A Sermon on Gardening
Give everyone a seed as they enter the building.
ATTENTION ill >>> I planted my garden this week.... I love to see things grow but mostly I like to eat what grows.
SHOW plan tin cup.<<<< TAKES WORK - TIME EFFORT - WATER FROM GOD << HE CREATED IT ALL
"Nothing grows under a banyan tree." This South Indian proverb speaks of leadership styles. The banyan is a great tree. It spreads its branches, drops air-roots, develops secondary trunks and covers the land. A full grown banyan may cover more than an acre of land. Birds, animals, and humans find shelter under its shade. But nothing grows under its dense foliage, and when it dies, the ground beneath lies barren and scorched.
The banana tree is the opposite. Six months after it sprouts, small shoots appear around it. At twelve months a second circle of shoots appear beside the first ones, now six months old. At eighteen months the main trunk bears bananas which nourish birds, animals, and humans, and then it dies. But the first offspring are now full grown, and in six months they too bear fruit and die. The cycles continue unbroken as new sprouts emerge every six months, grow, give birth to more sprouts, bear fruit, and die.
Some leaders are like the banyan trees. They have great influence and their ministries are widely productive and beneficial. However, they do not prepare for the transitions which will allow for the emergence of other leaders. They only equip followers, not leaders.
-- Layne A. Lebo. From the files of Leadership.
ILL>>> ( find ILL )A purposeless life vs a Purposeful life -- “A reason to live”
Last Sunday was Easter and the Sunday before that was Palm Sunday. This Sunday let’s listen to something that Jesus wanted us to know right before He died. The last words of someone we love are special. We remember them forever. After we grieve for a while those last few words become precious memories. On the way to the garden of Gethsemane, Jesus took a walk down a long country road.
As Jesus and the disciples walked together down that long dusty road, above the crunch of footsteps on gravel He explained what He wanted them to do.
THE MAIN THING JESUS WANTED HIS DISCIPLES TO KNOW AND DO
CAN BE BOILED DOWN TO THIS >>> PRODUCE FRUIT.
Every plant that “Hits the dirt and dies is designed” by God to do one thing, reproduce.
If your not bearing fruit or you know that God wants you to bear more fruit, Let Jesus tell us how in John 15 ....read John 15:1-11
So how do we bear fruit? #1
Victorious living and effective soul-winning service are not the product of our better selves and hard endeavors, but are simply the fruit of the Holy Spirit. We are not called upon to produce the fruit, but simply to bear it.
I. Remove the dead wood. Cleansing 1-3
A. See the one true vine = Jesus ( not Israel = OT vine) -- Know God!
1. Jesus is the trunk (last of 7 “I Am” statement in JN. )
a. 6:35 = “I AM the bread of Life”
b. 8:12 “I AM the Light of the World”
c. 10:7“I AM the Door”
d. 10:11 “I AM the Good Shepherd”
e. 11:25 “I AM the Resurrection and the Life”
f. 14:6 “I AM the Way the Truth and the Life”
g NOW “I AM the True Vine”
2. The Father tends the plant
a. He loves us and wants us to be healthy.
b. He loves us and wants us to produce fruit.
B. See the 2 branches v 2
1. Branches that no fruit -- He takes away! God’s Judgment! Saved but refuses to grow.
ILL >>> The Christian walk is much like riding a bicycle; we are either moving forward or falling off.
ILL>> In Bruce Wilkinson’s book Secrets of the Vine he asked audiences all over the world how they would describe the level of fruit bearing among Christians. There responses are consistent. They conclude that nearly half of all Christians bear little or no fruit. Only about 5% bear a lot.
a. What is keeping you from bearing fruit? Are you dead to God?
ILL>> Rebellious Teens ignore authority -- blank stare -- loud music -- = REBELLION
Let the father tend to you!!
b God will judge the dead wood. - Be afraid of the day when He stops dealing with you.
2. Branches that bear some fruit - He prunes. -- saved but in sin (Cuts away the dead part) v2-3
a. Cutting and cleaning -- are you willing?
ILL>> Ralph told me the best way to grow okra is to whip it. ..
WHAT ARE THE FRUITS??? === Gal 5:22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith,
23 Meekness, temperance:
b. Requires change! Personal and Churchwide!
Ask God to haul away your deadness.
ILL>> Someone once told me that you can either have a big beautiful grape vine with tones of leaves or you can have big beautiful grapes. You cant have both. A vine must be pruned. What we think is healthy may be a substitute for fruit.
for example * fellowship - it can be good but it can also take away from our Bible study time,
* friendship - it can become a snobby click ( sometimes a SS class)
* Following tradition - if it doesn’t bear fruit - it needs to be cut out!
I. Remove the dead wood
II. Remain attached Abiding means remaining, living, staying ... v4-5
A. Remain (=Abide) in ME to bear much fruit -- impossible without God!
ILL>> Those whose garden isn’t growing go to God’s hardware store and ask, “What can I get to make my garden grow?”
>>>>>> 4 things you can get >>> LOUD!!!
1. “Get your Bible out of the car where it has been all week and begin again to read God’s growth manual every day!” He is the master gardener!
2. Get on your knees in the morning before work and beg God for forgiveness, for the sin of prayerlessness, for a schedule that serves self and not God.
-- Oswald Chambers in My Utmost for His Highest >> Probably the most powerful book I have ever read besides the Bible...
Think of the last thing you prayed about--were you devoted to your desire or to God? Determined to get some gift of the Spirit or to get at God? "Your Father knows what you need before you ask him." The point of asking is that you may get to know God better. "Delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart." Keep praying in order to get a perfect understanding of God Himself.
-- Charles Grandison Finney, ---We have had instruction until we are hardened; it is now time for us to pray.
3. Get in a SS class so you can be fed with the “Miracle Grow of the Word”
4. Get to work building some fruit,
>>> building character, building Christians, building a class, building a church
B. Remain or be removed - = unsaved v6 - fire = hell
ILL>> Those whose garden is dead can go to God’s hardware store and ask, “What can I get to make my garden alive?”
>>>>>> 4 things you can get >>> LOUD!!!
1. Get forgiveness
2. Get Cleansing - pruning
3. Get life - salvation
4. Get growing - SS, teaching, Word, ...
C Remain in the right place v7
ILL>> Those whose garden isn’t giving you what you ask for
can go to God’s hardware store and ask, “What can I get to make my garden produce?”
>>>>>> 4 things you can get >>> LOUD!!!
1. Get into Jesus -- become what the teens call a Jesus freak - fall in love again with your savior!
2, Get in the Word - SS< intense Bible Study < Be in church every time the doors are open
3. Get your prayers answered
It is awesome to realize that at the end of our lives we will be the sum total of our responses to God’s answers to our prayers, for God has chosen to be limited in His next action by our response to His previous answer. The final outcome of our lives is decided by a life-long series of responses of God’s answers to our prayers. The way we respond to God and then He, in turn, to us actually determines the direction our lives will take.
-- Evelyn Christenson in My Heart Sings.
4. Get God on your side, in your garden, tending you and your branches
If one should give me a dish of sand and tell me there were particles of iron in it, I might look for them with my eyes and search for them with my clumsy fingers and be unable to detect them; but let me take a magnet and sweep through it and now would it draw to itself the almost invisible particles by the mere power of attraction. The unthankful heart, like my finger in the sand, discovers no mercies; but let the thankful heart sweep through the day and as the magnet finds the iron, so it will find, in every hour, some heavenly blessings, only the iron in God’s sand is gold!
I. Remove the dead wood
II. Remain attached
III. Remember to obey Rule Obedience v 8-11
A. Remember it is all about Him ( theme for camp) v8 >> THIS IS FRUIT
The purpose of Faith Baptist Church is to be a lighthouse; loving and reaching people for Christ, bringing them into the membership of His family through passionate worship, fellowship, and encouragement, helping them to grow in Christlikeness and equipping them for ministry, thus glorifying God.
1. It is all about glorifying God “By this is My father glorified”
2. Impossible if we don’t produce fruit “that you bear much fruit”
3. We become true disciples - proof of out Christianity “so you will be my disciples”
B. Remember it is all taught by Him - love v9 >> Jesus didn’t always inspire and awe - most of His words are simple.
Somehow we have to make disciples instead of inspiration junkies.
-- Bill Self, Leadership,
C. Remember it is all commanded by Him v 10
I. Remove the dead wood
II. Remain attached
III. Remember to obey
IV. Result = joy , fruit
A. Results in a revelation of the purpose of obedience v 11 “spoken so ...”
B Results in the joy of God inside - ***God’s joy & purpose becomes our
Whenever people expend themselves, they want results. If they lay down life, they want someone’s life raised up. If they empty themselves, they want someone to be filled. They want their sufferings to bear fruit.
If this doesn’t happen, they’re tempted to give up. The refusal of the gift quickly becomes a reason not to offer it. Instead of leaning into resistance with love, they’ll back off and say, "Well, we tried."
However, the motive for offering love is not that it be successful. Christians want reponse, but they are not bound to it. They sacrifice for others because they are the recipients of sacrifice. They are the current generation of a long line of broken bodies and shed blood.
This gift Christians have received, they freely give. They join the living history in enacting the dream of God, [which] is a people sustained and transformed by mutual sacrificial love.
C Results in our Joy is full! *** Joy & purpose***
My God, I love Thee. Not because I hope for heav’n thereby, Nor yet because who love Thee not must die eternally. Thou, O my Jesus, Thou didst me upon the cross embrace; For me didst bear the nails and spear, and manifold disgrace. Why, then why, O blessed Jesus Christ, should I not love thee well? Not for the hope of winning heav’n, or of escaping hell; Not with the hope of gaining aught, not seeking a reward; But as Thyself hast loved me, O everloving Lord! E’en so I love Thee, And will love, and in Thy praise will sing; Solely because Thou art my God, And my Eternal King.
-- From a 17th Century prayer.
In Point Man, Steve Farrar tells the story of George McCluskey. When McCluskey married and started a family, he decided to invest one hour a day in prayer, because he wanted his kids to follow Christ. After a time, he expanded his prayers to include his grandchildren and great-grandchildren. Every day between 11 a.m. and noon, he prayed for the next three generations.
As the years went by, his two daughters committed their lives to Christ and married men who went into full-time ministry. The two couples produced four girls and one boy. Each of the girls married a minister, and the boy became a pastor. The first two children born to this generation were both boys. Upon graduation from high school, the two cousins chose the same college and became roommates.
During their sophomore year, one boy decided to go into the ministry. The other didn’t. He undoubtedly felt some pressure to continue the family legacy, but he chose instead to pursue his interest in psychology. He earned his doctorate and eventually wrote books for parents that became bestsellers. He started a radio program heard on more than a thousand stations each day. The man’s name was James Dobson. Through his prayers, George McCluskey affected far more than one family.
-- Loyal J. Marti
