In the old days people made blood sacrifices to atone for their sins and to gain the approval of God. New testament Christians do not have to do this anymore as Jesus came as the final and ultimate sacrifice, forever taken away any accusations that stand against us, paying the price for our penalty with His precious blood, once and for all.
However, we even with this awareness still seek out sacrifices that we can make to gain the approval of God, often because of the guilt of hidden sins or unintentional sins that exist in our lives. John the Baptist addresses this whilst preaching against the Pharisees and the Sadducees. They had come to be baptised along with the multitude of others who also came to be baptised. John stops them and says to them,
Bring forth fruit that is consistent with repentance [let your lives prove your change of heart]. (Matthew 3:8 AMP)
His words come across as being quite harsh and uncalled for, seeing that they came for the exact same purpose everyone else came. They were not doing anything wrong so why scold them so heavily? The scolding came out of the fact that the religious leaders were simply coming to the baptism as another religious activity and by implication to win the favor of God by appearing righteous. Yet, they were not displaying a character that was consistent with repentance.
How many of us seek deliverance services, prophetic words and prayer meetings to deal with the issues in our lives and to cover the shame and guilt that eats at us inside? We often think that the solution is in coming to church regularly, participating in all the activities and shouting ‘Amen’ to every word will bring the transformation we want to see in our lives. We queue up for prayers and sign up for outreach events and volunteering, when what we really need to do is truly repent in our hearts and bear the fruits that are consistent with repentance.
All of these other things like attending prayer meetings and even seeking out deliverance and prophetic counsel are good and important. They certainly have their place. But more importantly, what God wants from us is that we bear the fruits of repentance. That means that when we repent we become aware of our position in God and walk in a way that reflects our spiritual statues. God gives us the position of sons and daughters, but it is our responsibility to represent and grow into this position as well as possible. He wants us to bear the fruits of the spirit, which is not measured by our ability to speak in tongues, but in our relationship and dealing with people.
For anything to bear fruit, it needs to be planted, watered, nurtured, the ground needs to be tilled and the plant needs to be watched and cared for as required. In other words, it takes active work and effort on our path to make sure we bear the fruits we are required to.
There is no amount of prophecy, word of knowledge, wisdom or deliverance that can make us bear the fruits of repentance that God requires to see in us to release the blessings that He has for us. A tree that is mature will bear the fruits of its type. An Apple tree that is mature will bear fruits every year according to its season. There are certain blessings God cannot give us not because, we aren’t delivered, or because we don’t participate in religious disciplines, but simply because we are not yet bearing fruits that are consistent with what we say. What we are declaring and confessing we are is not consistent with what we do and how we act towards others. God wants consistency from us.
Let us daily take sincere outward steps as signs of our inward repentance so that the fruits we bear can attract others to the knowledge of Christ. And faithful is He to keep us from falling or slipping in our demonstration of Him.
We Grow in Faith 