BLOSSOM IS NOT FRUIT
[p. 262] BLOSSOM IS NOT FRUIT
The surest proof of progress and the deepest cheer to the heart go hand in hand. They are simultaneous in the word, “Without me ye can do nothing” (John 15: 5). There is always progress in proportion as I am conscious that apart from Him I can do nothing, that I have no power for anything apart from Him. The most beautiful flower will fail and come to nothing apart from the parent stem; now the more you have this conviction and act on it, the more you are confirmed in the new creation, not only “rooted” but “built up in him”. Every blossom is not fruit. If the blossom, however developed, be detached from the tree there is no fruit. The heart, deeply sensible that nothing can be done apart from Christ, testifies of its growth in not resting on any success, however promising, but simply on the Lord Himself. You might have had the most appropriate conversation with one deeply interested, or a very good time beside a sick bed, but the more you advance in the knowledge of Christ, the less will you think of the effect produced, but you will simply and entirely depend on Him who only can make it fruitful. It is the same in any service. The blossom may be fragrant and encouraging, but the heart that knows Christ clings to Him as the source and spring of all power to bring the blossom to perfection. In this way growth is measured, for as the vigour of a branch is measured by the extent in which it draws from the parent stem, so the measure of my strength is the extent of my drawing on the Lord. There can be no strength nor progress apart from Him, and what a delight and satisfaction to my heart to be assured that I am powerless apart from the One who has so entirely bound my heart to Himself. No word could more fully gratify a true heart than — “Without me ye can do nothing”. Because if I am really bound to Him I should feel distanced if I could do anything independently of Him, and as dependence on Him increases so does the heart become better acquainted with Him. May you be like the green branch that cannot do without Him — [p. 263] rejoicing daily that the bond is greater and greater, and though the blossom be ever so promising and fragrant that your eye rests not on anything produced, but on Him who produces it.
The Lord bless you greatly.
... If there be progress upward there must be progress in life and ways down here; you cannot see the demand for a change in your ways here until you are transformed by the influence of nearness to Him. You thus gradually find things here are not suitable for the order and nature of the things which are so attractive to the renewed heart up there.