Read this passage from Mark 11:
11 Jesus entered Jerusalem and came into the temple; and after looking around at everything, He left for Bethany with the twelve, since it was already late. 12 On the next day, when they had left Bethany, He became hungry. 13 Seeing at a distance a fig tree in leaf, He went to see if perhaps He would find anything on it; and when He came to it, He found nothing but leaves, for it was not the season for figs. 14 He said to it, “May no one ever eat fruit from you again!” And His disciples were listening.
See anything interesting? Read it again!There are a couple of things. Jesus is hungry and want some figs. So he walks up to a fig tree and moves away the leaves to see if there is any fruit. He finds none, which according to Mark is no surprise he states, “it was not the season for figs.” Now to me this was odd, how does the Son of the Creator of the universe, in his 30′s not know that there would not be fruit? But it gets better, he curses the tree.I may be the only one that finds this wierd, but here is Jesus and the 12 staring at a leafy tree looking for fruit thats not in season. If that’s not wierd enough, Jesus (The Son of God), starts talking and getting mad at the tree (“May no one ever eat fruit from you again!”).I’m sure the disciples are thinking like I am, what the heck. This is Jesus. Our king. The Son of God. And he’s talking to a tree. We know he’s God because we have been with him for a while, we have seen people healed and fed, and raised from the dead. And now talking to a tree? What’s going on.But there’s a point to this whole story and to the actions of Jesus. Read verses 15-17:
15 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, 16 and would not allow anyone to carry merchandise through the temple courts. 17 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.’”
Now does it make sense? Still murky?Jesus was trying to teach the disciples something. You see the Temple was to be a place where people connected to God on the deepest level, but the congregation had forgotten that and turned it into a place that was no longer a place for connecting. It had become a place to make money and to exploit people, full of hypocrisy. The whole point of the previous verses was to open the eyes of the disciples, that what you see is not always the whole story. Jesus can see everything and he knows the deepest most secret parts of our hearts. He wants us to connect to him on the deepest level. The Temple was looking good and full of people, it was leafy. But the people were not connecting to God in the way they were supposed to, bearing fruit. Jesus longs to have relationship with people that have a true desire to connect with him, he’s looking for fruit. He wants to push aside the leaves of our lives, all the things we pretend to be and get to the heart of the matter, he wants to see our fruit.So no, Jesus was not mentally unstable, he was making a point. All from a few verses that I had never really “seen” before.