Your Fruit is God’s Divine Nature Being Formed (Bearing fruit - 2, SUNDAY MARCH 2, 2025)

We are continuing our meditation on bearing fruit.

We started with Jesus assertion in John chapter 15:8 that the Father will be glorified when we wear much fruit and we will be His disciples indeed. It is such an important outcome of a Christian faith that in order to become disciples and part of his kingdom, we ought to be bearing fruit. It is not an optional exercise.

We looked at the parable of the sower, which Jesus said, was fundamental to the understanding of all parables. Jesus spoke about a sower who sower seed that fell on four types of soil. The first type of soil was the wayside where the seed did not even sprout before the birds came and ate them away. The second type of soil was a stony ground that had no depth and even though plants had sprung up, they had no root in themselves. Then affliction and prosecution came on behalf of the word they fell away. We spent most of our time discussing the third type of soil, which I believe is also the most common type of soil in the Christian world today. These were healthy plants, except for the fact that they were not able to bear fruit because of thorns. We also hear about what the thorns are. They are the worries of this world, the deceitfulness of riches, and the desires for other things. 

Today we're going to be looking at apostle peters description of the Christian life, and his advice on how to prevent a condition of unfruitfulness. 

Notice the number of the times the word "knowledge" is referenced in this passage.

“Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord; seeing that His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness, through the true knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and excellence."

Peter's blessing to the church is to be have grace and peace be multiplied in the knowledge of God. Because God's divine power has given us everything pertaining to life and godliness. Most of us have memorized this verse and often repeat this verse. It is a great promise that everything that we need for living and for living in a godly manner has already been given to us, but hear we also hear about how we have access to it. It is through a true knowledge of God. A true knowledge of God's glory and excellence. Or a true knowledge of God's greatness and goodness. If we look closely at these words, goodness and excellence, we see that they speak about two distinct characteristics of God's person. Technically speaking, they are God's attributes and His character. 

• God's attributes are the essential qualities of God, the qualities that are His nature by definition, because He is God. Examples of this include His omniscience (He knows everything), His omnipresence (He is everywhere), His omnipotence (He can do anything), His eternality (He has no beginning and no end).

• God's character is His moral attributes, the qualities that define His personality. Examples include His love, His mercy, His justice, His patience, His kindness.

For by these He has granted to us His precious and magnificent promises, so that by them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world by lust.

It is through knowing these qualities that we have everything we need for life and godliness, for the precious and magnificent promises that we need to partake of the divine nature are given to us through the knowledge of His character and attributes. 

“Now for this very reason also, applying all diligence, in your faith supply moral excellence, and in your moral excellence, knowledge, and in your knowledge, self-control, and in your self-control, perseverance, and in your perseverance, godliness, and in your godliness, brotherly kindness, and in your brotherly kindness, love. “For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they render you neither useless nor unfruitful in the true knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.”

‭‭2 Peter‬ ‭1‬:‭2-8

God wants us to not stop at having faith. He wants us to grown in our faith and diligently add to our faith moral excellence. Sometimes we do not emphasize God's call to us to be morally excellent or people of virtue arguing that God called us while we were yet sinners. But God called us to not remain in our situations of moral depravity. He called us inspite of our sin, that we may be holy unto Him. Because He is a holy God.

To our moral excellence, we ought to add true knowledge. True knowledge that comes from knowing Him, the one true God and Jesus Christ whom He sent.

He then encourages us to add self-control. God has blessed us with His Spirit who is able to strengthen us to gain victory over the challenges we face. He brings discipline into our life. 

Peter then mentions perseverance. Perseverance comes because of the hope that we have in God. That whatever happens in our life, His is on the throne. True perspective helps us grow in perseverance. When we know that we are not only raised from the dead, that we are seated with Christ in the heavenly places, we know that whatever happens in this world does not have the power to shake us. With a heavenly perspective, we are able to see that we might be in a difficult situation at the moment, but God has a purpose for it; it might be to prepare us for a situation in our life in the future, it might be to show His strength to deliver us so that His name might be glorified. The deliverance we are desperately seeking might just be around the corner. It might be a few years away. Whatever it is, having God's perspective will give us great perseverance in our journey with Him. Hallelujah!

Add godliness, which is devotion and purity. As God's children, we ought to have deep devotion and love for Him and we must seek to become more and more like Him. 

Add brotherly kindness for your fellow believers and even for those that are not yet in God's kingdom. 

Above all add love, God's perfect redeeming love to our lives. More than anything we need His transforming love. 

Essentially, when we study these qualities and those mentioned as the fruit of the Spirit in Galatians 5, we see that they reflect Christ’s nature. God did not save us to be better people. He saved us to become more like His Son, Jesus Christ. Becoming Christ-like is God's ultimate purpose for our lives. Having these qualities make us more like Christ. And that is fruitfulness.

And Peter exhorts us to keep adding these qualities in increasing measure. In a growing measure. More and more. Not just one filling a few years ago. But every time, these qualities must be added to our lives so that we avoid become fruitful in the knowledge of God. Because fruitfulness is God's purpose for our lives.

“Diligently help Zenas the lawyer and Apollos on their way so that nothing is lacking for them. People must also learn to engage in good deeds to meet pressing needs, so that they will not be unfruitful.”

‭‭Titus‬ ‭3‬:‭13, 14‬ ‭

Finally, I want to mention this reminder to be generous in giving as a key to be fruitful. A lack of generosity can make you unfruitful. It's God's nature to give and He wants His people to also be those that help those in need. Engage in good deeds to meet the pressing needs of those in the ministry, those in the kingdom, and those in your circles and outside. Doing that makes you open-minded and unselfish. This leads to fruitfulness in God. 

May God help us to grow in relationship with God in adding all those qualities mentioned in 2 Pet 1 so that we bear fruit that please Him. Praise God!

Let Not Thorns Choke Your Fruit (Bearing Fruit - 1, SUNDAY FEB 23, 2025)

In John 15, Jesus spoke to His disciples about being The Vine. If we remain in Him and He in us we will bear fruit. I would like to focus on one verse from that passage.

"By this My Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit; so you will be My disciples.”

John‬ ‭15‬:‭8‬ ‭

For most of my Christian life, I believed that the goal of preaching is to make the hearers believers or to convert them. Much later did I understand that believing is only the starting point. Jesus commanded His disciples to go into all the world and make disciples. The verse we read earlier provides one definition of being a disciple: one who bears much fruit.

Jesus didn't come into the world to make people believers. He came to save us from our sin and to make us a part of His kingdom.

Jesus came into this world and initiated a kingdom. Kingdom that is very different from the kingdoms of this world. A kingdom has a king, a dominion or a territory, subjects, and rules. 

 The kingdom of God also has all of them:

• Our King is God in heaven.

• The dominion or territory of God's kingdom is spiritual, and does not have physical boundaries. It's in fact beyond time as well. 

• Its subjects, and are disciples. So wherever you live on the Earth, you are subjects of His kingdom if we are His disciples. Again, not believers (who are in the periphery), but according to John 15:8, we become disciples by bearing fruit.

• Laws: God's word written in our heart is the law of this kingdom, but the central commandment that encompasses everything is love.

‬‬We often focus on getting the theology correct, and the experience correct, but we get the life wrong. God is not pleased by perfect theology or amazing experiences. He is pleased when our lives reflect His glory by bearing fruit and we thereby become His disciples.

Jesus often spoke to his disciples in parables. Parables are simple stories with common elements familiar to the audience and present a moral message.

In the parable of the sower, Jesus spoke about a sower sowing seed that falls on four different types of soil. He speaks about what happens to each batch of seed.

1. The wayside: Some of the seed fell by the wayside. The seed was eaten by birds, so they never grew. Jesus explains and says that this seed is snatched away by the devil. The easiest way in which the devil can prevent the word from bearing fruit is by snatching it away before it bears fruit. We need to make sure that the word we hear and read is not lost by treating it with reverence and humility.

2. Rocky ground: the next type of ground we are here about is rocky ground. There is no room for roots to grow. When they receive the word, they receive it with great joy. However, when affliction or persecution comes on account of the word, they just fall away. The Bible says that it is because they did not have any root in themselves. We can rely on another persons experience or faith to carry us through the times of testing that will invariably come. Our pastor, elders, our family, our friends cannot carry us through situations for which we need our faith to overcome.

3. Among thorns: the third type of soil that we hear about had thorns growing in them. Jesus described three types of thorns: the worries of this world, the deceitfulness of riches, and the desires for other things. These are so common in our life, and Jesus warns that they have the ability to choke the word such that the word does not bear fruit. If we look around and into our own lives, we might notice that this could be the most common type of soil. So often, the pressures of this world prevent us from the word bearing fruit in our lives.

   • The worries of this world. It is a certainty that there will be problems in our life. But let us not focus on our problems so much that they become a source for worry. We need to always have our focus on God Himself. Whatever we focus on we elevate. Sometimes we face a problem in life, we feel that the problem being removed by a supernatural act is what bearing fruit really is. Let us look at our Lord Jesus who is our example. Hebrews says that He was perfected by the things He suffered. ("For it was fitting for Him, for whom are all things, and through whom are all things, in bringing many sons to glory, to perfect the author of their salvation through sufferings. Heb 2:10) It does not mean that Jesus was less than perfect and became perfect. But that in each situation, from His childhood to the time of His death, in every situation, His response to every trouble, every temptation, every suffering was perfect in the eyes of God. When we face situations in life, that is how God wants us to bear fruit: respond in a way that is pleasing in the eyes of the Lord. That is bearing fruit.

   • Deceitfulness of Riches. Riches are deceitful because they deceive us when we think it gives us security, when we think that we have mastery over them and really do not, or when we think that if we accumulate enough we will be satisfied. The richest people in the world with obscene amounts of riches still don't think they have enough. It's a curse. Paul writes in 1 Tim 6:9-10, "Those who want to be rich, however, fall into temptation and become ensnared by many foolish and harmful desires that plunge them into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil. By craving it, some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many sorrows." This is strict word of caution. We can observe that those that seek to become wealthy will be overcome by that desire and they will rarely be able to bear fruit. Paul, in multiple epistles, equated covetousness with idolatry. Wealth takes the place of God and becomes the object of our worship! 

   • Desires for Other Things. In the verses preceding the ones quoted about in 1 Tim 6, Paul does tell that that we ought to be content having food and clothing. In Matthew 6, Jesus tells us that it is the gentiles that seek after food and clothes and we should only seek God's kingdom and His righteousness. Paul gives us a little bit of extra leeway allowing us to seek food and clothing! Before this, Paul does tell that that we ought to be content having food and clothing. In Matthew 6, Jesus tells us that it is the gentiles that seek after food and clothes and we should only seek God's kingdom and His righteousness. Paul gives us a little bit of extra leeway allowing us to seek food and clothing!

4. Good Soil: The fourth batch of seed fell on good soil, where it had good root, and the thorns were not present to choke the fruit. So the seed bore a thirty, sixty, and a hundred fold of crop. We ought to bear good fruit pleasing to the Master. We do that by doing the following
   

   1. ​​​​​​​Making sure that the devil does not snatch away the word that is planted in our hearts

   2. Making sure that we dig deep roots through our devotion to God, fellowship, worship, and sharing our faith

   3. Making sure that the worries of this world, the deceitfulness of riches, and desires for other things do not choke the fruit in our lives. 

Let us bear much fruit for God's glory so that we might become the disciples of Christ indeed! 

The Lord Delivers Those That Fear Him (SUNDAY, FEB 16 2025)

Psalm 34 is one of the most well-known and beloved psalms. Most believers have even memorized several verses from this psalm. It is amazing when we learn that this psalm that speaks with such positivity and confidence in the power of God that works on behalf of His people was written during or about one of the darkest periods of David's life.

The subtitle of the psalm says that it was written “when David feigned madness in front of king Abimelech and he drove him away, and he departed.” We read about this incident in 1 Sam 21:10-15.

Young David who was once anointed as future King of Israel and having defeated the Philistines by killing Goliath, David was a folk hero in Israel. However, due to the jealousy of King Saul, Saul attempted to kill David at multiple locations and David spent years fleeing from him. At this occasion, David tried to go to Gath, in the land of  the Philistines to try and escape from Saul who was constantly in pursuit. The king of Gath at that time was Achish. Most likely, Abimelech was his title, like Pharaoh, Ptolemy, or Caesar. 

David, when he was recognized by the people of Gath, feigned  madness: scrawling on the wall and letting spittle flow all over his beard. What a humiliating situation for one who was celebrated only a short while ago. It was at this time that David says: I will bless the Lord at all times. Hallelujah!

“I will bless the Lord at all times; His praise shall continually be in my mouth.”

This means that at all times, in all kinds of circumstances, we ought to bless Him. I will praise Him verbally. With words, not silently.

“My soul will make its boast in the Lord; The humble will hear it and rejoice.”

Our boast should be in the Lord and in the Lord alone. Not in things the Lord graciously blesses us with, not in His blessings. We must boast in Him and honor Him in front of the humble, because hearing us praise Him strengthens the others around us.

“O magnify the Lord with me, And let us exalt His name together.”

A beautiful call to worship God together. When the people of God worship Him together with hearts that are truly submitted to Him, God receives glory, He is pleased, and His people are blessed.  

“I sought the Lord, and He answered me, And delivered me from all my fears.”

God is One who delivers when we truly seek Him. We see this theme again and again throughout this psalm. That the people of God are those that fear Him and Him alone, they go through trouble and He delivers them. 

The enemy uses fear to get to us because fear is a powerful weapon. Fear of something, fear of what people think, fear of what people might do, fear of the situations we are facing, fear of what might go wrong, fear of what tomorrow holds. When fear takes hold of us, it has the power to grip us, to overpowere us, to tie us down. God does not intend us to fear anything else but Him. He did not call us to fear, but to freedom. 

The opposite of fear is faith. When we believe that He is with us and is able to help us in every situation, it will help us overcome every fear. 

“They looked to Him and were radiant, And their faces will never be ashamed.”

God causes us to shine bright for Him. There are times in our life when we go through situations which could make us feel, "Oh Lord, I have put my trust in you. If this situation is not resolved, I will be ashamed." Cheer up, child of God. If you put your trust in the Lord and wait in Him for your deliverance either the deliverance itself or the strength He gives you before it will cause you to be vindicated. You will not be ashamed. 

“This poor man cried, and the Lord heard him And saved him out of all his troubles.”

Again, when we call out to Him in our deep poverty, He saves us out of our troubles. The poor man is one who has no confidence in anything other than in his God. Not in his strength, nor in his wealth, nor in people, nor in his influence. The poor man has only one source of strength: his God. 

“The angel of the Lord encamps around those who fear Him, And rescues them.”

God's angels are ministering whose main purpose is to worship God. But we often see in scriptures that they are given a task to carry a message to His people or do something on behalf of them. God is able to send His angels to encamp around you to deliver you. 

“O taste and see that the Lord is good; How blessed is the man who takes refuge in Him!”

Experience Him personally. His grace and His mercy are abundant and everlasting. Let your knowledge of Him be real and personal. Not what you read about, but what you know to be true. 

“O fear the Lord, you His saints; For to those who fear Him there is no want.”

Fear Him O His people. He is not your buddy, your pal your chum. He is the creator and possessor of the universe. Fear is not being scared of Him like you are afraid of the dark, heights, or jump scares.

Fear as the Hebrew people understood the scriptures is to have a reverential awe and a worshipful obedience. We need to have reverence for God that leads to a sense of awe. We need to worship Him that leads to total submission and obedience to Him. That is the fear of God. 

“The young lions do lack and suffer hunger; But they who seek the Lord shall not be in want of any good thing.”

What a beautiful promise. Even the young lions who are very agile and healthy and can hunt themselves might go hungry. But if you are one that seeks the Lord, you will not be in want of any good thing.

“Come, you children, listen to me; I will teach you the fear of the Lord.”

“Who is the man who desires life And loves length of days that he may see good?”

The psalmist is encouraging his listeners to learn the fear of the Lord. What is this reverential awe and worshipful obedience that he is speaking about? How do we have it? We have the answer to that question that hides a promise that follows immediately. That if you fear God, that you can see length of days and you will see God.

“Keep your tongue from evil And your lips from speaking deceit.”

The first thing it speaks about is your speech. Keep it from saying evil things and deceitful or lying things. Very important that the man and woman of God guard your lips and not allow any unwholesome words to proceed from our mouth. No foolish talk, coarse joking, on jesting. Only words that glorify God and build others.

“Depart from evil and do good; Seek peace and pursue it.”

‭‭Now do not do evil things. Keep away from sin. Often the power of sin comes from our focus on sin and temptation. When we focus on God and His holiness instead, the power of sin is removed.

Thirdly, pursue peace. If there is an opportunity for misunderstanding, pursue peace. If there is a possibility of conflict, pursue peace.

‭‭Hebrews‬ ‭12‬:‭14‬ ‭‬‬echoes this same statement:

“Pursue peace with all men, and the sanctification without which no one will see the Lord.”

“The eyes of the Lord are toward the righteous And His ears are open to their cry.”

Isn't it reassuring that God's eyes are able to see us, His people and that His ears hear our cry? It is a great assurance that God always hears us and answers us. Recently, I heard a Bible teacher speak about the silence of God and said, "God may often be silent, but He is never indifferent." When we are righteous before God, in that we are closed with the righteousness that comes from faith in Christ and have forsaken and repented of known sin, God always hears us and delivers us.

“The face of the Lord is against evildoers, To cut off the memory of them from the earth.”

This verse shows that the opposite is also true! When we are not righteous in the eyes of God, He can turn turns His face from us.

“The righteous cry, and the Lord hears And delivers them out of all their troubles.”

Once again, the promise that when the righteous cry out to God, His deliverance is not afar off.

“The Lord is near to the brokenhearted And saves those who are crushed in spirit.”

At every time God is with us. But when we go through a time of brokenness and mourning, His presence is nearer than ever. When we are crushed in spirit, when we are contrite in repentance before Him, He is very near to us.

“Many are the afflictions of the righteous, But the Lord delivers him out of them all.”

I wish this weren't true. But it is a fact that every child of God goes through situations that are difficult. There are many afflictions for the righteous. But take heart, child of God, He will deliver us from all of the afflictions.

“He keeps all his bones, Not one of them is broken.”

This is a direct Messianic prophecy that was fulfilled in Christ. But God's promise of protection is still available to His people.

“Evil shall slay the wicked, And those who hate the righteous will be condemned.”

“The Lord redeems the soul of His servants, And none of those who take refuge in Him will be condemned.”

The Lord has redeemed, or purchase‭‬‬d by paying a price, the souls of His servants. And the ones that take refuge in Him will not be condemned or punished. By His perfect sacrifice, Jesus, the Lamb of God, paid the price for our sins and has set us free from the penalty of our sins.

Praise be to God for His wonderful promise to save, rescue, and deliver the ones that fear Him.