With three kids awake before seven, it can be a long day. It
could be even worse when looking at my phone. I still felt a little cold and
checked the temperature, -2. It was a good time to thank God. Here I am in a
house that is just three feet, some wood, insulation and a heating vent away
from this brutal temperature. I am blessed that I am on the inside looking out
rather than the outside looking in. I say a prayer for those who don’t have
homes and hopefully found some warm place to be indoors. Life can be full of
glass half empty or half full moments. This weather makes me think what five
months from now will be like. This weather makes me think how crazy this world
can be. Five months from now we will forget about this cold, cold weather and
start saying things like I can’t believe how warm it is. I look back to last
summer and one of my favorite summertime things, relaxing and eating some good cantaloupe.
Cantaloupe has to be one of my all-time favorite fruits. It
has such a smooth and great taste. The problem with this fruit, it’s like a box
of chocolates, you never know what you are going to get. It’s not easy to pick
out a good melon. I have tried all the methods: smelling, tapping, looking distinctly
at the color and choosing one based on size. Sometimes they are great and
sometimes they are a complete failure. I am about 50-50 with picking a good
melon. Yet when I am right, there is nothing better than this beautiful great
tasting fruit in the middle of the summer. It’s sometimes hard to pick great
fruit, but it’s worth the gamble everytime.
Good tasting fruit can be tough to find, but Paul uses good
fruit as an example for what a good Christian looks like.
Galatians 5:22-23…
“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace,
forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.
Against such things there is no law.”
Being a Christian and living life according to God’s way can
be a losing battle. We can struggle daily to keep our composure. Sometimes we
are good fruit, people can see us being full of everything talked about in this
scripture. Other times we can fall short, we can be bad fruit. It’s a daily
struggle what we bring to the table. There are days I do extremely well, but
there are days I fall completely short. I mess up, I lose my cool, and am bad
fruit. It’s a daily and sometimes hourly battle to be good fruit.
This is the challenge with faith. We have to look on the
inside and produce on the outside. We can know everything the Bible teaches but
unless we show the characteristics show above we fail. Living life God’s way is
a challenge. Some days are extremely hard, but it’s during those times we are
especially called to be good fruit.
What will you become today? With this weather, with the bad
stuff going on in your life, you can choose to be bitter, angry, mopey and
miserable. What happens to bad fruit? It gets thrown out, people don’t eat it.
People want to surround themselves with people that lift them up. Not saying
you have to fake being happy (There are fruits that look great but taste awful)
but knowing there so many things to still be thankful for can be a great start.
Become what you believe, be full of love and peace today.
