Either make the tree good, and its fruit good; or make the tree corrupt, and its fruit corrupt. For from the fruit the tree is known.
The religious leaders had just said His power came from Satan. Instead of arguing about the miracle, the Lord points to the root that produced their words, and asks whether that root can be changed.
The verse follows straight on from His statement that no one can be neutral toward Him. One writer sees the same dividing line drawn here through human nature itself:
From this point down to verse 37 He meets the whole power of evil. In Matthew 9 He took no notice of the charge that He cast out demons by the power of Beelzebub. Here He answers it, and He narrows everything down to Himself and the opposing power of the devil. "Whoever is not with Me is against Me, and whoever does not gather with Me scatters." The tree is either good and its fruit good or corrupt and the fruit corrupt (verse 33). The two classes could not be clearer. In the light of Christian teaching, it is the difference between what is of Christ and what is of Adam.
The argument runs backwards, from what is seen to what is hidden. One commentator applies it to Israel as a whole:
The tree (Israel) had shown what it was by its evil fruit. If the tree had been good, the fruit would have been good too. Since the fruit was corrupt, the tree was corrupt. So the charge the Lord brings against Israel is a solemn one, calling them a brood of vipers. He knew their hearts, which, being evil, could not produce good words.
The first half of the verse is not advice on fruit-growing. It puts the whole issue at the root:
These Pharisees were committing a sin: blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. From that sin the Lord now turns to its cause, the spring from which the evil comes… He is the Searcher of hearts. He understands our thoughts from far off, and He uncovers the real condition of these men, and the condition of man in general. The tree is bad, the fruit must be bad. The tree must be made good, and that means a change, and then the fruit will be good… All their religious ceremonies and outward morality did not and could not produce a change.
Another writer answers with a picture from the garden:
What would you do if you wanted to make something of a crab apple tree? Not feed it, and prune it, and dig around it and fertilise it. God has already done that with His fig tree. If you know anything about it, you will cut it down and graft it. Until you find out that the old man is completely bad, and that there is no mending it, you will not give it up. If you cultivate the old crab tree you will have pretty flowers but only bigger crab apples.
The fruit in view here is speech. Words decide how a person stands before God:
What God insists on is testimony to Jesus. These idle words betray the heart's rejection of Jesus, and slight the Holy Spirit's testimony to Him. "By your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned." With the mouth a person confesses and is saved. Words that leave out Jesus prove that the heart prefers its sin to Him. The words of the mouth show the state of the heart. They are the outward expression of the feelings, and they show a man in one way as much as his conduct does in another.
This saying is not just for one dispute. It runs through Matthew's Gospel and points forward:
The parables that are unique to Matthew illustrate that word of the Lord which is one of the keywords of the Gospel: "the tree is known by its fruit" (12:33). So they look on to the end, to the harvest, where everything good or bad reaches its completion at the end of the age, at the coming of the Lord.
- Root — The Lord traces their words back to the spring they came from. Make the tree good, and good fruit follows.
- Change — A bad tree needs new life, not better care. Cultivating the old stock only grows bigger bad fruit.
- Either/Or — The verse allows only two classes: what is of Christ, and what is of Adam. Whoever is not with Him is against Him.
- Evidence — Speech is the fruit on display. Words show the heart as plainly as conduct does, and the Lord says they will justify or condemn.
- Harvest — This is a keyword of Matthew. It looks ahead to the end of the age, when the harvest shows what each tree was.
Offspring of vipers! how can ye speak good things, being wicked? For of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks.
The Pharisees had just credited the Lord's power over demons to Satan. Here He turns from their charge to the source that produced it. His answer moves from fruit back to tree, from speech back to the heart. Can anyone speak good words while the inner spring stays bad?
The Lord had just told them to make the tree good and its fruit good, or the tree bad and its fruit bad. Here He goes behind the sin they had committed to what produced it.
The Lord now turns from the sin these Pharisees were doing, the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, to its cause, the spring from which the evil comes... The Searcher of hearts, He who understands the thoughts from far off, uncovers the real condition of these men and the condition of man in general. The tree is bad, the fruit must be bad. The tree must be made good, and that denotes a change, and the fruit will be good.
The name He gives them is not random abuse. It points to poison, and John had already used the same word for the same people.
All we learn from the passages that speak of the viper is that its bite was poisonous... John the Baptist called the crowd who came to be baptised "a brood of vipers." The Lord uses the same name for the scribes and Pharisees. It shows how deadly their opposition was.
The question "how can you speak good?" is not a call to try harder. The mouth can only pass on what the heart holds — and this is true of religious people too.
If the heart did not contain these evils the mouth could never give them forth. Here then we have an insight into the human heart. Notice also that this terrible quotation comes in the apostle's description of religious Jews, not in his account of pagan Gentiles... Yet it is one of the hardest lessons of all to learn that the heart of every man is wicked beyond cure.
Fine language is no evidence of a good heart:
The language of the cultured, religious, unsaved man may be fine and polished, sweet and pleasant. But it comes from an evil heart, so it can never please God.
If speech comes out of what fills the heart, then speech becomes evidence. Small, unguarded words tell more than big, controlled actions.
"Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks." An impatient word betrays the heart. A blow I may restrain and yet utter the word.
The test also works in reverse. What you talk about most shows what has your heart.
When we find people taken up with one thing more than another, we may be sure that that object has the heart. We are always marked by what we seek. And so our words matter.
The Lord goes on to say that people will answer for every careless word. Read in context, the words in question are words about Him.
These idle words betray the heart's rejection of Jesus, and they slight the Holy Spirit's testimony to Him. "By your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned." It is with the mouth that a person makes the confession that leads to salvation. Words that leave out Jesus prove that the heart prefers its sin to Him.
Since the mouth only reports, guarding the lips alone will never work. The remedy is to change what the heart is full of.
Again and again He warned those around Him of the danger of uncontrolled speech, and Scripture repeats the warning everywhere... The way to reach this goal is for Christ and His things to fill our hearts. Then our talk will flow out of what fills us.
And the test is not the hour when we are trying to sound spiritual:
"In word." This is a very big test for each of us, for "out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks." Whatever sits on the throne in our hearts will surely govern our speech. The question is not how we speak about divine things for one short hour in a Bible reading. The question is what our talk is like at home, at work, among our friends, in company, and at all times.
- Root — the Lord traces their blasphemy back to its spring. The fruit was bad because the tree was bad. Only a changed tree bears good fruit.
- Poison — "Brood of vipers" is the name John used first. It marks how deadly their opposition was, not just bad manners.
- Impossible — the mouth only gives out what the heart holds. An evil heart cannot produce good words, however polished the language.
- Evidence — words are the index of the heart. An impatient word betrays what a restrained hand hides. What we talk about most shows what owns us.
- Verdict — words that leave out Jesus prove the heart prefers its sin to Him. The cure is a heart filled with Christ — tested at home and at work, not for one religious hour.
The good man out of the good treasure brings forth good things; and the wicked man out of the wicked treasure brings forth wicked things.
The Pharisees had just called the Lord's power satanic, and He answers by exposing them: speech is the overflow of a hidden store. The verse asks what a person keeps inside, how anything good gets there, and why God judges us by what comes out.
The charge against Jesus was not a slip. It came from a settled hostility, and He treats their words as evidence of it.
Speaking against Christ in blindness could be pardoned. But to admit the power was real and still call the Holy Spirit Satan was unpardonable. It was open hostility to divine power that nobody denied. The Lord shows the folly of it — Satan destroying Satan's kingdom. It was the fruit of what filled their heart — a deliberate hatred of God even when He was acting in goodness. Every word they spoke showed what was inside, and men would be judged by such words.
"Treasure" is the store a person draws from. The mouth does not create; it spends what is already kept.
Whatever is in the heart comes out through the lips, and in the life... So we can judge what is in the heart by what comes out of the mouth. The tongue is the organ of the heart — the organ of the man... When the word of God truly governs the heart, the whole character shows the blessed result. It must be so, since the heart is the mainspring of our entire moral condition.
This makes concealment temporary. A person can guard a sentence, but not a lifetime of them.
What is really filling my heart will come off my tongue. And so you can always tell what occupies my heart, because I have a tongue. I cannot deceive you for long.
The verse assumes two kinds of people. The good treasure has to get into the heart from somewhere, because it does not grow there naturally.
In these verses the Lord is striking at people's pretence of goodness. Their hearts are untouched by His grace, not born again, and so still under sin. A good person is one whose heart is purified by faith in the Son of God, for by nature "no one does good, not even one" (Rom. 3:12). Only the grace of God can make a difference in the person. In this case grace plants a "good treasure" in his heart. It is the treasure of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ, given to "jars of clay" (2 Cor. 4:6-7). Only good can come from this, however weak the vessel may be. Without this good treasure a person has only "an evil treasure" in his heart, and his mouth soon expresses it, for whatever rules the heart is what the mouth will speak.
That raises a question. If only God is good, how can the Lord call anyone good?
Our Lord Jesus used the word "good" in a relative sense. He said, "The good person out of his good treasure brings forth good." Yet He also said, speaking in an absolute sense and not a relative one, "No one is good except God alone" (Matt. 19:17).
Because speech reports on the heart, it counts as evidence. Commentators tie this to what a person has done with Christ.
What God insists on is testimony to Jesus. These idle words betray the heart's rejection of Jesus and brush aside the Holy Spirit's testimony to Him... It is with the mouth that one confesses and is saved, and words that leave out Jesus prove that the heart prefers its sin to Him. The words of the mouth are evidence of the state of the heart. They are the outward expression of the feelings, and they show a man in one way as much as his conduct does in another.
Commentators differ on how far to press the judgment that follows. Some read it as the standard for every person's words. Others say it is aimed at the self-righteous, who rest on their own record.
If they relied on their works as a means of their justification and salvation, they have to expect a judgment accordingly.
On that reading, the account for the believer concerns rewards, not salvation.
If the mouth only spends, the practical work is on the supply.
Again and again the Lord warned those around Him about the danger of uncontrolled speech. Every part of Scripture repeats the warning... The way to guard the lips is to let Christ and the things of Christ fill our hearts. Then our conversation will flow out of what occupies us.
- Stored. The heart is a store, and speech spends what is already kept there — the tongue is the organ of the man.
- Received. Nobody has a good treasure by nature; grace implants it, the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
- Relative. "Good" describes a person changed by that gift; measured absolutely, God alone is good.
- Revealed. What fills the heart comes off the tongue, so no one hides it for long; the Pharisees' words exposed a settled enmity.
- Reckoned. Words are evidence, so fill the heart with Christ and the conversation takes care of itself.