FRUIT FROM THE HARVEST

GALATIANS 6:7-9

      The thousand-mile Kyela district of Tanzania received notice in the mid-1980s because of the tremendous response to the gospel. More than 7,000 baptisms resulted from a single crusade in 1986. The growth attracted more attention since the missionary in leadership was not a preacher, but an agriculturalist–a farmer (Doug Knapp) who faithfully sowed seed and in time saw fruit from the harvest.

  I. Fruit of gratitude

Ex. 23:16 [ESV]. You shall keep the Feast of Harvest, of the firstfruits of your labor, of what you sow in the field. You shall keep the Feast of Ingathering at the end of the year, when you gather in from the field the fruit of your labor.

Lev. 23:10 [HCSB]. “Speak to the Israelites and tell them: When you enter the land I am giving you and reap its harvest, you are to bring the first sheaf of your harvest to the priest.

Heb. 13:15 [ESV]. Through him then let us continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of lips that acknowledge his name.

      The harvest is a cause of praise and thanksgiving to a gracious God. Worship is an offering of thanksgiving to God for the bountiful harvest from His hand.

      When President Franklin D. Roosevelt made his 1941 address to Congress setting out the “four essential human freedoms,” Rockwell decided to paint images of those freedoms for the Saturday Evening Post. Rockwell finished and published these paintings in 1943. The paintings portrayed Freedom of Worship, Freedom of Speech, Freedom of Want and Freedom from Fear. The federal government decided to take the original paintings of the Four Freedoms on a national tour to help sell war bonds. Over the next few weeks the paintings were seen by 1,222,000 people and were instrumental in selling $132,992,539 worth of bonds. In “Freedom from Want” Rockwell painted a family picture, who have gathered for the grand feast. The hosts—an elderly couple presented the guests a huge platter on Thanksgiving.

      Once, Mrs. Green thanked Tom, the grocery boy, for delivering a loaf of bread.

“Do not thank me. Thank Grocer Jones,” Tom smiled. “He gave me the loaf to deliver.”

But when she thanked the grocer, he said, “I get the bread from Baker Brown. He makes it, so he deserves the thanks.”

So Mrs. Green thanked the baker. But he told her that Miller Milligan should be given the gratitude. “Without Miller Milligan’s flour, I could not make bread,” Brown replied.

The miller told her to thank Farmer Foster because he made the flour from Foster’s wheat. But the farmer also protested, “Don’t thank me; thank God,” Foster said. “If He did not give my farm sunshine and rain, I could not grow wheat.”

Even a common loaf of bread can be traced back to God, the Giver of “every good and perfect gift” (Jas. 1:17).

 II. Fruit of giving

Lev. 23:22 [GW]. “When you harvest the grain in your land, don’t harvest the grain in the corners of your fields or gather what is left after you’re finished. Leave it for poor people and foreigners. I am the LORD your God.”

Dt. 14:22 [GNB]. “Set aside a tithe---a tenth of all that your fields produce each year.

Phil. 4:17 [KJV]. Not because I desire a gift: but I desire fruit that may abound to your account.

      The Lord taught the principle of the first-fruits–to honor God with the first portion of the substance. Giving liberates the heart from covetousness and teaches stewardship rather than ownership.

      An old story that goes like this:

An unusual tree grew outside the gates of a desert city in the Middle East. It was an old tree, a landmark as a matter of fact. It seemed to have been touched by the finger of God, for it bore fruit perpetually. Despite its old age, its limbs were constantly laden with fruit. Hundreds of passersby refreshed themselves from the tree as it never failed to give freely.

But then a greedy merchant purchased the property on which the tree grew. He saw hundreds of travelers “robbing” his tree, and he built a high fence around it. Travelers pleaded, “Share with us.” The merchant said in return, “It is my tree, my fruit, bought with my money.” And a strange thing happened: the old tree died! What had happened? The law of giving expressed the principle: when a tree stops giving, it stops bearing, and it dies.

     One day in Korea, two wealthy men–a lawyer and a businessman together on a mission tour, saw in a field by the side of the road a boy pulling a crude plow, while an old man held the handles and directed it. The lawyer was amused, and took a snapshot of the scene.

“That’s a curious picture! I suppose they are very poor,” he said to the missionary who was interpreter and guide to the party.

“Yes,” was the quiet reply. “That is the family of Chi Noui. When the church was being built they were eager to give something to it, but they had no money so they sold their only ox and gave the money to the church. This spring they are pulling the plow themselves.”

The lawyer and the businessman by his side were silent for some moments. Then the businessman said, “That must have been a real sacrifice.”

“They did not call it that,” said the missionary. “They thought it was fortunate they had an ox to sell.”

III. Fruit of goodness

Is. 5:2 [GW]. He dug it up, removed its stones, planted it with the choicest vines, built a watchtower in it, and made a winepress in it. Then he waited for it to produce good grapes, but it produced only sour, wild grapes.

Mt. 7:16-20 [MKJV]. You shall know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes from thorns, or figs from thistles?

 17. Even so every good tree brings forth good fruit; but a corrupt tree brings forth evil fruit.

 18. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruits, nor can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit.

 19. Every tree that does not bring forth good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.

 20. Therefore by their fruits you shall know them.

Mt. 12:33 [CEV]. A good tree produces only good fruit, and a bad tree produces bad fruit. You can tell what a tree is like by the fruit it produces.

      The bitter cannot bear sweet. Each seed produces fruit after its kind. The nature of the fruit is an exact representation of the nature of the tree.

      A person cannot hide the products of an unholy life since all reproduce outwardly the fruits of their life inwardly. The test of Christianity is fruit. Spiritual life flows through a true Christian and reproduces itself in others. The Christ-life inside produces spiritual fruit. The carnal person cannot produce Christ-like fruit.

Jas. 3:12 [CEV]. Can a fig tree produce olives or a grapevine produce figs? Does fresh water come from a well full of salt water?

      One former Navy pilot told of the wild life that he lived. He decided the problem was that he was being led astray by his friends in flight training. So he arranged to finish his work in the program early and be transferred to another field nearby. Yet, it wasn’t long, he said, before he was back in the same old bars, with the same girls, just with different friends. One night he wondered, “Why do I do this?” And he realized, “Because I want to.”

Why do we do what we do? The answer is simple: we do what we do because of what we are. It’s like fruit trees. Apple trees bear apples, pear trees produce pears, peach trees grow peaches. The fruit is the natural result of the nature of the tree.

When a person is born again, God repairs his “want-to.” Even though he still feels the pull of temptation, he will have a new set of desires. There is a new desire to obey God.

 IV. Fruit of ground

Gal. 6:7-8 [MSG]. Don’t be misled: No one makes a fool of God. What a person plants, he will harvest. The person who plants selfishness, ignoring the needs of others--ignoring God!--

 8. harvests a crop of weeds. All he’ll have to show for his life is weeds! But the one who plants in response to God, letting God’s Spirit do the growth work in him, harvests a crop of real life, eternal life.

      The sinful nature tempts one with the lie that he will escape the end results of yielding to sin. The sinful nature leads one to believe he will be the single exception to God’s irrefutable law. The tempter schemes to convince one that he will not reap the consequences of sin. Temptation says that God will not notice this time.

      The harvest of the seed sown depends on the ground. The sower reaps out of the impact of the soil on the seed.

      If one sows into the corrupt nature the corrupt nature does what it always does. The corrupt nature contaminates and defiles exponentially with evil results.

Gal. 5:19-21 [GW]. Now, the effects of the corrupt nature are obvious: illicit sex, perversion, promiscuity, idolatry, drug use, hatred, rivalry, jealousy, angry outbursts, selfish ambition, conflict, factions, envy, drunkenness, wild partying, and similar things. I’ve told you in the past and I’m telling you again that people who do these kinds of things will not inherit the kingdom of God.

      When one has been born of the Spirit, the Spirit jealously longs to fill and control that life. When a believer drinks deeply of the Spirit and cultivates the Spirit-filled life, then God increases the abundant life in that soul.

Jn. 7:37-38 [ESV]. On the last day of the feast, the great day, Jesus stood up and cried out, “If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.’”

      Samson succeeded only when yielded to the power of the Spirit. However, in the end Samson sowed to the flesh and reaped the result of that nature.

  V. Fruit of grace

Jn. 15:4-5 [GNB]. Remain united to me, and I will remain united to you. A branch cannot bear fruit by itself; it can do so only if it remains in the vine. In the same way you cannot bear fruit unless you remain in me.

 5. I am the vine, and you are the branches. Those who remain in me, and I in them, will bear much fruit; for you can do nothing without me.

Gal. 5:22-23 [MKJV]. But the fruit of the Spirit is: love, joy, peace, long-suffering, kindness, goodness, faith, meekness, self-control; against such things there is no law.

Jas. 3:18 [GNB]. And goodness is the harvest that is produced from the seeds the peacemakers plant in peace.

      Likeness to Jesus is the desired fruit of a Christian life. The fruit of the Spirit is the outgrowth of abiding in Christ.

      Paul described the life of Jesus in Gal. 5:22-34 when he identified the fruit of the Spirit. Jesus is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, humility, and self-control. When the fruit of the Spirit is in the life of a believer, that believer will be like Jesus. This fruit is produced by Jesus (the “vine”) through believers (“branches”). In Phil. 1:11 (NEV) Paul said, “Your lives will be filled with the truly good qualities which Jesus Christ alone can produce, for the glory and praise of God.”

      God generates outward fruit through the inward root. Any lasting fruit emerges from the overflow of divine life (Jn. 15:5).

∙          Sweet water cannot come from a bitter well.

∙          Words reflect the whispers of the heart.

∙          Diseased roots will not produce ripened fruit.