Voices: Fruit tree challenge

I have a challenge for every church and every church member who reads this.

The church I pastor has planted a vegetable garden beside the church building, because some of our church members want to learn the art of raising our own food for two reasons: 1) so we can be self-sufficient in economic hard times and 2) to understand better the Lord Jesus’ parables about good and bad soil, about wheat and tares, about planting and harvesting, and about first fruits.

Our context

I was working the church garden the other day, and I looked over the lot our church building sits on. We have almost an acre of field for a future building if needed on the north side. On the south side, we have a plot of ground maybe 20 yards by 10 yards in size. We have a good road frontage on a very busy street called Dairy Ashford.

Our church is located on a poorer side of town. Homelessness is rampant. The number of homeless who come to our church is significant.

Every day, when I am at the church, I see people in need walking in front of the church on the city sidewalk, back and forth all day. They are hot in the summer. They are cold in the winter. They are tired. They are hungry. They are poor.

They are handicapped mentally, physically and emotionally. The majority, I believe, are spiritually lost. They have no relationship with the Living God.

Bearing fruit

As I was watching them walk in front of our church property, I thought of what Jesus said in Matthew 7:20-21: “By their fruit you will recognize them. Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven.”

Jesus also said in John 15:4, 16-17: “Remain in me, and I will remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me. … I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit—fruit that will last. Then the Father will give you whatever you ask in my name. This is my command: Love each other.”

By their fruit you shall know them.

I want to bear fruit. I want the church I pastor to bear fruit. I want us to be reminded daily that after giving our hearts to Jesus and being saved by him, we are to bear fruit.

We can’t bear fruit unless we love each other. We can’t love each other without action. Love is something we do, not just something we say.

The challenge

So, I asked every church family member to go and buy a fruit tree. We are planting those fruit trees along the Dairy Ashford sidewalk on our side of the property. We are planting fruit trees also in that 20 yards by 10 yards lot of land on the south side to make a little fruit tree orchard.

Each church family will look after their tree, to water it, fertilize it, prune it and make sure each bears fruit.

This will take several years of our attention, but in due time, those trees in front of our church and beside it will bear fruit—peaches, pears, plums, lemons, limes and figs, to name a few.

We can eat from those trees, but more importantly, we can invite all who are poor, all who are homeless, all who are hungry, all who are in need who walk by to come and eat at no cost the fruit our trees bear. We will be reminded weekly: We are to bear fruit for the Lord.

My challenge to you

What if every church in our nation planted fruit trees on their property? What would we be saying to this generation?

We are children of the Living God. We are abiding in the vine—the Lord Jesus Christ. We want to bear physical fruit and spiritual fruit in love. And we welcome all who are willing to come to the Lord Jesus, trading in old lives for new, preparing for heaven, where there will be plenty of fruit for all of us to eat.

As John wrote in Revelation 22:1-2: “Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, as clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb down the middle of the great street of the city. On each side of the river stood the tree of life, bearing twelve crops of fruit, yielding its fruit every month. And the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations.”

Will you and your church accept my challenge?

Johnny Teague is the senior pastor of Church at the Cross in West Houston and the author of several books, including his newest The Lost Diary of Mary Magdalene. The views expressed in this opinion article are those of the author.