Disappointing Apple

 

 It was lunchtime at the office and as usual, I opened my lunch box and took out an apple.  Then, I turned to my computer and opened my message folder to see all of the things I hadn’t had time to get to that morning blinking at me.  I had a moment to breathe and hopefully I could catch up on these messages before the onslaught of the afternoon began.  At least I had an apple to munch on…

I took a bite of the Honey Crisp Apple I was holding and was instantly disappointed.

I will confess freely that I like apples.  If I were to name my top five fruits, apples would certainly be there along with peaches and pears.  Grapes are good, but in my experience inconsistent.  Plums are often sour, while catching watermelons at the perfect ripeness is often a challenge.  Apples, on the other hand, (except for Red Delicious Apples) are always good.

Except for this one.

The apple I held in my hand didn’t measure up.  The flavor wasn’t great, which was disappointing, but even worse, the nice crunch you are supposed to feel when you bite into an apple simply wasn’t there.  This apple was mealy – the memory of an apple – floating in that dismal space between over ripe and rotten.

I looked into my lunchbox and discovered that I hadn’t packed much else except a sandwich and two cookies and went ahead and ate the thing.

An apple a day may keep the doctor away, but this one wasn’t keeping anyone away – except some sad soul who happened to be allergic to apples.

The disappointment came from the fact that my apple didn’t have flavor or crunch I expected.

There are some people in this world that we don’t trust.  When they let us down, we are not pleased, but we are not surprised either.  I am never surprised when I hear that a politician was caught taking illicit money or cheating on their spouse.  This seems par for the course.

On the other hand, when someone seems trustworthy and outstanding and we discover that all of this is fraud, it tends to make us distrust not only that person, but others, as well.

Jesus called out the religious leaders of His day, “What sorrow awaits you teachers of religious law and you Pharisees. Hypocrites! For you shut the door of the Kingdom of Heaven in people’s faces. You won’t go in yourselves, and you don’t let others enter either.” (Matthew 23:14) These men looked good on the outside, but inwardly, they didn’t measure up.

Of course, hypocrites aren’t what they appear, but the sad thing is that they damage the faith of others who put their trust in them.  Jesus described them as white washed tombs – shiny on the outside, but inside full of skeletons.

The call comes clearly through to live honest lives.  The problem isn’t that hypocrites aren’t perfect – none of us are – but that they pretend a perfection they haven’t attained.  When it finally falls apart and their true nature is exposed, it will damage not only their lives, but the faith of those who placed them on a pedestal. 

I pray that we could live with integrity, not like a honey crisp apple that pretends to be a paragon of appleness when it is hiding a mealy, flavorless interior.