Fruit Inspection: Bruised Fruit
Pastor Rollan Fisher
Focus: The trials of life reveal what is in us that we might be led to the cross and joy found only in Jesus Christ.
What’s on the Inside?
Revealed
But Jesus Changes Everything
What’s on the inside?
Our trials not only test our faith, but are meant to produce the completing work of God in our lives.
James 1:1-8 ESV
“James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, To the twelve tribes in the Dispersion: Greetings. Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing. If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him. But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea that is driven and tossed by the wind. For that person must not suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord; he is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways.
The trials of life will change you - you must ask for the grace of God to ensure that they are sanctifying and not corrupting changes.
Trials are meant to draw you closer to Jesus rather than pushing you away from him.
Our job is to ask God for wisdom in the midst of the trial to know how to glorify him as we depend on his strength.
“You will never really understand your heart when things are going well. It is only when things go badly that you can see it truly. And that’s because it is only when suffering comes that you realize who is the true God and what are the false gods of your lives.”
-Timothy Keller
Revealed
Trials show us what is inside of us with which we need to be deal.
James 1:12-18 ESV
“Blessed is the man who remains steadfast under trial, for when he has stood the test he will receive the crown of life, which God has promised to those who love him. Let no one say when he is tempted, "I am being tempted by God," for God cannot be tempted with evil, and he himself tempts no one. But each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire. Then desire when it has conceived gives birth to sin, and sin when it is fully grown brings forth death. Do not be deceived, my beloved brothers. Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change. Of his own will he brought us forth by the word of truth, that we should be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures.”
“Trials teach us what we are; they dig up the soil, and let us see what we are made of.”
-Charles Spurgeon
Just as we are who we really are when nobody's watching or when we’re away from the public eye, so trials are used by God to show where we truly are in relationship to him.
Trials are meant to strengthen us even as they break us of the things that are not of God.
The hope of the gospel is that Jesus has the power to make us new creations, set us free from our sins and truly change everything!
But Jesus Changes Everything
When God allows things to come to the surface he is showing us what he intends to heal through the gospel - either now or at the resurrection.
James 1:19-27 ESV
“Know this, my beloved brothers: let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger; for the anger of man does not produce the righteousness of God. Therefore put away all filthiness and rampant wickedness and receive with meekness the implanted word, which is able to save your souls. But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks intently at his natural face in a mirror. For he looks at himself and goes away and at once forgets what he was like. But the one who looks into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and perseveres, being no hearer who forgets but a doer who acts, he will be blessed in his doing. If anyone thinks he is religious and does not bridle his tongue but deceives his heart, this person's religion is worthless. Religion that is pure and undefiled before God the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world.”
God’s word shows us God’s goals.
We must be doers of the word and not simply hearers.
We must put God’s word into practice by being about his life and Kingdom mission in our city and the nations.
The cross of Jesus Christ makes this all possible no matter what we’ve previously seen come out of us through trial because God’s grace changes everything.
At the cross, Jesus not only paved the way for our forgiveness, but broke the power of sin and death for those who come to him by faith.
Jesus gives us steps through which we are discipled and transformed into his image.
What are the steps that you are taking with God to become more like Christ and be more about his mission?
You walk this new life out being connected to the body of Christ - the head, who is Jesus, and interdependent with our other brothers and sisters in him.
“The Christian husband is not a free-standing moral agent, doing whatever he pleases in this marriage. He is a member — an arm, a leg, a finger, an ear, a tongue — of Christ and responsible to Christ as the head and to other members, especially the leaders of the body of Christ that he’s a part of. That’s true of the wife as well, which means that this marriage is not an isolated couple with no accountable relationships. They are part of the body of Christ. She and he have recourse to the church for help. They are members of Christ’s body.”
-John Piper
Second City Church - Pastor Rollan Fisher