HELEN SANDERS
9-20-2020
FRUITFULNESS
As a young girl my grandmother planted hydrangeas and also grew violets. They were beautiful. I learned “not to touch”, but even as a little girl I wanted to touch the beautiful flowers. I didn’t understand the work that it took to get them to the place of their beauty.
One day when I was older, I decided to grow something myself, an avocado. I learned that there was a proper way to put it into water, and then watch it sprout. The normal way of thinking was to put the pointed side in the water, but I learned it was the opposite way to make it grow. I have grown dozens of avocadoes, and some of them are now large trees. I have given away so many of them that I have stopped counting.
One day someone gave me the “first fruit: of one of my avocado seeds. I was so overwhelmed. It was a huge avocado, and I enjoyed every bit of it. One seed planted the right way can bring forth many more avocados. So it is, with our lives.
Jesus shared this principle when He said unless a seed is planted into the dirt and dies, that it remained alone — just a lonely seed. Yet, if it is planted and dies or breaks open and sprouts in the dirt, it will bring forth much fruit.
My friends our lives are like that. We are to die to the things of the world in order to come alive to things of the Spirit. It is not always easy, but the end results will be like that avocado seed that was planted and grew into a tree—fruit. The gifts in our lives are wonderful, but it is the fruit that God is looking for. Out of our dying and yielding to the master’s hand as He plants us in his field will come something more wonderful than we can imagine. When we want to do it our way, we are like the lonely unplanted avocado seed sitting on a shelf that will eventually just dry up and be useless.
Yielding to the dying means letting go of what we understand, and letting God do what is necessary. It means letting Him have control and not taking control ourselves. It will always take death to bring life, but with God death always brings life and increase.
Perhaps you are in the seed stage and need to be planted. Maybe you are in the ground ready for the next step and haven’t broken through the seed yet. Maybe you are in the breaking open stage, or perhaps you are starting to sprout. Whatever stage it is in your life, God is with you, and if you allow Him to be the “gardener” of your life He will surely bring forth fruit! The process may take time, but it is worth it to be fruitful! Be blessed to be a blessing
