In our spiritual journey, we often find ourselves eagerly awaiting the fruits of our labor, akin to impatiently expecting a seed to bear fruit immediately after planting. Just as a seed requires time, nurturing, and patience before blossoming into a fruitful tree, so too do our lives require a similar process of growth and development in order for us to become His instruments of love in the earth!
But also for this very reason, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue, to virtue knowledge, to knowledge self-control, to self-control perseverance, to perseverance godliness, to godliness brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness love. For if these things are yours and abound, you will be neither barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. 2 Peter 1:5-8
The passage above is profound regarding fruitfulness. Interestingly, the Apostle Peter did not mention doing things in the Kingdom. Instead, he listed virtues that need development before true fruitfulness appears. We need faith, virtue, knowledge, self-control, perseverance, godliness, brotherly kindness, and love. When these virtues abound in our lives, fruitfulness in our walk with God is inevitable.
It seems to me that developing the fruit of the spirit has much more profound effect in our fruitfulness than any task we do for the Lord. As part of the process of our spiritual growth, the fruit of the spirit will be developed if we respond well to the circumstances that come our way! If what we do doesn’t seem to be fruitful or appreciated, we can still rejoice in growing in the fruit of the spirit.
Does this mean we don’t do anything until we develop the fruit of the spirit? Of course not. It is in “doing” that we get tested by the Lord in exposing the maturity of our fruit. We just can’t make it the main focus of our fruitfulness. If we make working in the Kingdom the main focus of fruitfulness, we will get driven, discouraged, and burned out. It will also impact our relationships negatively. Instead, we need to Keep going to the Lord knowing that He accepts us and loves us, but He will relentlessly be working on growing us and ripening our fruit!
Therefore, let us relinquish our impatience and embrace the journey of growth and transformation that God has set before us. As we surrender to His timing and trust in His wisdom, we can rest assured that the fruits of our labor will be plentiful and ripe when the above virtues are developed in us and the time is right. For in God’s perfect timing, the seeds we sow will undoubtedly bring forth a bountiful harvest of spiritual fruitfulness.