24 October 2015 - don't soil yourself

For three years now I have come in search of fruit on this fig tree 
but have found none.
So cut it down.
Why should it exhaust the soil?

Sometimes we feel like the fig tree. Sometimes we feel like we just aren't growing fast enough. We wonder where is the fruit which we are supposed to bear. We imagine a voice of condemnation suggesting that we are without value, not even worth the soil in which we grow. But this voice of condemnation is not the voice of Jesus.

Now there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.

Jesus is the gardener who understands that fruit takes time to grow, that it takes care, that it takes tender loving care which the tree cannot provide for itself.

Sir, leave it for this year also, 
and I shall cultivate the ground around it and fertilize it; 
it may bear fruit in the future.

So if we aren't bearing fruit as quickly as we want let us turn to Jesus. He will cultivate the soil of our hearts and fertilize them with his love and grace. He won't let us be cut down until he gives us every chance and every resource to bear fruit.

Even if bad things are happening it does not mean he is not at work in us. If we suffer persecution we might feel that we are not loved. If towers fall on and around us we might doubt that the gardener is at work. But whatever is going on out there he is at work within!

But if Christ is in you,
although the body is dead because of sin,
the spirit is alive because of righteousness.
If the Spirit of the one who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you,
the one who raised Christ from the dead
will give life to your mortal bodies also,
through his Spirit that dwells in you.

Our hearts might not be completely pure yet. Our hands might not be entirely clean. But his Spirit is within us and we long to seek his face. This attitude is all we need to receive a blessing from him. Ultimately, it will bring us to his holy mountain.