FRUIT FOR GOD
J. Trotter1
I would like help from the Spirit to say a brief word, beloved, on an impression received on Lord’s day as to fruitfulness. Ephraim’s name means ‘double fruitfulness’, and fruitfulness in Scripture is primarily for the heart of God. There was a calamity in this man’s house. His sons had gone to take cattle from the men of Gath and they were all slain. What a calamity that was! and his brethren came to comfort him. Calamity comes to each of us in some way or other. I do not think that any of us has got through the testimonial pathway so far without some calamity having come upon us, and such matters give the brethren opportunity to comfort each other.
But I am thinking of what the result is for God from these calamities; what is He getting out of them? Our brother has mentioned sickness and other matters that come upon the brethren, ordered of God. As we accept them from Him, and go through them with Him, there will be fruit for Him—double fruitfulness, as this man’s name means.
I was thinking too of Deuteronomy 26, although I did not read it, where we read of a man with a basket in which was the first of all the fruits of the land. He did not get those fruits in the wilderness; no, he got them in the land. He had taken possession of the inheritance and dwelt in it. If we are to have our basket full of such fruits it means that we have to be in the land, in the enjoyment by the Spirit of our inheritance. That man had the first-fruits in his basket and they were for God—his basket was set down before the altar and before Jehovah (Deuteronomy 26: 4, 10). To bear fruit for God in this way we must be dwellers in the land, the land flowing with milk and honey. God’s thought was that His people should be in the land. We know all that came into the wilderness, but God loves to have His people in the land. God’s thought for us at this time is that we should take possession and be in the enjoyment of our inheritance. It is there for us, the heavenly land, where we can gather fruit and present it to God for His pleasure.
Well, dear brethren, that is just the simple impression one had, that out of calamity, and also out of our dwelling in the land, there may be more and more fruit for God, to enrich the service of God. May the Lord help us in it.
Word in meeting for ministry, Lossiemouth
19 August 1980