I’d like to share some­thing with you that I stum­bled across a few moths ago, which has blessed me. There is a pro­gram that airs on TBN (Trin­ity Broad­cast­ing Net­work) called, The Stranger. The series is listed as a seven episode mini-serial of sto­ries about mod­ern day encoun­ters with the Son of God, based on events from the New Tes­ta­ment. ( Please visit their site if you would like to get more infor­ma­tion or pur­chase copies.)

The clip that I am post­ing is close to my heart. Before the Lord saved me I ques­tioned why Chris­tians thought Jesus was the only way. I will omit the details that led to find­ing that answer for the brevity of this arti­cle. How­ever, I feel led to share a devo­tional by Joni Eareck­son Tada, which to me, beau­ti­fully holds hands with the clip.

“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kind­ness, good­ness, faith­ful­ness, gen­tle­ness and self-control.”

– Gala­tians 5:22–23

It’s impos­si­ble to man­u­fac­ture the fruit of the Spirit such as love and peace, gen­tle­ness and kind­ness. You can paint a veneer of joy and put up a facade of self-control, but invari­ably you will be found out. You can only deceive your­self and oth­ers for so long with false love and plas­tic peace.

Fake fruit comes from self-effort. It’s like grow­ing grapes the wrong way around. First you find a clus­ter of white Con­cords and fas­ten them to the branches of the vine. From there, you tie roots to the trunk and dig a hole, set­ting the entire thing into the ground. There you have it, man­u­fac­tured fruit (and inci­den­tally, fruit that will rot quickly). What you have done is put first the fruit; second, the branches; third the root; and fourth, the soil.

God grows gen­uine fruit in the oppo­site order. First He plants the seed of His Word in the soil of our heart. The Spirit quick­ens us and causes the Word to take root in our soul. Next, as we grow in the Lord, the vine and branches mature until sweet and sat­is­fy­ing fruit clus­ters in abun­dance. Gen­uine fruit comes from abid­ing in the Vine.

“No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Nei­ther can you bear fruit unless you remain in me.” 

 –John 15:4

Lord, I con­fess that I try to bear fruit by myself, forc­ing self-control, remind­ing myself to be good and kind, often paint­ing a smile of joy and putting on a pre­tense of peace. For­give me for all this man­u­fac­tured fruit in my life. May I abide in Your Word and keep step with Your Spirit today.… I look for­ward to the sweet and sat­is­fy­ing fruit You will pro­duce in my life.

Bless­ings,

 Joni and Friends

 Taken from Dia­monds in the Dust.  Copy­right © 1993 by Joni Eareck­son Tada.  Used  by per­mis­sion.  Zon­der­van Pub­lish­ing House, Grand Rapids, Michi­gan 49530

God bless,

–gh