Stop trying to produce peaches!

My goal as an peach tree is not to try to make peaches appear on my branches. My goal as an peach tree is to be the healthiest peach tree that I can be, and by doing that, I naturally and without effort produce peaches. By being a healthy peach tree, I don’t produce Strychnine. I don’t produce Marijuana. I don’t produce Poppy seeds and I don’t produce Thorns. By diligently taking in the water and nutrients that a peach tree needs I produce good fruit because that is my destiny. If I receive what I need to grow, I can do no other.

As a Christian, my goal is not to produce both a civil and religious law abiding person. It is not to produce someone who goes about the day doing good things. Being a Christian doesn’t mean that I set out each morning to sound and act like Jesus the Christ. Rather, by imbibing the nature of Jesus, by acknowledging and interacting with Jesus throughout the day, by walking and talking and breathing and existing “in Jesus name” I naturally produce an obedience to the laws of Jesus the Christ as well as the laws of the land. Taking in the former means that producing the latter requires no effort at all. In fact, I can do no other. It's become my destiny.

The only thing that the Law of God can do is point out where and in whom the nature of God is not present. It can do nothing more than that. Jesus and only Jesus is able to produce in us the kind of character that gives off the aroma of Jesus’ nature.

Focussing on having the right shape, colour, smell, size or texture will not allow just any tree to produce good peaches. One must first be a peach tree. Just the same, trying to appear to have the right thoughts, words and behaviours will not make you a Christian. Sooner or later what is really “in there” will leak out and let the truth be known. If you are not filled with the Spirit of your Creator, sooner or later your thorns will poke the innocent. Sooner or later your poison will kill those you love.