong to my party, to our group, to the proper
tradition?’ But parties, groups and traditions have a way of attracting both genuine believers and true
prophets on the one hand and hangers-on on the other. The only way to be sure is to look for fruit from
the tree, and to be sure what sort of fruit it is.”
I3: So what if a person is a bearer of bad fruit? What if a person is a real false prophet? And then, what if
that bad-fruit-false-prophet person goes around claiming faith and trust in Jesus? Representing Jesus in
a way that actually is leading people away from Christ while claiming to be leading them to Christ?
Always calling “Lord, Lord” while they are misleading the flock? If you like, now re-read verses 21 - 23.
Do they make any more sense now? Perhaps a more difficult question is this one: what does it mean to
do the will of “my (that is Jesus) Father in heaven”? Most immediately Jesus is saying that those who
make the teachings of the Sermon on the Mount real and active in the world are the ones who are doing
the will of the Father. In this light Jesus sets the bar extremely high. Higher than even the “narrow way”
in verses 13 - 14 of chapter 7. Jesus has thus laid down the final teaching and the ultimate warning of
the Sermon. And in so doing, find a truly genius way to call us to the true measure of his teaching.
3 Links to further study:
L1: From one of Christopher’s children’s favorite Christmas movies, How the Grinch Stole Christmas
(based on the Dr. Seuss book of the same name). Who is true, who is false? Whenever we see this movie
and see this scene I always think, “and a little child shall lead them.” While rather silly it makes the point
for children. And like the children’s sermon in worship, sometimes the wisdom of the young and lessons
for them are the most effective of all.
http://www.wingclips.com/movie-clips/how-the-grinch-stole-christmas/the-book-says
L2: We do not endorse this sight. It seeks (we think) to promote what the designers and web site
proprietors would define as true faith in Jesus. We think their definitions are quite limited and quite
flawed, to be perfectly honest. You’ll see if you look at this link that they (whoever they are) have it out
for televangelists in a big way. Is this fair? Back to that age old question: what is it that makes a true or
false prophet? In church members? In preachers? Again, we do not endorse the view point of the web
site. We simply include the link to show that the question of true/false prophets is alive and well in the
Christian-media internet sphere.
http://so4j.com/false-teachers