“What misery is mine! I am like one who gathers summer fruit at the gleaning of the vineyard; there is not cluster of grapes to eat, none of the early figs that I crave.” (Micah 7:1 NIV)
People are made to be fruitful. Fruitless lives lead to a miserable, meaningless existence. Israel had lost it’s faith and the results was a dreary, dry desertification. The land was nearly uninhabitable.
What happens on a national scale also happens on a personal level. We are designed for fruit production. When production ceases, our lives become small and pointless. We dry up. This is not the abundance that we are created for.
“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.” (Galatians 5:22-23 NIV)
I have discovered that it is impossible to produce the fruit of the Spirit without first learning to abide in Christ.
“Remain in Me, as I also remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself, it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in Me. I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in Me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart form Me you can do nothing. If you dod not remain in Me, you are like a branch that is thrown away and withers; such branches are picked up, thrown in to the fire and burned.” (John 15:4-6 NIV)
The expectation of heaven is fruit production. Eventually, fruitless branches will be lopped off and burnt up. There is a time coming when the Savior will walk by and examine our lives. Let us pray He finds more than leaves.
“Seeing in the distance a fig tree in leaf, He went to find out if it had any fruit. When He reached it, He found nothing but leaves, because it was not the season for figs. Then He said to the tree, “May no one ever eat fruit from you again.” And His disciples heard Him say it.” (Mark 11:12-14 NIV)
Our lives are designed to be fruitful, but we cannot produce fruit apart from Jesus. If we find ourselves lacking love, joy, peace or any of the other fruits of the Spirit, we realize it is an abidance issue, not a production issue. The more we root ourselves in Christ, the more fruit we’ll eventually find on our branches. Let us turn our attention to abiding instead of assessing outward appearance.
Lord, for whatever reason it is challenging to abide in You. As the old hymn says, our hearts are prone to wander. Awaken us to our wanderings, bind our hearts to You. May ur primary objective be abiding. We trust that fruit production will come with time and tenacity as we cling to You. Amen.