To Bear Fruit Each Day
Good Morning Friends,
Let’s talk about the joy of being in the Kingdom of Jesus… about the prospect of possessing what one desires… about a joy whose roots extend down deep into the bedrock of eternity…about the emotion evoked by well-being and how it relates to bearing fruit that lasts…about finding a way to help someone…To Bear Fruit Each Day.
Scripture: Jesus said, “Go and bear fruit — fruit that will last. Then the Father will give you whatever you ask in my name. This is my command: Love each other.”
John 15:16-17 (NIV)
The righteous flourish like the palm tree, and grow like a cedar in Lebanon. They are planted in the house of the LORD; they flourish in the courts of our God. In old age they still produce fruit; they are always green and full of sap, showing that the LORD is upright; he is my rock, and there is no unrighteousness in him.
Psalm 92:12-15 (NRSV)
Through the middle of the street of the city; also, on either side of the river, the tree of life with its twelve kinds of fruit, yielding its fruit each month. The leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.
Revelation 22:2 (ESV)
Message: I was raised in the breadbasket of the world in Illinois, but it had its seasons. Then I came to Florida where stuff grows all the time and old folks retire to play golf and tomatoes are grown for the salads of people on winter cruise ships. Then I went to Israel and saw an old olive tree and was amazed at the beauty of the wood that Jesus would have carved… whose shades of red and cream and black and its stripes and cuts that remind of Jesus on the cross and I wonder at the reality of a tree 1,700 years old still bearing fruit… of a cross upon which the seed of our faith has been planted. Friends, no one in all of history has been as joyous as Jesus and had more reason to be miserable. No one has produced more fruit…not because of what He did alone but because of who he was and is today in our lives. Friends, the strawberry plant produces strawberries. The apple tree yields a harvest of apples. What kind of fruit are you producing? If you are graphed on to the vine of Christ you too can produce fruit that lasts.
Pray we bear fruit not just feed off the vine. Pray we abide in Christ allowing Him to do the producing. Pray we trim the branches of our lives that do not bear fruit. Pray we graph on new ones that do. Pray we realize it is not what we do as much as who we are that brings us joy. Pray we share our faith, if only one mustard seed at a time. Pray we confess our selfishness and realize the misery it causes. Pray we not just seek surface nourishment. Pray our roots go deep into the life giving water. Pray we be authentic, producing each day the unique fruit God has planted in our lives. Pray we love each other.
Blessings,
John Lawson
Daily Devotionals 