When Jesus talks about fruitfulness, he is not afraid to throw around numbers, real numbers, numbers like 100 fold and 60 fold and 30 fold. So does this mean pastoring a small church that is not growing less fruitful than pastoring a large growing church? It's a question from a listener named Wilson, who is a discouraged pastor.

Dear pastor, John, I was told by a seminary professor that to bear fruit is to reach an increasing number of souls with the gospel. I think he gets this from Matthew 13, 23. Basically, if you only serve a handful of people, a congregation of 40, for example, you're not bearing as much fruit as a larger church.

God is investing in you and seeing less significant fruit in return. He wants big fruit measured in the hundred folds. I believe many pastors, especially from small churches, struggle with the weight of this pressure. What is the fruit that Jesus meant when he says bearing fruit? Is it number of converts?

Is it personal holiness or repentance? And how did you define success and fruit in your own pastoral labors? Well, I sure want to be used by God at this moment to help the discouraged pastor keep his hand on the plow. When John the Baptist comes in preparation for Jesus, one huge part of his message is bear fruit in keeping with repentance.

Even now, the ax is laid to the root of the trees. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. And the crowds ask him, what should we do? And he answered, whoever has two tunics, share with him who has none. The tax collectors ask, what should we do?

And he answers, collect no more than you're authorized to do. Soldiers ask, what should we do? And he says, don't extort money from anyone. In other words, what is completely clear is that bearing fruit in John the Baptist ministry, as he intends it, is a new kind of love.

It's unselfish, it's loving, it's kind, it's sacrificial, it's generous, and it flows from a heart of repentance and trust in God. Now, Jesus picks up the same language, Matthew 12, and says, either make the tree good and its fruit good or make the tree bad and its fruit bad, for the tree is known by its fruit.

You brood of vipers. How can you speak good when you are evil? The tree is evil. It's not going to bear good fruit for out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks. So the specific fruit that Jesus has in mind here is language coming out of the mouth that is loving or kind or honest or gracious or helpful or upbuilding rather than damning and condemning, putting people down.

You will know them by their fruit means that there's an internal condition of the heart that expresses itself in outward words and actions. So fruit for Jesus at this point then is new kinds of words and actions that accord with faith and repentance. Then we come to John 15, which I think is probably the most important section on fruit.

And he's using the imagery of fruit and the vine being grafted into the vine. And I think he's talking about a transformed life of sacrificial love, but probably also it flows over into people being influenced by this and coming to do it themselves. So here are the key verses.

"I am the vine," this is verse 5, "I'm the vine, you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit for apart from me you can do nothing." So fruit is the opposite of nothing. In other words, fruit is everything we do which can only be done by the power of Christ, which would include our entire moral transformation by the power of the Spirit flowing through Christ and the effect it has on other people.

And then he goes on in verse 8 and says, "By this is my Father glorified that you bear much fruit and so prove to be my disciples," which sounds a lot like Matthew 5:16, "Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good deeds and give glory to your Father in heaven," which would incline me to think he has in mind here a real significant transformed, visible, new kind of behavior.

And then he goes on and says, "Abide in my love. If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love." And then he adds in verse 12, "This is my commandment that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love is no one than that he laid down his life for his friends." And the paragraph ends in verse 17, "These things I command you so that you will love one another." So, the very least we can say about the fruit that Jesus is saying will be produced by his disciples is that they love each other, that they love people, which I think is confirmed in verse 2 where it says, "Every branch in me that does not bear fruit, he takes away." In other words, love is absolutely essential to confirm that we are truly abiding in the vine, truly born again.

And that's exactly what John says in his epistle, "By this we know that we have passed from death to life, that we love the brothers." And, of course, then we turn to the apostle Paul, we find almost the same kind of thing as he uses the imagery of fruit bearing over and over again, and it's a transformed heart of love and joy and peace.

For example, Galatians 5:22, "The fruit of the Spirit is joy, love, joy, peace," and Colossians 1:10, "Walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, bearing fruit in every good work." Philippians 1:11, "Be pure and blameless, fill with the fruit of righteousness." Ephesians 5:9, "The fruit of light is found in all that is good and right and true." Titus 3:4, "Let our people learn to devote themselves to good works so as to help in cases of need and not be unfruitful." Now, to what degree this kind of faith-filled, self-denying, fruit-bearing love and good deeds will lead to the conversion of sinners and grow a big church is decisively in God's hands, not ours.

We pray for this. Of course, we want this to happen, and we strive for this. This is God's intention. He says that others may see your good deeds and give glory to your Father. There is no artificial disconnection between our bearing the fruit of love and others being moved by it, changed by it, but they're not identical, and we don't have ultimate control over the response of other people.

So, the decisive assessment of the success of our ministry, now this is Wilson's question, the decisive assessment of our success in ministry, that is, whether we have been faithful, is not determined by the number of our converts. What God will hold pastors accountable for, indeed, all of us, is have we fought the good fight of faith?

Have we put to death evil deeds in our own hearts and bodies by the power of the Spirit? Have we walked in love? Have we preached the Word with faithfulness and courage and without compromise? Have we maintained a life of earnest prayer for ourselves and for our people? Have we loved and pursued lost people?

Have we been faithful with the ordinances of the church and with the right ordering of church discipline? Have we kept the global purposes of God in world missions and the Great Commission before us with concern and prayer and advocacy? Have we cared about suffering people inside, outside the church, and done what we could in acts of compassion and justice?

These are the things that we should devote ourselves to because we can, by the power of the Spirit. For some, God blesses this faithfulness with many converts. For others, fewer. But the joy of the Lord will be our strength, and the triumph over sin and the loving of other people and faithfulness to God's Word rooted in the gospel.

This will be our peace. Amen. Gospel-rooted peace in it all. Thank you, Pastor John. And thank you, Wilson, for the question. And thanks for joining us on the podcast. Three times a week we publish, and you can subscribe to our audio feeds and search our episode archive and even reach us by email with a question you may be facing in ministry leadership.

You can do all that through our online home at DesiringGod.org/AskPastorJohn. Well, speaking of things that Jesus said, the theme of the kingdom is a big one for him. In the ESV translation, kingdom gets mentioned 126 times in the gospels, but just 34 times after that in the rest of the New Testament.

So why does Jesus give the kingdom such prominence? And what is the kingdom of God to begin with? Two questions for the price of one APJ. That's on Friday. I'll be your host, Tony Reik. We'll see you then. 1 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9