I Want it NOW

I am ever waging a war against discontentment.  Right now, I'm content with what I have, where I live, my family and my friends, but myself...that's a different story.

I have been wanting fruit so badly.  I want to see that God is using me to further His Kingdom!  I want to know for sure, but focusing on fruit is just as bad as pouring too much energy into anything else, other than glorifying God.  

"He [the blessed man] is like a tree planted by streams of water that yields its fruit in its season, 

and its leaf does not wither.  In all that he does, he prospers."

(Psalm 1:3)

Okay, so am I not one of the blessed?  I'm not seeing too much fruit, so... Wait a minute.  "yields its fruit in its season."

It's season.  Not harvest time, when I see fruit in everyone else's lives, but rather, the time that God knows is my season.  I've been seeing so much fruit coming from Josh's death, and in other friends' lives and it's hard not to become discouraged.  The thing that's difficult to remember is that God's timing is best.

"He has made everything beautiful in its time."

(Ecclesiastes 3:11)

I don't know that Josh saw much fruit in his life before he died.  Maybe he did, I certainly can't say for sure, but this does make me wonder.  He definitely didn't see the kind of fruit that is being harvested now.  I wonder if he was getting discouraged over not seeing much fruit.  God, the great gardener, knows when the fruit is ready to be harvested, and it's rarely the same time for each of us.

Sometimes I can get so obsessed with producing fruit that I forget to prune the tree.  I'm too caught up in looking up into the dying branches to remember that the tree needs watering.  I see the tree next to me, which is beautiful and simply stuffed with its juicy crop, and I become disgusted in my own poor, sad, naked little branches.  Somehow I don't stop to consider why the other tree is doing so well.

Josh didn't do anything extraordinary, but he did all the ordinary things in an extraordinary way: he did them for God.  I'm not saying Josh was perfect, but he got it.  Why would God trust me with precious fruit when I have neglected to deal with the bugs eating away at my roots?  

"Well done, good and faithful servant.  

You have been faithful over a little; 

I will set you over much."  

(Matthew 25:21)

I've been wanting fruit pretty badly.  And I think that's a good desire; it will hopefully push me to work hard at doing fruitful things for the Kingdom.  But, as with anything else, when it is taking too much of our time away from worshiping and glorifying God, it's not healthy.  And when I'm wanting the product, but not to produce it, then that's only going to be counterproductive.

You know what just hit me?  Wanting fruit too badly was what got us into this whole mess in the first place...

Source

This post was kind of all over the place; I hope some of it made sense!  Love you all. <3

Over and out,

~Emily