“Before This Time Another Year” (Mark 11:12-14) 12-31-24 10pm

“Before This Time Another Year” (Mark 11:12-14)



This episode in the life of Jesus, as remembered by Peter and told to Mark, is not about fig trees at all. It is about people. Mark uses intercalation, or a sandwich structure, to drive home the point of this episode in the life of Jesus. Verses 12-14 are about the tree, and so are verses 19-21, but the middle verses are about religious people.

Thus Mark uses the tree as a parable about people. People are expected to bring forth fruit for God (John 15:2, 8, 16). But they don’t. We live around the church, like money changers, doing things solely to profit for ourselves.

Likewise, the fig tree in full bloom was expected to bring God glory just as we are expected to live for His glory (1 Corinthians 10:31; Matthew 5:16; John 14:13; Psalm 1). But we don’t. Subsequently, when bad things happen at the hands of God, we wonder why. Consider the following four points.

1. Jesus sees you.
2. a. The Lord saw the tree from a distance (Mark 11:13).
3. b. Jesus may not feel especially close to you now, but He sees you (Psalm 139:1-2).
4. c. He knows you by the goodness that He has sent your way (Isaiah 43:4).
5. Jesus will come closer expecting the harvest from your life.
6. a. Hagar once said, “I have seen the One who sees me” (Genesis 16:13).
7. i. She calls God by a Hebrew phrase “El Roi,” which means “the all-seeing God.”
8. ii. God “saw” her in her time of distress in the form of an angel (Genesis 16:7-12).
9. b. God had blessed the fig tree. Though it was not the season that figs typically appear on trees, this tree was full of leaves. It can be said that it was an early bloomer (Mark 11:13).
10. Jesus will curse those who have failed to produce.
11. a. Jesus cursed the fig tree. No one would ever come to it and find figs ever again. The last person to eat from it would be the last to ever enjoy its fruit (Mark 11:14).
12. b. Mark ends the verse by writing, “And His disciples heard it.” The curse was addressed to the tree, but others who were in the proximity heard it.
13. What God curses is wholly cursed.
14. a. The fig tree, by the end of the day, had withered from its roots upward (Mark 11:21).
15. b. God curses in totality—even affecting future generations (Exodus 20:5).

“Christ First, Christ Only, Christ Always”