The discussion about “fruit” on my blog has really had me in a time of process over the last week. I have debated and pondered and talked about this concept of ‘fruit’ in ministry. I have questioned myself and wondered do I really have what it takes to “produce fruit”. As I mentioned before it was revealed to me by God  while on the mission field that missions is not about what I do but about how much He get’s to Love me. AND then it is about how I EXPERINCE his love and about how I POUR OUT his love. You see it starts with me, it really does…or should I say it starts with HIM. HIM loving me, seeking me in fact in John 6:44 it says “No one can come to me [Jesus] unless the father who sent me draws him.” You see I knew this verse but I did not really KNOW it and I think that this is part of what I was trying to say when I said it is not about how many I help get saved or how many holes we dig. When you choose to lay your life down and to serve the Lord as a missionary in a foreign land it needs to be about this LOVE and HIS desire or you will not survive.

What I have started to understand partly through my bible study “Experiencing God: Knowing and Doing the Will of God” by Blackaby and King. Is that to do the will of God we are to take Jesus as an example. In John 5 17-20 it talks about how The Father has always been working even up until now, that the father gets Jesus working, that Jesus does nothing on his own initiative, Jesus watches and sees what the father is doing he does what the father does and that the father loves him and will show him everything the father  is doing. I think this is a good example of where we should put our resources- time and money and prayer. Recently as I have been waiting for these Zimbabwe Visa papers to get processed I have been wondering is this really where He wants me?

You see when the question of "what fruit is coming out of what I am doing"  came up and I understood it as a request under what has been shared with me is Consumerism Christianity it took me back. Part of this has to do with my submersion in Africa. This type of Christianity does not really exist at the forefront of African Christianity(not to say they are not void of Prosperity Christianity!). And we all know Consumerism Christianity  is so prevalent here in the West. If I do this, what will you do for me, or is this valuable enough for me to do as I have very little time or resources.

According to the Blackaby study they suggest we are to WATCH and wait to see WHERE God is present and then to join forces with that. They say this  has to do with two factors that I would pray that I continue to have and so would I pray this for all Christians who are involved in ministry. It states we need to 1) Must have an intimate love relationship with God and 2) God must take the initiative to open our spiritual eyes so we can see what he is doing.

It talked about how we can be prepared to respond is to have a tender heart which will allow us to respond with the slightest prompting by God. I think I tend to be on the side of “let’s pray about it” a bit more that I need to. What I mean is that I feelI have built this tender heart through my Love relationship ith God which allows the Holy Spirit to be very alive in me so that I am sensitive to God’s prompting and yet I tend to want to be cautious so I ask for confirmation through prayer…at times I know this is actually my own lack of faith that God would speak so clearly to me. You see it takes a love relationship and childlike faith to be able to respond to what the father is doing- to not question it and not want to have a consumer approach but a Kingdom  approach to what God is doing and how HE asks us to be involved.

I am grateful for this time to clarify this for my life and to understand more clearly about where I would want to invest my time and money. This past week I have started to work with a 29 year old women who got out of prison just a week ago after been away for nearly two years and she got saved in jail. You see when I and sensitive, tender hearted and able to ‘watch’ and see where the father is at work I can join him.

“God hasn’t told us to go and see what we can. He has instructed us that He is already at work bringing a lost world to himself. If we adjust our lives to Him in a love relationship, He will show us where He is at work . That revelation [which is from God] is His invitation for us to become involved in what He is doing. Then when we join Him, He completes His work through us.” Pg 81 Experiencing God, Blackaby & King, 2007

THIS, I think, is the key to Good Fruit!