HOW'S YOUR FRUIT? MATTHEW 12:33-37

Fruit is God’s natural candy. Until a few hundred years ago when we learned to refine sugar, fruit was how we got our sweet fix.

I have gardened for many years now, but I’ve learned that fruit trees take another level of care and patience. It takes about 3 years before you begin to see fruit from a tree and if you don’t provide the roots with the right balance of nutrients and water and sunlight, you will not get any fruit or the fruit you get will rot or become diseased or fall off. You then have to wait a full year before you can get anymore.

I have an apple tree in my yard that I planted with three other trees. It’s the only one that I have been able to save and it almost looked like it was going to be a goner. I really don’t know what kind of apple tree it will turn out to be because the tree died back and now what I have is a shoot from the roots.

You see, fruit trees often have a different root stock than the top of the tree that has what you are trying to grow. Anyways, the tree this year had its first apples on it after years of trying to grow them. I warned the kids not to even look at it wrong so we didn’t have any of the fruit go bad.

But, you know what happened? I got busy and didn’t spray the tree for pests or fertilize it. I didn’t care for the tree like I should have and now I have one rotten apple left on the tree. My fruit was lost. It was no good.

This morning, I want to ask you a question. How’s your fruit? Not the fruit from the trees in your yard, but how is your spiritual fruit? Have you been tending your tree? Do you have good roots? Are you bearing fruit for the Lord?

Let’s take a look at what Jesus had to say about our fruit this morning.