I don’t consider myself a particularly good cook. Don’t get me wrong, for Thanksgiving this year, I made a delicious pecan pie, the best chocolate chip cookies ever, a perfect Amish baked corn, and a wonderful green bean casserole, all from scratch! I got plenty of compliments on them, everyone agreed: Candace’s cooking was a success! But my answer to those compliments? “I can follow a recipe like the best of ‘em!”
For each and every one of those dishes, I googled recipes. I found one that sounded good and looked easy. I made a list, went to the store, gathered the ingredients, and then painstakingly followed the recipe (almost to the letter) with very few variations. I just followed the formula that someone else set for me.
In other areas of life, I try to follow the same principle. I see good results coming out of someone, and I want to know how they did it, so that I can follow “their recipe”. That works with cooking, but it doesn’t always work with spirituality or with leadership.
Lately, on a podcast, I heard Larry Osbourne say, “I’m big on judging the fruit, not the watering schedule. I’m a fruit inspector. If you’re fruit is fine, stop changing the watering schedule! If your fruit sucks, then maybe google watering schedules.” To understand this, you have to understand what the Bible says about fruit, so this week we’re going to study just that!
Read:
Galatians 5:22-23
John 15:1-17
Matthew 7:15-20
James 3:17
Psalm 1:1-6
Ephesians 5:8-11
Isiah 37:31
Matthew 3:8
Answer:
What kind of fruit do you desire to produce?
Why do you think you haven’t been producing it?
Do you think you need to change up some watering schedules?
Is there an area of your life that you need to be a “fruit inspector” for?