Jekyll or Hyde?

Consider this story:  A woman went out to a vacant weedy litter cluttered city lot to plant two trees.  For the first tree she dug a hole in the rubbish of broken beer bottles, ripped up lotto tickets, used syringes, empty food cans and wrappers, broken toys and old car parts.  She planted the tree and watered it thoroughly leaving it to fend for itself in that filthy hole and taking its sustenance whenever the rain fell to water it.  For the other tree, she dug a huge hole, filled in the hole with compost and good soil and planted the tree firmly in it.  She watered it well and checked on it often to see to it that even in the dry spells it received plenty of water.  The first tree grew slowly.  It was weak, and spindly.  In good rains, it blossomed and leafed out but fruit was extremely rare.  The second tree grew tall and lush.  It always blossomed and the fruit was delicious.  Children from the neighborhood would come and play in its shade and climb among its branches, thankful for the safe cool place to play in the heat of summer.  Thankful for a haven in which to play away from the nastiness of the life in which they lived.  Moms would gather and talk and laugh underneath its shade, grateful for the relief from the heat and thankful for the fruit to help feed their children.

Which tree are you? 

Are you the first tree planted in the rubbish of life?  Do you go to church on Sunday mornings, your Bible in hand, looking all nice, but stiff, in your Sunday best? Do you then go home and join the masses of folks going to work each week, nose to the grindstone forgetting what you heard, never opening your Bible again all week long? Perhaps you join in the raucous laughter of dirty jokes told in the break room?  Perhaps you head to the pub after work for beers with your buddies?  Perhaps you stop off by the convenience store for the daily lotto ticket hoping to win your fortune?  Maybe you yell and cuss your kids out when they interrupt you reading the paper or your favorite sports magazine?  Perhaps you come home to watch the soap operas you DVR’d or that R rated movie everyone else is raving about?   Are you Hyde?  Do you think that you are doing all the right stuff by going to church each week as Jekyll, but then turn to Hyde all week after that joining in the worlds ugliness, taking part in the filth?  Are you like that first tree, getting scant rain as you worship each time you manage to go (around your fishing trips, vacations, sleeping in or shopping trip needs) and then trying to grow amid the rubbish of life?  You think you are living a noble life, walking among sinners like Christ did, but are you really walking like He did?  He walked among them with compassion on them.  He served them giving them relief and rest.  He ate with them, yes, but He called them out on their sin and didn’t participate in the sin with them.  Are you doing this?  If you are joining them in the sin, you are telling them being a Christian is nothing different than what they already live like, that they don’t need to change.  And they won’t change.  They won’t want to know Him.   Are you Hyde? 

I have lived like Hyde, all too often in my life.  I think we all do.  I have worked under the pressure of nasty folks who wanted me to fit in with the group and be like they were.  I had to walk the line of joining in or being different.  I understand that road very well. I also went to school with them. Some of you do too. 

 I also know I want to be like Jekyll.  I want to be good and sweet and nurturing and loving and compassionate.  I want to be that second tree, firmly planted in good soil, reading His word all week long, spending time in prayer, worshipping each week with others who are also firmly planted.  Well watered.  Growing and impacting those who are needing Christ, loving them, helping them, encouraging them, listening to them. Showing them what true rest and shade is.  Giving them a place to come that is different and refreshing.  They are thirsty.  They are rooted in that rubbish too.  They want good fruit. I want Him to produce that fruit through me.  I want to dare to be different.  Dare to love yet, not participate in the sin.  Dare to show someone that Christ is faithful and will be all that they need in life and that they don’t need that rubbish to be happy.

I long to be Jekyll all of the time and to leave Hyde behind forever.  Do you? 

In Luke 13:6-9 Jesus calls us to repentance using a parable: 

 ⁶And He began telling this parable: "A man had a fig tree which had been planted in his vineyard; and he came looking for fruit on it and did not find any.
 ⁷"And he said to the vineyard-keeper, 'Behold, for three years I have come looking for fruit on this fig tree without finding any. Cut it down! Why does it even use up the ground?'
 ⁸"And he answered and said to him, 'Let it alone, sir, for this year too, until I dig around it and put in fertilizer;
 ⁹and if it bears fruit next year, fine; but if not, cut it down

In contemplating this, I have spent more time reading in the Gospels.  I want to see how Jesus lived.  He walked among the needy, sinners, broken, and sick.  He had compassion.  But He also called folks to walk away from their sin.  He didn’t participate in it.  How did He do that?  Yes, He is God.  But He also took lots of time away in quiet prayer with the Father.  Numerous times throughout the gospel accounts, you will see a simple verse like Luke 5:16   But Jesus Himself would often slip away to the wilderness and pray.   Don’t you think that if Jesus needed time away for this that we do too?  I know I do.  I know if I don’t, I start to be Hyde in the worst way.  We can’t just be Jekyll on Sunday mornings hoping that he will last us through the week and then change to Hyde all week long and hope to be pleasing to God.   Luke 13: 9 says we will be cut down if we do not bear fruit.  I know I don’t want to be cut down.  

I pray you, like me, will want to live a rich full fruitful life like the second tree.  I pray too that we will take time in the Word, letting the Holy Spirit water us.  That we will let Him help rid our lives of the rubbish.  That we will encourage others to live Godly lives to help them and hold them accountable to see the rubbish by being the refreshment and shade with luscious fruit that they will desire to have for themselves. 

Hyde:   Spending your days rooted in filth, your heart full of that and fruitless

Jekyll:  Spending your days rooted in faith, watered by His Spirit, with fruit from Him.