Plastic Bananas

While preaching on the petition "Hallowed be Your name" last night by urging our congregation to pray for true conversions that would glorify the sovereign grace of God, I used the following illustration:

Suppose we go down after the service to the evening snacks prepared by our ladies.  On one of the tables you see a bowl of fruit that looks inviting.  Yet you realize that someone brought to church a bowl of artificial fruit by mistake instead of real apples, bananas, and oranges.  Not wanting to offend her, you make your selection, sit down, then start chewing on a plastic banana.

That sounds ludicrous, of course.  Yet spiritually speaking that is exactly what is going on in the American church.  Multitudes of church-going people profess Christ but the fruit of their lives testify to the artificiality of their profession.  Not wanting to offend them, we just chew on and try to swallow down the false fruit they are offering.  By the looks of things in our churches, it appears a good act is more acceptable than the good fruits that God requires.
I was interested then to see this morning the video below (HT: Tim Challies) where Jackie Hill  presented a rapid-fire poem at a P4CM event entitled _Jig-A-Boo.  _Listen to her passionately and creatively take to task pastors and their followers who are satisfied with false fruit.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ePsZNMJGMHs&feature=player_embedded]