April 21 2024
Colossians 1:9-13
Every day I can be found walking my dog, Mazy, at least two to three times. So to say that I am thrilled with the spring time weather and the blooming flowers which follow, is an understatement. It is amazing how many different plants and trees are showing off right now. We often think of daffodils and hyacinths as being early spring flowers yet there are trees such as the maple trees, that also bloom pretty early. And while we enjoy the living fireworks these spring flowers provide, if all a plant did was bloom it would certainly think itself a terrible failure. No, a flower’s hope is that it might be transformed into a fruit, a carrier of a seed. The red flowers on the maple trees desire only to become those annoying little whirly gigs blowing around in the early summer breezes. Every plant wants to ensure that its life will continue on in the event of its inevitable death. Even in nature, the deeper thoughts about God and life continuing after death, seem to be even found there as well.
Today as we come to the third part of this series of messages called, “The Fullness of Joy”, we want to consider just what does it mean for us as followers of Jesus to bear fruit. We hear in our scripture for today that Paul says that in addition to living a life in a manner worthy of the Lord, a life that our Lord Jesus would be pleased with, we are to be people who bear fruit in every good work and as we do so, we are to increase in our knowledge of God. The reason why we need to be growing in our knowledge of who God is is that God desires that we yield ourselves to him, to allow him to take hold of our life, to be our strength when we are weak. Can you see why there is joy in knowing our Heavenly Father? And as we show the Father’s goodness to others, we come to know our Heavenly Father better than before and our joy increases as well.
Today we want to make this connection that joy and producing fruit for the kingdom go hand in hand. This is what Paul teaches us in his letter to the Colossians, that we are to depend on God to strengthen us with his power according to his glorious might, a power that enables us to endure with patience whatever we may face. We are also promised that there, as we patiently endure our trials, joy will be present with us.Yet as good as this all sounds what is difficult for us to figure out is just what is meant by this idea of bearing fruit. Perhaps the best place to begin is with the teachings of Jesus from the seventh chapter of Matthew. There Jesus uses this image of bearing fruit in reference to how we are to know who are the false prophets in our midst. Just who are those who are the wolves who are parading around in their best wool coat? The answer Jesus gives is that the way that we can tell just who are the prophets of a false god and those who speak in the power of the one, true, living God is by their fruit. Just as one would not expect to find many grapes on a blackberry bush so too we would not expect a tree that is rotten to the core to produce anything but evil fruit. It just makes sense, Jesus continues, that a tree that is good at its core is going to produce beautiful fruit and a tree that is rotten at its core is going to produce evil fruit. It would be rather odd to think that a good tree would bear evil fruit just as it is rather absurd to think that a tree that is rotten at its core is going to produce beautiful fruit. So, it is the kind of fruit that our lives put forth, this is how we can be certain as to who those are who speak in the power of the Holy Spirit.
What Jesus teaches us here is rather straight forward yet what causes us to hesitate a bit is just what does Jesus mean when he speaks of the evil and the good. We know, from looking at the story Jesus told about the fishermen and their nets, as recorded in the thirteenth chapter of Matthew, that at the end of this age, the angels will sit down and sort out all the people separating the evil from the good. This tells us that good is what is the age to come is going to be all about. Evil, then, is everything about this world that is less than good, all that God is going to eventually do away with. This is why John tells us in the second chapter of his first letter, that we are to, “not love this world or the things in this world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in them. For all that is in the world-the desires of the flesh, and the desires of the eyes, and the pride in our possessions-is not from the Father but is instead from the world. And this world is passing away, along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever.” The trees that are rotten at the core are this way because the life of such a tree is based on a reality which is passing away, most certainly dead. It is this dead and dying way of life which is evil. If we put it in terms of the difference between the happiness we go searching for, and the joy of the Lord which finds us in the most surprising places, then we could say that the evil fruit is a life which believes that their best experiences are behind them. These are people who have had a mountain top experience, one that was pleasing to their base desires, an experience that was attractive to look at, an experience which gave them pride in all of their treasures. For these people, life becomes a continual effort to try and get that same feeling and experience back, to hold so fast to a memory that, in doing so, we let the reality of our moments slip away. Good, on the other hand, is a life founded on joy, the joy of living life in a love relationship with the God who desires to give us the very best. This is the God that we discover is with us even in our afflictions because we have a God who is afflicted when we are afflicted. This knowing that our God is continually with us and that there is nothing that can ever separate us from his love, is the eternal source of our joy, a joy that can be experienced even in the worst of what life throws at us. For those who find delight in the joy of our Heavenly Father who smiles upon us as we work with him, they are always looking forward for they know that the joy that is tasted today is but a small portion of the greater banquet that is to come. This means that they face the future with excitement as the very best is yet to come.
The bearing of fruit then is about getting the right bearings for our life. To bear fruit is to be headed in the right direction towards the very best, knowing that ahead of us is when we will experience in full, the joy of the life to come. This focus upon the future that God has in store for us is the basis of the faith that we find in what is often called the Faith Hall of Fame found in the eleventh chapter of the book of Hebrews. As you read this chapter you find that the hero’s of the Old Testament all had one thing in common which was that they believed that the very best is ahead of us. They all knew that God has something greater planned, a great banquet, a cosmic festival gathering, where those of heaven and earth unite in celebration. It is this faith in the future God is making ready, this affected very much, how those hero’s of faith lived in the present. They were willing to give up the chasing after the delights of this world, that which is second best, at best, in order that they might go on to have the very best. To them it just made sense to give up what was second best, at best, in order to wait for what is undeniably the very best. This focus on the very best is what kept these hero’s of the faith from succumbing to the temptation of sin. They were willing to be diligent at dealing with their sin because they never wanted that which is second best, at best, from keeping them from experiencing the very best that God has for all of us.
So when we desire the very best God has for us, this good future God is preparing, this is what keeps us diligent in letting go of anything that is second best, at best, which might try and take ahold of us here in the present. So to bear fruit, yes, we need to desire the very best but we also must go further and inspire others to join us in this very best future God has for us. Listen to how Paul speaks about bearing fruit in the fifth chapter of Galatians, telling us that the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. What Paul describes sounds very much like the very best life, doesn’t it? I mean, doesn’t a world where people look out for one another, seeking the very best for one another, sound great? A world where people bear with one another, one where they graciously meet the needs of those around them and one where there is moral excellence in the way people interact with each other, doesn’t this sound so much better than the second best existence we know right now? It just makes sense that a world where people know that real power is found when we gently do life with each other, a life where every person is ruled through Jesus being the king of their hearts, this is a world, that when it is experienced, creates a longing in those who have grown tired of second best and are ready to trade in this second best life so that they can receive the very best God has to offer. How can we not be filled with joy as we experience a small taste of the very best God has for us in the age to come, right now, in the midst of this evil age.
This foretaste of life in the age to come, is how Paul describes our experience with the Holy Spirit. The way that the Spirit gives the world a sampling of what God has planned is through working in us, the church, so that in our lives the white light of God’s faithful love is seen as a rainbow of wonderful experiences that Paul calls the fruits of the Spirit. Jesus also speaks of bearing fruit as we find in the fifteenth chapter of John, where Jesus on the night he was betrayed told his disciples, ‘I am the vine and you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.” And further Jesus adds, “By this is my Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit and so prove to be my disciples. As my Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Abide in my love.” The way that we can live a life which desires the very best, and inspires others to desire the very best is only by having our life securely anchored by the One who desires the very best for us. As we enter into the open arms of God we come to know the goodness of God, his faithful love. In response to this loyal love of God, we obey what Jesus has taught to us about what pleases and delights our Heavenly Father. As we know the Father and in our obedience, we show the Father, we come to know the Father in a deeper, more meaningful way. In this way, we come to abide in the Father’s love, to find our rest in his comfort so that we, at last, long to remain always with him. But even so, we must not believe that this resting in the Father’s love is all that we are called to do. Our lives are to tell the world that our God has a plan to take this second best experience of life and transform it, in a twinkling of an eye, into a world where we experience the very best God has always desired for us to know. This is what it means for us to bear good fruit, lives that bear the good news that the best is yet to come. So we must always be diligent to refuse to give an audience to the false gods of our day who desire to speak despair into our hearts. We must be careful that we never attempt to make the best of a life in the here and now, which will never be nothing more than second best, at best. You see, this is what evil really is, everything that is less than good, a second best experience, at best. But when we know the Father who wants the very best for us, what we call, “good”, then we must be people who refuse to let go of our belief that the very best is waiting for all of us. This is the importance of our bearing fruit, so that we are known as people who know that our Father desires the very best for us, going so far as to give the very best, his Son for us and in response, we desire the very best, this new age where nothing second best will ever be found. We are to not only desire this very best life but also, we are to inspire others to have the same desire, to have this very best life. This means that this life we live together as the family of God has to give those who wander into our gatherings a sense that this longing all of us have for something better is not just some pipe dream but is rather a reality they can have a taste of and find a hope to anchor their souls.
And yes, when we have lives which point others to the truth that the very best is waiting for us, we most certainly experience the fullness of joy because by living such a life we are stating that the evil of this world will most assuredly be overcome. As we read in the fifth chapter of John’s first letter, we have a victory which overcomes the world, and this victory is our faith. Our faith is our belief that the very best, the good we all look for, is coming up in the age to come. This is our faith, this is our victory. John asks us in this chapter, who is it that overcomes the world? The answer is that the one who overcomes this world is the one who has placed their faith in the fact that Jesus is the Son of God. We must hang on to this truth that Jesus came from our good, good Father’s side so that he might, through his death and resurrection, make a way for us to live forever in the presence of our good, good, Father which is without a doubt, the very best that life can be. So how can we not rejoice, and jump for joy knowing that our faith is our victory. How can we not find exceeding delight knowing that this world, which bears down on us so hard at times, is still a world that one day will be overcome. So let us just be done with any thoughts of accepting second best. Let us instead, keep our eyes looking forward for, yes indeed, the best is yet to come. Go and bear this fruit for all to see. To the glory of the Father! Amen!
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