“Becoming Fruitful”
May 9th, 2010
John 15:1-8
1"I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. 2He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful. 3You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. 4Remain in me, and I will remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me.
5"I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. 6If anyone does not remain in me, he is like a branch that is thrown away and withers; such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned. 7If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be given you. 8This is to my Father's glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.
It is obvious, from this Scripture and others like it, that God wants us to be fruitful. In the parable of the talents, Jesus talked about three individuals that were given various amounts of money. The two that used their money wisely were richly rewarded. The one who hid his money was cast out to his destruction. In this scripture, the branch that doesn’t bear fruit is cast into the fire and burned. Jesus makes it very clear that fruitlessness is not an option for us. Jesus makes it very clear that he wants us growing and living and becoming bigger and better. But how do we do that? We are going to find out this morning.
Before we do that, we need to define fruit. I have heard pastors and evangelists describe this fruit as being souls you win to the Lord, growth of the church, using your gifts, and fruits of the Spirit. Some say if you aren’t winning people to the Lord, you aren’t being fruitful. That’s kind of heavy and negative. Who leads as many people to the Lord as we would like. We can all find a lot of guilt here.
Church builders say if the church isn’t growing you aren’t being fruitful. What pastor or Christian doesn’t feel his church isn’t growing fast enough? Other teachers say that you have been given gifts of the Spirit, like teaching, preaching, giving, helping, etc. and if you aren’t using those gifts for the Lord you aren’t being fruitful.
I think that is a little closer to it but I think the closest meaning of the fruit Jesus was talking about was the fruit of the Spirit. If you are producing the Fruit of the Holy Spirit in your life – then all the other kinds of fruit will take care of themselves. Do you remember the nine fruits of the Spirit? Galatians 5 says,
“22But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23gentleness and self-control.” Galatians 5:22-23
I think every Christian ought to memorize this fruit or have them displayed someplace prominently in his home. We need to always have these things on our minds and we ought to always be striving to get better at them. Our goal as a church is to “make Christlike disciples”. Our personal goal as a Christian is to become more and more Christlike. We are to be transformed into His image. We are to reflect Christlikeness in all we do.
The Bible says,
“So be truly glad. There is wonderful joy ahead, even though you have to endure many trials for a little while. These trials will show that your faith is genuine. It is being tested as fire tests and purifies gold—though your faith is far more precious than mere gold. So when your faith remains strong through many trials, it will bring you much praise and glory and honor on the day when Jesus Christ is revealed to the whole world.” (1 Peter 1:6-7 New Living translation)
Jesus said, “God blesses you when people mock you and persecute you and lie about you and say all sorts of evil things against you because you are my followers. Be happy about it! Be very glad! For a great reward awaits you in heaven. And remember, the ancient prophets were persecuted in the same way.” Matthew 5:11-12
Without trials we would not have an opportunity to grow in the fruit of the Spirit. One of the fruits of the Spirit is love. How to you become more loving? Jesus said,
“But I say, love your enemies! Pray for those who persecute you! In that way, you will be acting as true children of your Father in heaven. For he gives his sunlight to both the evil and the good, and he sends rain on the just and the unjust alike. If you love only those who love you, what reward is there for that? Even corrupt tax collectors do that much. If you are kind only to your friends, how are you different from anyone else? Even pagans do that. But you are to be perfect, even as your Father in heaven is perfect.” Matthew 5:44-48
Perfect as God? Yes, perfect in love. We are to strive for heart purity. In this life we will never achieve perfection of action – we don’t have the equipment for it. We aren’t smart enough, wise enough, mature enough, pure enough. But we can love as God loves. We, through the Holy Spirit’s help, can love even our enemies.
But we can’t grow in love unless we encounter some unlovable people in our life. When our flesh says, “Stay away! Don’t care about them!” The Spirit says, “Love them! Care about them! Help them!” We don’t have to like what they do or how they act – but we can pray for those who use us spitefully.
If we are to grow in spiritual fruit, we must have a little manure in our life. As that stinky steer manure spurs growth in my fruit trees, unpleasant people spur spiritual growth. You need enemies – so you can learn to love. You need negative and depressing influences so you can choose joy. You need agitation so you can choose to grow in peace.
This fruit does not just magically appear in our lives. The Holy Spirit shows us we need to grow in a particular area – and then we have to choose to act in the right way. We choose life – not death. Fruit bearing is a choice.
To be fruitful, we first must be faithful. Have you ever tried to grow a garden half heartedly? You watered pretty well for a few weeks and then you sort of forgot it. You got too busy doing other things. You pulled out some of the weeds, but you just didn’t have time for it – and besides it wasn’t much fun.
You garden wasn’t too fruitful was it? It is the same with spiritual fruit. You have to be faithful to be fruitful. You can’t just go to church when you feel like it and expect to be a mature Christian. The mature Christian is there faithfully. You can’t just read the bible when you feel like it. It’s a daily discipline. You can’t just pick out the fruit you want to produce – when you want to – and expect to be fruitful. You have to be faithful. Faith is when God reveals His will to you – you believe Him, trust Him, and obey. Faithfulness is doing God will –period. There is no faith without obedience.
To be fruitful you must be faithful. To be fruitful you must be faithful in you Funds. Jesus said,
“No one can serve two masters. For you will hate one and love the other; you will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.” (Matthew 6:24)
“Don’t store up treasures here on earth, where moths eat them and rust destroys them, and where thieves break in and steal. Store your treasures in heaven, where moths and rust cannot destroy, and thieves do not break in and steal. Wherever your treasure is, there the desires of your heart will also be.” (Matthew 6:19-21)
In the Old Testament days, idols made of wood and stone were chosen over God. It had to do with the sinful sensual pleasures these idols allowed and promoted. Today the god we put our faith in is money and materialism. We ought to change the lettering on our money. Instead of “In God we trust,” we ought to put – “In money we trust” - Because we do. That’s why it is so hard to tithe. We don’t trust God. We don’t believe Him. He says,
“You shall truly tithe all the increase of your grain that the field produces year by year.”
Deuteronomy 14:22
The tithe was a tenth of whatever the person made. In the agricultural society, the increase was grain or animals. If a person lived too far away from the temple he could exchange the grain and animals for money and bring the money in. So to us, a tithe is the first 10 percent of our paycheck. It’s not the leftovers. It’s the first 10 percent. And if we don’t have the faith to tithe – there is no way we can be a fruitful Christian. But if you do take a leap of faith and tithe- maybe even when there is not enough for bills or food – God promises that He will bless you. He will more than meet your needs – you will have abundance. To be a fruitful Christian your faith has to include your funds. You can’t love God and money. One will be the master. Which one is master in your life?
To be fruitful, we have to fellowship. Ever hear of any Lone Ranger Christians? There isn’t any. Even the Lone Ranger had Tonto. Have you ever noticed what part fellowship played in the early church? Listen to the Scripture.
“They devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer.” Acts 2:42
Notice the four things the early church was devoted to - the apostles teaching, fellowship, communion and prayer. That’s a pretty good example for us to follow. To be fruitful we need to be in fellowship. How can you produce the fruit of love, patience, self –control, kindness, gentleness, etc. if you aren’t in fellowship? You can’t. We need to devote ourselves to fellowship. Paul says,
“Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching.” Hebrews 10:25
Fellowshipping is not always fun. Some people are immature and selfish. Some people have bad days or have chemical imbalances and emotional instabilities. The temptation is to avoid them. The temptation is to stop meeting together. God’s Word says don’t give in to that temptation. Keep in fellowship. And fellowshipping is more than one or two hours a week on Sunday. Look at the example of the early church again. The bible says,
“Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts.” Acts 2: 46
The early church fellowshipped every day. They met in church and they met in their homes. They ate together and worshipped together – both in their homes and at church. We need to do the same. We need to meet together and sing and praise God together. We need to pray together. We need to eat together. That’s all a part of fellowship. You can not be fruitful if you don’t fellowship.
And we need to invite people into our homes. Our homes are given to us as a tools for the Lord. It is not where we are to selfishly retreat from the world. We are to invite people in for fellowship. Do it. Some people, the Bible says, have even entertained angels in their homes and didn’t even know it. Be fruitful. Fellowship on purpose. Make it happen.
One last thought. It’s fun to be fruitful. Harvest is always a fun time. In the Old Testament days they would have harvest festivals. They would sing and dance and have a good ol’ time. I remember as a kid, when the corn was harvested, we would build a fire under an old wash tub and boil up a bunch of corn on the cob and eat until we were stuffed. I loved it!
Spiritual fruit is fun, too. Take a look at the early church in action.
“The jailer brought them into his house and set a meal before them; he was filled with joy because he had come to believe in God—he and his whole family.” Acts 16:34
“And the disciples were filled with joy and with the Holy Spirit.” Acts 13:52
Isn’t this how the church should be – filled with joy! Shouldn’t Christians be the happiest people around? We have it made. We are so blessed in so many ways – and our future is eternal life in heaven! What joy should fill our hearts, knowing that! Luke 10:21 shows us that Jesus was filled with joy through the Holy Spirit. We ought to be a joyful people. And when we, as a church are experiencing that joy, don’t you think your family and friends will want to be in on it? Nothing kills a church more than cranky, carnal, complaining Christians. Nothing hinders a Christian’s witness more than a lack of joy. We are to be thankful. We are to praise God. We are to be full of joy. If we do that – we will be fruitful Christians and a fruitful church.
I want you to know that God wants you to bear fruit. It glorifies Him. Jesus said, “This is to my Father's glory, that you bear much fruit…”. Jesus said that this is how people know we are his disciples. How are you doing at bearing fruit? Does God need to prune some things out of your life – so that you bear more fruit? The key to bearing fruit is to stay plugged into the vine. We are the branches – He is the vine. We need to be one with Him. We need to talk with Jesus and surrender our wills to Him every day. Ask Him to use you to bear fruit and accomplish His will. The result will be great joy and great glory.
Dear Jesus,
I know I haven’t been bearing fruit like I should. Please forgive me. Prune everything out of my life that shouldn’t be there so I can bear more fruit for you. Lead me. Guide me. Reveal Your will to me. Help me to bear fruit and glorify Your name.
HIS BANNER OVER ME IS LOVE
