Fruit Is Success Series

Two young brothers, Nathaniel and John Chapman, entered the

Black Bear Tavern, the largest building in Pittsburgh back in 1788.

They were looking for a place to sleep in this little village on the

Western Frontier. All of the rooms were filled, so they had to sleep

on the floor in the corner of the bar. Little did the bar keeper

realize that one day one of these brothers, John, would become one

of the most famous characters West of the Allegheny Mountains.

John had been to Harvard, and had also been a missionary

preaching the doctrines of the Swedish mystic Swedenborg. He

came to Pittsburgh because it was the point from which people

departed for settlements in Ohio, Kentucky, and Indiana.

John and his brother went up the Allegheny River to visit an

uncle. When they found his cabin enemy they decided to settle there

for awhile. John noted that there was an absence of fruit trees in the

area, and he decided to do something about it. He found an

neglected orchard and set out hundreds of apple tree shoots.

Clarence Macartney in his book of historical studies called Right

Here In Pittsburgh says, "This was probably the first nursery in the

West." John became so concerned about orchards and the

providing of fruit for the people moving West that he made it his life

work to plant apple trees.

He said, "Fruit is next to religion. I use to be a Bible missionary

down in Virginia, but now I believe I'll be an apple missionary. He

chose a very fruitful profession, and he was a marvelous success at

it. He became known all over the country as Johnny Appleseed.

Everywhere he went he carried his bag of apple seed and he planted

them. He said, "I am going to sow the West with apple seeds,

making the wilderness to blossom with their beauty, and the people

happy with their fruit."

On horseback, in canoe, and on foot he roamed the wilds of

Western Pennsylvania, Southern New York, and Ohio. He kept a

cabin near Pittsburgh. He dressed with ragged, ill fitting, faded

garments. He went barefoot and had long black hair that fell over

his shoulders. He made friends wherever he went as he sowed his

seeds and preached from the Bible. When the Indian wars raged

through Ohio, he was the only white man who could go on roaming

the woods and not be killed, for the Indians also loved him. For 50

years he lived a vagabond life risking every danger to sow his seeds.

More than once he was brought down by malaria. Robert Luccock

in The Last Gospel tells of how on one occasion he was found by a

pioneer in an Ohio River settlement dying with an intense fever. He

did not know who he was, but he called for a doctor. The doctor

came and seeing him clutching a bag of seed with the initials JC

burned into the leather said, "It's Jonathan Chapman that good

Samaritan of Pittsburgh come to settle among us. Praise God from

who all blessing flow."

At the age of 79 Johnny Appleseed died at Fort Wayne, Indiana

where he is buried. Monuments have been created in his memory,

and many legends have surrounded his career. In the U. S. Senate,

General Sam Houston of Texas paid this eulogy to Johnny

Appleseed: "This old man was one of the most useful citizens of the

world in his humble way. He has made a greater contribution to our

civilization than we realize. He has left a place that can never be

filled. Farewell, dear old eccentric heart. You labor has been a

labor of love..." We are interested in this life, because his life of love

and fruit illustrates the ideal of the New Testament for the

Christian. Our goal is not apples, but our goal is fruit. As Peter

indicates here, and as the whole Bible makes clear, the purpose of all

virtues, including love, is that they might lead us to fruitful living.

Johnny Appleseed dressed like a bum, had his hair like a hippie,

had habits as strange as John the Baptist, and was just a very

unusual man, but he became a great success because fruit was his

aim, and he fulfilled that aim. Without fruit he would have been

considered an eccentric old fool and a mad man. Fruit made the

difference, and fruit will make the difference for all of us between

failure and success.

Fruit is one of the key themes of the Bible. God is a God of fruit,

and all that is in harmony with His will is fruitful. Paradise was

paradise because of the fruitfulness of nature. To be put out of

paradise was to have to labor for food, for the earth was less fruitful