Oh tomato plant that towers many feet above my head. Where is your fruit?
I grew up on a farm in Kansas, and at the risk of embarrassing all my Kansas friends and relatives who put into canning jars what they can’t eat or give away, I couldn’t grow a bean or kernel of corn if my life depended on it.
So, it’s precisely that (our lives possibly depending on it) which motivated my husband and I to at least try to grow something to eat. We hear a lot of dire apocalyptic predictions, you probably do too.
We thought maybe we should try our hand at raising some of our own food, you know, just in case.
If city friends can raise chickens in their back yards, surely we can manage veggies for our own dinner, right?
We have tried gardens in the past, with a modicum of success, my husband being much better at it than I am. Our backs and knees have a few more decades on them now. And where our mid-western soil was rich, black, and level, presently we are knee deep in red-dirt, hill-covered, root-entwined eastern ground.
This year we decided to really put some effort into the process. And by the looks of it, you’d think it was well worth it. It’s the first time our tomato plants grew over nine feet tall, lush and green. We have a crowded jungle of tomato plants.
In retrospect, perhaps I should have changed my defiant attitude. I didn’t follow the directions very well. For instead of planting a few seeds, I dumped a packet. Instead of thinning baby seedlings, I figured, “take that, oh soil which chokes life.”
We live in a veritable tomato forest. Impenetrable. Deep. Creepy and crawly. Without fruit.
But it is a great reminder to my husband and myself, that things aren’t always as they look, fruit matters. Perseverance matters too. “And let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up.” (Galatians 6:9 ESV)
While we wait for a tomato harvest, which we look forward to by faith, we understand enough about the process to know we need to care for those plants as if we expect a harvest. If we ignore their needs, they will die. We need to be vigilant in insect control, weed control, deer control, and disease control. We need to give them the water they need in this heat and the nutrients to produce fruit.
How applicable to my season of life.
God asks us to keep growing. Keep running the race. Don’t give up.
But let’s face it. We do grow weary. We’ve been through too many trials, too much sorrow, and too many election years. We’ve seen flashy showy non-fruit bearing promises before.
Well, so had the author of Galatians. Paul wrote a strong letter to the church he’d helped start in Galatia. Those defining fruits of the Spirit waned between believers, disunity and legalism threatened. And, they were motivated by extreme selfishness. (Galatians 5:16-26)
In contrast, Paul reminded them and us that spiritual fruit corresponds to our relationship with Jesus.
God’s Word, His thoughts, His will, His presence must nurture us daily for His fruits to grow.
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. (Galatians 5:22-23 ESV)
Our next generations will be impacted by the things around them, much of it off the rails of common sense and certainly against Biblical truth. The fear of God is a low flickering dim flame in a thick forest of ungodliness. We may never realize the grounding influence of the testimony of a perseverant life.
Yours and Mine.
Without personal nutrition from His Word, our spiritual weariness will become a sad and disheartening example, full of weeds, parasites, and drought. Our testimony will be ineffective and fruitless.
To be in Jesus’ presence consistently, like watering drought-fractured hardened soil, provides perseverance for the kind of fruit that overflows to others, love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.
Scripture, administered correctly, is an invitation to experience an abundant harvest. The harvest will attest to the perseverance.
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