by Elizabeth Haarberg

God sees the beauty in our fruitfulness.

You can listen to today’s devotion by clicking on this SoundCloud link.

“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.” Galatians 5:22-23

I took a picture of my fruit bowl. I thought about rearranging it first, but then realized there might be a message in the layers. The smallest fruit is on the bottom, then the larger apples, and the largest fruit, bananas, tops it off. Everything appears out of order.

How often in our self-evaluation of ourselves do we feel as if the fruit we produce is less important than someone else’s? Our little oranges could never equal someone’s bananas.

In other words, the kindness I show someone is not as significant as my friend’s gentleness.

I am someone who encourages by nature. That is how I’ve been throughout my life. I love helping people realize their dreams, and cheering them on. Recently, I’ve realized the gift that God gave me from birth is a powerful tool in moving people forward toward their life’s goals. I have discounted ‘encouraging’ because it’s always been a part of me. I never realized it was important.

Although I didn’t know Jesus intimately until I was 33 years old, He knew me. The gift of ‘encouraging’ was given to me before I knew Him. There was fruit given to me even before I became a Christian.

As we go deeper with God, the fruit will naturally present itself and become more abundant, but the way we see ourselves can be messed up.

God sees a beautiful masterpiece, made in His image…unique for sure.

Sometimes it seems as if the fruit we’re producing is inadequate. If we can switch from self-evaluation to how God views us, we can see a clearer picture of the masterpiece He is creating.

Copyright Holy Cross Lutheran Church