Fruit of Love

A few nights before I left for Allume two weeks ago, Scott’s parents brought us a bag of apples they had picked with the senior adults at their church.  It was a huge bag of apples—my guess was 20 pounds.  I really wanted to make some of The Pioneer Woman’s applesauce but I had zero extra time as I prepared for my trip.

I let the apples sit while I was gone.  I got home from Allume on Sunday, full and happy, but definitely not ready to get back to real life.  Doing the grocery shopping that I missed on Saturday was the very last thing I felt like doing.  So I made applesauce with Emma.

We peeled the apples and then Emma worked to slice them. They were hard apples—the hardest I’d ever seen.  After Emma had dumped them in the pot on the stove, Emma picked up two apple seeds and said, “Let’s go plant these!”

I said, “No, Emma, they’ll take forever to grow.” I drifted off at the last of my explanation, taken aback at my reaction.  I couldn’t believe my disinterest in planting the seeds knowing that it would be years before it looked like a tree and even more before it produced apples we could use.

Was I really that selfish that I had no interest in planting something that likely someone else would enjoy in years to come?  Just because I wouldn’t ever see the fruit, wasn’t the planting and watching the journey with Emma enough?  Wasn’t knowing that someone else would have joy because of our work enough?

 

Yesterday was Billy Graham’s 95th birthday.  There was a huge celebration just a few hours up the road in Asheville, NC.  He celebrated by producing and televising his last message to America called My Hope America. 

In the video, Larry King asked him years ago what is your purpose?  Billy Graham answered to go into the world and tell people the gospel.   And still so many years later, when he is 95, at an age where anyone would give him a pass for not putting in hard work, he still has the passion and willingness to share this truth.  He will likely never see the fruits of his labor, but he knows and cares about others enough that it doesn’t matter.  It’s enough to know that someone else will be changed by Jesus Christ.

He says, “With ALL my heart, I want to leave you with the truth.”

He has that thing for people that I realized I was lacking when confronted with two apple seeds.  Great love of others.

I pray that we are—that I am–so full of love for others that we are willing to do the hard work of planting seeds, satisfied with watching the journey and resting in the knowledge that the fruit will bloom and be enjoyed for generations to come.

 

If you haven’t, please, watch the broadcast online here. Even if you don’t believe his message, I pray we are all inspired by his faithfulness to the task.