Faithful + Fruitful: Not Your Job!
On abiding in the vine and random acts of summer kindness.
Have you ever felt like the work of the life of faith and producing those good ole fruits of the Spirit was just too much? Like you can’t check off enough Christian boxes or the stuff of life keeps getting in the way of any spiritual progress you’d hoped to see?
If you resonated (slightly or painfully) with those questions, we’re here with happy news:
Faith and fruit? Those are Father God’s job to give and produce in us.
Working up faith and fruit is not our job! Do we have human responsibilities in this life of faith? Oh, absolutely. But white-knuckling faith and fruit production is not on us. Faith for salvation is a gift of God (Ephesians 2:8-9) and fruit is a result of the Spirit at work in us (Galatians 5:22-23).
Bottom line? We don’t save ourselves through frenzied Christian-y works and we don’t produce fruit. The Spirit of God produces fruit in and through us, we are the conduit for love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.
So if it’s not OUR job to generate faith or fruit…what IS the work of the believer? What is our divine responsibility to God’s kindness and redeeming love in our lives?
Trust + dwell + cultivate: that’s on us.
Trust in the Lord and do good;
dwell in the land and cultivate faithfulness.
Psalm 37:3
Our work isn’t about impressing God with a wide array of Bible studies or creating a habit tracker for how many times you “showed fruit” this week. Our work is wrapped up in:
trusting the Lord (believing Him, taking Him at His word)
doing good (through prayer & common sense initiatives to show love)
dwelling in the land (“wherever you are, be all there” is the gist here, but it’s also about making our home in God’s love!)
cultivating faithfulness (to cultivate is to tend to and nourish something — we cultivate faithfulness when we incorporate spiritual practices into the rhythm of our days not to generate something, but as evidence of our belonging).
We do these things in our own, unique, expression-of-God ways in the places He’s rooted us. In other words, we’re cooperating with the life of Christ to express His goodness “in all the places we live, work, learn, and play” as we practice making our home in His love and trusting His faithfulness and provision.
You can’t produce faith and fruit with any amount of Type A, goal-setter, boss babe energy.
But you CAN tend to the faith God has planted in you by trusting Him wholeheartedly, doing good work wherever you are, and cultivating the union you have with Christ through rhythms of spiritual habits.1
Random Acts of Kindness
Looking for a summer refresher? “Do good” and “cultivate faithfulness”, as the psalmist wrote, by showering people you love (or strangers?! if it works out?!) with unexpected kindness!
Join the Chat & Save the Date!
If you haven’t already popped into the subscribers-only chat thread, here’s your invitation to do so! Weekly-ish we’re offering a way to connect and share encouragement and gratitude and we’d love to have you there.
Our immersive evening of prayer and worship is on the church calendar for Monday, September 29 at 6pm! This is one of our favorite gatherings of the year, as we make intentional space for distinct ways of wholehearted worship through song, invitations to prayer, communion, Scripture and more. We hope you’ll mark your calendars and join us for this evening of soaking in His presence.
That’s it, friends. We hope you’re having a beautiful summer!
Spiritual habits, rhythms, disciplines… they don’t have to be complicated! If you need some summer inspiration, you can learn more about cultivating some of these habits by checking out a few of our favorites: Practicing the Way and Celebration of Discipline.