What More?

"What more could I have done for My vineyard than I did? Why, when I expected a yield of good grapes, did it yield worthless grapes?" Isaiah 5:4....."One day God will hold us accountable for all He has done for us. He will ask us to show Him the fruit of all His bountiful provision for our lives. What will He find?" Henry Blackaby

Blackaby asks a difficult question. One that can make us squirm. Oswald Chambers says such questions make us "shuffle our feet" in His presence. I ask a difficult one as well; can a fruitless Christian life even be considered Christian at all? I ask because there seem to be so many in the professing church who fall into such a category. Going to church, practicing the rudiments of the faith, prayer, activity, tithing, yet from it, producing little or no fruit at all. The lack comes from the fact that the practicing is done out of some sense of obligation. He expects it, so we'll do it, but our hearts are far removed from both the act and from Him. There is little fervor for Him in our prayers, little generosity in our giving, and little love in our activities. All of these flow from our hearts, but the soil of our hearts is fallow ground. They produce no lasting fruit.

The Father asks the question of His people Israel in Isaiah 5. He had done everything to bring them into that promised land, giving them all they needed to thrive physically, emotionally, and above all, spiritually. And they squandered it all. He meant for them to live in spiritual riches, but they chose spiritual poverty. They were to be a witness of His glory to all the surrounding nations, but instead they lived in such a way as to bring reproach upon His name. There was no lack in what He had given them. The lack was within them. Within their hearts. To what degree might we be like them?

Every believer is not expected to produce the same amount of fruit. Jesus said as much. But every believer is expected, indeed required to produce the maximum amount of fruit that their God given gifts can yield. And He has abundantly given us the resources to do so. Yet the average western believer doesn't look much different from the unbelievers who surround them. Someone said that the message of the western church has become one that says that happiness and fulfillment can be found in the same places that the world points to; success, possessions, financial security, and families that experience as little difficulty as possible. We look to become rich in the world's goods while remaining paupers in the things of the Kingdom. Because of this, the church has no more success in overcoming various addictions, divorce, crippling wounds of the past, terror as concerns the future, to name only a few, than does the unbelieving world. Jesus said that He freely gave us all things needed to live in victory, yet we too often fall into defeat. He can only ask us, as did the Father, "What more could I have done than I already did on the cross?" The battle was won there. The resources of the Kingdom, all of them in infinite supply were released there. Why do we not walk in them? Why do we have so little victory? What more could He have done?

The Father has placed the infinite resources of the Kingdom before us. He has given, but have we received? Problems and difficulties will certainly be a part of our lives in this fallen world, but we are called to live above them, not beneath them. We're to be victors, not victims. Overcomers, not overcome. One day, we, you and I, will be called to account. How will we explain our fallow ground, our lack of fruit? How do we explain it now? What more does He need to do?

Blessings,
Pastor O