Fruit

A few weeks ago Eric and I made a trip to a local apple orchard. We live only a few miles a way and had been talking about it the last couple years and decided it was finally time to go. So we got there, loaded up a wagon with baskets, and headed down the rows of trees.

It didn't take long for us to find just the right ones

And boy were they tasty!

I had kind of forgotten that apples grow on trees. I know, that sounds ridiculous. But when you go to the store and see them on a shelf it doesn't really matter where exactly they come from. So it was pretty amazing to look around and see dozens and dozens of trees with apples just growing on them! Fruit, ready to eat, waiting to be picked.

It made me think of how often Scripture compares our lives to trees and producing fruit. What immediately came to mind was Galatians 5:22-23, "But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self control." These are verses I remember being taught at a young age, but they're not really verses I pull out often enough to judge my life and look at what I'm producing.

So what am I "growing"? What's hanging off my branches for everyone else to see and take? Whatever it is will show what I'm rooted in. And those things - love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control - do not come from any part of me or of my own doing. They only come from living in the Spirit and letting Him develop those things within me. If I'm living out those things, it will point straight to God.

Blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked, or stand in the way of sinners, or sit in the seat of mockers. But his delight is in the law of the LORD, and on his law he meditates day and night. He is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither. Whatever he does prospers. (Psalm 1:1-3)

Emily