45. FRUITFULNESS
--page 353--
Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them (Mt.7:20).
1. We may be nuts, but we grow trees & feed the hungry.
2. If our fruit is souls, more Christians, what are our leaves?--Our works!
3. "His leaf also shall not wither" means your works are not going to wither, dry up & blow away!
4. If God has blessed the method with good fruit, then the method is good.
5. Good works will produce good fruit.
6. Look at all our good fruit--souls saved, lives reclaimed, missionaries made, miraculous healings & a most marvellous witness throughout all the World in every way, shape & form!--In word & song & music & all kinds of languages!
7. I have good fruit, so I must be a good tree!
8. I don't care how you do it, with whom you do it, where you do it or whatever way you do it, just bring forth good fruit--souls into the Kingdom of God!
9. Kill not the goose that lays the golden eggs.
10. They don't like our method, they don't like our means, they don't like our unorthodox measures, but they can't deny the fact that it gets results & it has good fruit!
11. You have to judge each individual case of a couple wanting to mate on its own merits. Is it good for them? Do they have real genuine love for each other, not just physical attraction? Is it helpful or harmful? Does it have a good effect on others? Is it good for God's work?
12. The monuments I want after I am dead are monuments with two legs going around the World--saved sinners telling about the salvation of Jesus Christ!
13. Better some tough, dinky, little fruit that remains, than a proliferous crop that rots & dies on the vine before it can be preserved!
14. The Lord is like the sun & we're His vineyard, & He's able to shine on us & chase away all the shadows & doubts & fears & cold, & warm the bosom of our Earth so we bring forth fruit.
15. The spire of His inspiration causes a spiritual orgasm which fills you with His Spirit in spirts of the Seed of the Word of God, which when conceived in responsive hearts, brings forth fruit, newborn babes into the Kingdom of God!
16. Why insist on deliberately & stubbornly hanging on in a worn-out, overworked, saturated field where you've already reaped your harvest, unless the Lord gives you some special revelation for it? Why not do what the Lord says & go into some more fruitful field white & ripe unto harvest where you can get greater results, instead of insisting on trying to glean a little bit here & there in an already harvested & exhausted field where it's dangerous & difficult, if not impossible.
17. Any ministry that brings more trouble & arouses more antagonism & more criticism & stirs up more enemies than it does good is not a good ministry. It merely aggravates the situation & makes it much more difficult for others who could have continued a long time in the ministries they're in, bearing good fruit.
18. Just because a ministry has extremely wide exposure, publicity & huge witnessing stats does not necessarily mean that it is fruitful & profitable & has been bearing the right kind of fruit. Good fruit means more souls won, more disciples won & more Family Members joined. "This is the Will of My Father, "Jesus said, "that you should bear much fruit & that your fruit should remain." (Jn.15:16)
19. The acid test as to whether a ministry is actually fruitful or not, is not just huge witnessing stats. That's fine, but if it doesn't get lasting results & bear remaining fruit it's unprofitable. It doesn't matter how much seed a farmer sows--if he doesn't get a crop, if it doesn't sprout & grow to bear more fruit, he's going to go broke & starve & he won't survive & his field won't survive nor his work. It's got to bear fruit. It's got to reap results. It's got to be profitable & fruitful or he'll go out of business.
20. If you're not doing the kind of seed sowing that bears fruit, if you're scattering your seeds on hard stony ground or shallow ground or amongst the thorns & thistles & briars that choke it out, instead of on good ground that bears fruit, then you're in an unprofitable ministry.
21. Show me something besides just seed stats & the size of your field & the volume of seed you've sown. Let me see the results, the fruit, the finished product: Souls won, disciples joined, new Family Members, new workers, new missionaries for the Lord.
22. If you want to continue for a while longer & still bear a little fruit that remains, with lasting results, disciples, members & support, through quiet wise unpublicised personal witnessing, then you'd better keep your mouth shut except where it really pays & bears fruit & remains, & don't get yourself thrown out too soon & stopped prematurely through unwise, insecure, excessive public exposure & dangerous publicity to your enemies & aggravating them to expose & oppose you to the bitter end of any ministry in that area.
23. One thing you ought to do is analyse your results & see if you're getting the kind of results you should be getting to see if it's the kind of a ministry that it should be. You need to count how many actual disciples & members that you have gotten out of that kind of ministry.
24. It's a good question to ask yourself at the end of each day: "What have I done with my life this day? What did I do for Jesus?" It's good to reflect on these things & assess these values as to whether you're obeying the Lord & pleasing Him, that He might say to you that day, "Well done, thou good & faithful servant, enter thou into the joy of thy Lord!"--In peaceful, contented sleep, thankful & satisfied that you have done your best & you can sleep in peace.
25. If the tree doesn't bear proper fruit, then we must dig about it & dung it, fertilise, prune it & trust that it will bear more fruit.
26. Even the branches that are in the Lord, even those that bear fruit, the Lord works over so they'll even bear more fruit.
27. Let us fear the Lord lest we be unfruitful, lest we be cut off for our unfruitfulness & cast away.--Not lost, not unsaved, but cast aside as being no longer useful, because we have failed to get the job done.
28. This is the ministry that has to survive--the Word! Others can be cut off & lopped off if we have to. Didn't He say that's why they pruned it & cut off branches?--Not so it will bear less fruit, but more fruit, so that the remaining branches can be more fruitful! (Jn.15:2)
29. We must not only win souls, but we must make disciples of those souls, or we are going to become a fruitless, dying Church like so many, dying of self-genocide for failure to be productive & self-propagating!--And like some religions which teach celibacy & are anti-sex, & therefore barren & childless & dying or already dead!
30. Mass media is a whole lot safer & easier than personal evangelism with less sacrifice, less danger, more support, more churchy cooperation & governmental toleration, but it doesn't make for real revolutionary disciples or real revolutionary missionaries!
(See also No.A, P, 189, 203, 214, 319, 344, 545, 565, 731, 1028, 1376, 1382, 1389, 1525, 1551.)
31. JOB.14:4 Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean? not one.
32. PSA.1:3 And he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season; his leaf also shall not wither; and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper.
33. PRO.13:19a The desire accomplished is sweet to the soul.
34. MAT.3:8 Bring forth therefore fruits meet for repentance.
35. MAT.3:10 And now also the axe is laid unto the root of the trees: and therefore every tree which bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire.
36. MAT.7:16-20 Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit; but a corrupt tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them.
37. MAT.13:22,23 He also that received seed among the thorns is he that heareth the Word; and the care of this World, and the deceitfulness of riches, choke the Word, and he becometh unfruitful. But he that received seed into the good ground is he that heareth the Word, and understandeth it; which also beareth fruit, and bringeth forth, some an hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty.
38. JOH.10:36-38 Say ye of Him, Whom the Father hath sanctified, and sent into the World, Thou blasphemest; because I said, I am the Son of God? If I do not the works of My Father, believe Me not. But if I do, though ye believe not Me, believe the works: that ye may know, and believe, that the Father is in Me, and I in Him.
39. JOH.12:24 Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit.
40. JOH.15:4 Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine; no more can ye, except ye abide in Me.
41. JOH.15:8 Herein is My Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit; so shall ye be My disciples.
42. COL.1:10 That ye might walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God.
43. JAM.2:18 Yea, a man may say, Thou hast faith and I have works: show me thy faith without thy works, and I will show thee my faith by may works.
44. 2PE.1:5-9 And beside this, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue; and to virtue knowledge; And to knowledge temperance; and to temperance patience; and to patience godliness; And to godliness brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness charity. For if these things be in you, and abound, they make you that ye shall neither be barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. But he that lacketh these things is blind, and cannot see afar off, and hath forgotten that he was purged from his old sins.
45. 3JO.11 Beloved, follow not that which is evil, but that which is good. He that doeth good is of God: but he that doeth evil hath not seen God.
Copyright (c) 1998 by The Family