Hosea 10:1 Israel is an empty vine, he brings forth fruit to himself: according to the multitude of his fruit he has increased the altars… A little while ago an inexperienced hand had trained a rose-tree over a porch, The leaves of the tree were green, and the growth was strong, but not a flower was there. "Why is this?" inquired the master of a skilled gardener. The answer was given by an act, not by words, for, taking out his pruning knife, the gardener in one moment levelled the rampant growth to the ground. "What have you done?" cried the master. "Don't you see, sir," was the reply; "your man has been cultivating the wrong shoot!" and, at the same time, the gardener pointed out the grafted rose, which had barely struggled two inches above the ground, and which the wild shoot had completely overwhelmed. In a few months the graft, set free from the encumbering growth of the wrong shoot, sent out in vigorous life its beautiful branches, and covered the porch with its luxuriance; and there it lives, a parable of heavenly things. Not all the cultivation or training in the world could have made that wrong shoot become a beautiful and flowering tree, neither will the efforts of a whole life succeed in making our "old man" like Christ, or fruitful towards God. God has condemned our nature in the Cross of Christ: He has judicially cut it down; and no fruit fit for God shall grow upon it for ever. The practical word, then, to those Christians who are seeking to produce out of self-fruit acceptable to God is, Do not cultivate the wrong shoot. (H. F. Wetherby.) Parallel Verses KJV: Israel is an empty vine, he bringeth forth fruit unto himself: according to the multitude of his fruit he hath increased the altars; according to the goodness of his land they have made goodly images. |
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