Bearing Fruit in Later Seasons of Life

Dannah Gresh: Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth says getting old has its difficulties . . . but lots of potential too.

Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth: Listen, the point isn't that we can have a healthy, flourishing, thriving life. The point is that we can be fruitful so we can point people to Christ.

Dannah: This is the Revive Our Hearts podcast with Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth, author of The Quiet Place, for December 8, 2023. I'm Dannah Gresh.

Nancy is continuing in her series, “Thriving in Every Season.”

Nancy: Well, if you're older than sixty-five, you've already experienced what I'm about to tell you. The week of my sixty-fifth birthday, I received a barrage of mail and emails and texts. I got emails from a company called Better not Younger. It's hair products for older women. And they said things like: “from weak to peak,” “abracadabra, hair magic.” Okay, I'm all about that hair magic stuff. I've got some of their products. They're good, but I don't know about the abracadabra part. But they were sending me emails about their products. 

Then I received an invitation to attend, quote, “a special event for retirees and those planning to retire soon.” I was hard at work that week. I wasn't quite ready for that “retiree” term. But that's what came into my inbox. And then, of course, I received in the mail an envelope from the American Association of Retired Persons—AARP—that said “Happy Birthday, Nancy,” with a membership card and a deal you just can't refuse. Maybe you've gotten those envelopes. 

Then I received a brochure in the mail advertising a two-day retirement planning workshop. I was feeling tired just from all these birthday greetings from sources about getting older. That workshop about retirement planning offers the “secret to building your ideal retirement.” And what's the secret? “You are your dreams, your bucket list, your definition of the ideal retirement, your ability to find purpose for this chapter in your life.”

Well, I was inundated with those and many other types of reminders that I was getting old and that changes perhaps were in order. But what I wanted to know is, what is God's perspective? 

As I was turning sixty-five, I wanted to know what God thinks about this? And what was His definition of this season of my life? What was His idea for my life? That's why I set out to study Psalm 92 as I hit that marker birthday. I've been living in this passage for the last several months. It's good for every season of life. It's not just for people getting older. 

But the part we're going to look at today has a special application to us as we are aging. Let me read through the psalm. We've been talking about it over the last several days. I just want to read it to give you a sense of the whole. Then we'll park today on the last two verses of Psalm 92. This is a song for the Sabbath day.

It is good to give thanks to the Lord,
to sing praise to your name, Most High,
to declare your faithful love in the morning
and your faithfulness at night,
with a ten-stringed harp
and the music of a lyre.

For you have made me rejoice, Lord,
by what you have done;
I will shout for joy
because of the works of your hands.
How magnificent are your works, Lord,
how profound your thoughts!

A stupid person does not know,
a fool does not understand this:
though the wicked sprout like grass
and all evildoers flourish,
they will be eternally destroyed.

But you, Lord, are exalted forever.

For indeed, Lord, your enemies—
indeed, your enemies will perish;
all evildoers will be scattered.
You have lifted up my horn
like that of a wild ox;
I have been anointed with the finest oil.
My eyes look at my enemies;
when evildoers rise against me,
my ears hear them.

The righteous thrive like a palm tree
and grow like a cedar tree in Lebanon.
Planted in the house of the Lord,
they thrive in the courts of our God.

They will still bear fruit in old age,
healthy and green,
to declare, “The Lord is just;
he is my rock,
and there is no unrighteousness in him.

This is a word of the Lord. Lord, how we praise You for Your promises, for Your Word, for what it means to us and in us and through us. I pray that you would quicken our hearts and our ears. Set our minds to receive and to respond to what You have for us today, whatever season of life we may be in. We pray in Jesus’ name, amen.

Verse 14 of Psalm 92, “They will still bear fruit in old age.” That word “old age” has to do with gray hairs. I think I qualify. I started getting these gray hairs when I was in my twenties. I colored them for a while. And then in my mid thirties, I say the happiest day of my life was the day I got off the bottle—speaking of coloring for your hair. It's just that I finally got to the place where I said, “You know what? I think I earned these. I'm gonna keep them. “

So, this old age, this “gray hairs” thing speaks to me. When the psalmist says they will still bear fruit in old age, I'm all ears. That bearing fruit has to do with germinating, with flourishing, with bringing forth fruit, to make cheerful, to increase. It's flourishing, it's growing, it's thriving. It's not just being stagnant. These people with gray hairs will still bear fruit; they will be healthy and green (says the CSB translation that I'm using). 

Let me read to you what some other translations say. The King James says they will be “fat and flourishing.” I don't know if I like that translation so much. But the word “healthy” actually does mean “to be fat or rich or fertile.” They are “fresh and flourishing,” says the New King James. The ESV says they are “ever full of sap and green.” The NIV says they will “stay fresh and green.” 

You get the idea. They're not dying away. Yes, our bodies are decaying and dying. But the inner man within us is being renewed day by day. And these people with old age and gray hairs will still bear fruit; they will be healthy and green. 

Now, pause. Because as I think about this passage, bearing fruit being healthy, being fresh, being green in old age; that's not how we normally describe or think about old age. We think of young people as being fruitful and having kids. We think of old age as being more associated with barrenness; the body dries up; the eyes become dim; we get hard of hearing; the skin dries up; the memory fades—anything but healthy and green.

In fact, if you want a kind of depressing description of old age, go to Ecclesiastes chapter 12. You can see metaphorically a lot of word pictures that are used in that chapter to talk about old people. They're headed toward their final home. 

Now, there's hope in the book of Ecclesiastes, because where there's the gospel, there's always hope. But we don't think of old age as being the time when you're vital and vibrant and bearing fruit and healthy and fresh and green. 

And yet, God's ways and God's Word go just counter to what would be ordinary and natural in our thinking. 

It dawned on me just recently since turning sixty-five that Abraham and Sarah or Abram and Sarai were seventy-five and sixty-five when God called them to pick up and leave their prosperous homeland where they'd been rooted all their lives and move to a whole new life. 

I told Robert about this. I said, “Honey, Abram was seventy-five and Sarah was sixty-five. You're seventy-five; I'm sixty-five. Fasten your seat belt, Friend. We're getting ready to move into God's calling. 

Now, I don't know that that means we're going to have children. I doubt it seriously. But we are asking the Lord to make us productive and fruitful in this season of our lives when so many people see themselves as on a downward trend—spiritually, emotionally, and in terms of productivity. We're saying, “Lord, do you have something for us that's a new or fresh, growing, calling?” We're just raising our hands and saying, “Lord, we're here. We're your servants. Do with us, in us, and through us, whatever you want in this season of life.” 

There's another godly older couple in Scripture, this one in the Gospel of Luke. I've referred to this couple quite a few times to Robert in conversations we've had recently. You remember Elizabeth and Zechariah, the older couple who had prayed for a son for years. Then God gave Zechariah the priest the promise that he would have a son, that son would be John the Baptist. They lived a fruitful life. And, Elizabeth spoke into the life of Mary of Nazareth.

I love this couple. I love so much about them. I've said to Robert many times, “Honey, I want us to be Zechariah and Elizabeth as we get older. I want us to have their spirit, their attitude in our old age to grow as they grew to be fruitful. That's not natural. That's supernatural. But that's what the Spirit of God wants to do and can do in and through us. 

So, what does it look like to be fruitful in old age? When we are frail, when we are weak, when we are old? As will be the case for many, if not most of us, at some point. Does that mean we keep working at the same pace that we did when we were forty? Does it mean we keep the pedal to the metal? Does it mean we always have to have things to do. What does it look like? What does it mean? 

I think it's important for us to understand that fruitfulness will look different in different seasons of our lives. Robert and I are watching friends and family members who are getting older, some of them quite old. We were last year at funerals for two friends in their nineties who had lived precious fruitful lives, but it looked different in their eighties and their nineties than it did when they were in their fifties or forties or thirties. We saw them in those latter years with their mental and their physical capacities diminishing. It was hard to watch and hard for them to go through. 

But we're pondering what it means to still bear fruit in old age. And I'm not just talking about mid-sixties. I'm talking about seventies and eighties and nineties, perhaps even longer, trusting God with whatever lies before us. Saying, “Lord, we want to be fruitful in old age.” 

I want today to give you some illustrations of people who have inspired me, who were fruitful in their old age, and see if we can learn some things from their lives, see if we can be inspired to let God fulfill this promise that the righteous will still bear fruit in old age.

Corrie ten Boom, you've heard her name, was the author of the best-selling book The Hiding Place. It was the story of how she and her family hid Jews during World War II in Holland, until they were betrayed, arrested by the Nazis, and imprisoned. Her sister Betsie was killed. But following the war, Corrie immigrated to the United States and began a worldwide ministry of traveling and speaking. She was energetic and fruitful well into her eighties. She touched millions of lives.

But then at the age of eighty-five, she experienced the first of a series of strokes that left her paralyzed and unable to talk for the last five years of her life. 

I read a book years ago that impressed me so much as I thought about this elderly season of life. The book is called The Five Silent Years of Corrie ten Boom. It was written by her longtime companion and caregiver. It talks about how God used Corrie when she couldn't talk. She was bedridden. But God used her in the ministry of silent intercession. 

It talked how she communicated with her eyes with guests who visited her in her home. People would leave and they had been refreshed, and they had been encouraged by this woman who couldn't say a word. 

I read recently about another woman, a ninety-one-year-old childless widow in India named Jenny. Jenny lives alone in a tiny house that a landlord has carved off from his own house. One room in that house that is actually just a hallway. Her tiny bedroom leaks, and the landlord won't repair the roof, so she sleeps in the tiny living room. 

She has very little money, a tiny leaky house, and no family. But this woman is cheerful and happy. She told visitors who wrote about this occasion, “When I wake up in the morning, I thank Jesus for everything.” She said, “I read my Bible all the time.” She's upbeat, she's positive. In her trembling old voice, she sang to these visitors a song about counting her blessings.

I read about women like Jenny, and I think of that song “10,000 Reasons.” Let me be singing when the evening comes. That's what I want to do. I want to be singing. I want to be praising the Lord. I want to be ministering grace. I want to be a source of grace to others. I want to be bearing fruit in old age. 

I'm thinking of another woman who's still living who is singing till the evening comes. She is an aunt of Robert’s. Aunt Lois is ninety-two. She lost her husband to COVID. She's had multiple health issues herself. Last year she moved across the country so she could be near her daughter and son-in-law. When we call her, we're hoping maybe we can give her a pick up or lift her up or lift her spirits. 

But she always asks how we're doing? She wants to know how Revive Our Hearts is doing? She's others-centered. She's upbeat, she's graceful. She's a woman who is fruitful in old age and, might I add, she follows every sport you can imagine, all the teams you can imagine. She knows how they're doing, what they're doing. She's cheering. She's not settling down and groaning and moaning in her old age. She is being fruitful. 

But it's not just the thing she's interested in. It's the people and the Lord that are causing her to thrive. She's interested in others and how she can bless them. She's giving financially out of resources the Lord has entrusted to her. She's pouring out, she's a life-giver. She's a fruitful woman bearing the fruit of the Spirit in her old age. 

There's a couple I've served with in ministry for many years. I read Dan's latest monthly newsletter update recently. He said, “Vicki and I are both in our eighties. We have no plans to retire. But our support has dropped about 50 percent.” Through all of their decades of serving the Lord people have supported them financially as missionaries. He said, 

We wish to maintain our giving to others and our current lifestyle. So, I've accepted a job with a company nearby doing some consulting work. This job is about eight hours a week. So, I will still have three to four days per week to serve in this ministry. [Where he has been for many years.] I am looking forward to this new challenge.

Here's a man in his mid-eighties who's looking forward to what new challenges God may have for him. 

Now, he's physically in a place where he can still do that, not at the same pace he did in his fifties. And the time may come when he can't leave his house. But as long as he can serve, he is going to work for the glory of God and the good of other people. He’s looking forward to a new challenge in his eighties.

My longtime friend, Barbara Rainey, is enrolled in seminary at age seventy-two. She's doing remote seminary through online courses. She'll be seventy-six or seventy-seven when she graduates. Why did she do it? I asked her that. And she wrote back and she said, 

I've loved Bible study since I began decades ago with Bible Study Fellowship and Precept. I knew I would never stop studying. The whole experience has been so good for me. My eyes have been open to the breadth and depth of knowledge about our Savior. I have no regrets for tackling this so late in life. [Then she said she wants to be fruitful.] We need an army of seasoned adults, modeling for the younger generations the importance of continuing to pursue Jesus with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength. 

That's a woman who is flourishing. She's thriving. She's bearing fruit in old age, in her mid-seventies. Well, old age can be a lot older than that. But here's a woman who is getting older who says, “I want to keep pressing on. I want to keep pursuing Jesus. I want to keep making Him known. I want to keep sharing him with others.” 

And then my longtime friend, precious Kim Wagner, you've heard her on Revive Our Hearts. You can listen to some of her story at different seasons in her life. She has been fruitful in different ways. She and her husband LeRoy have been friends of mine since the very beginning of Revive Our Hearts. We had a text exchange and email over the last few weeks as she knew I was teaching on Psalm 92. I wanted to just hear more about how this passage has spoken to her, what it has meant in her life. 

And she said, “Several years ago I adopted Psalm 92:12–15,” the last portion of the psalm that we're looking at. She said, 

I adopted that as the passage that I asked God to fulfill in our golden years. But our flourishing and fruit bearing has been nothing like I expected, and certainly nothing I would have wanted. 

Let me just give you a parenthesis here. In 2017 Kim's husband LeRoy was stricken with a complex, difficult-to-diagnose ailment that has left him in excruciating pain ever since and very limited physically. They've been to all kinds of doctors and appointments and treatments and efforts and have gotten some small relief, but life has never been the same for them. He was a pastor, shepherding the people of God, and in his fifties was struck with this affliction and is now trying to figure out what does it look like to be thriving and flourishing as they get older. 

She said, “Since 2017, it has seemed as though our season of bearing fruit had passed as we've had to live in isolation so much of that time.” Her husband's very immunocompromised. They're not able to get out and about. They have to be very careful when they do. She said, 

But I'm still hopeful that even in our small ways we are bearing fruit in this season, even if it's only in caring for my mom and others in simple ways and investing in family members.

I won't go into the details, but she has done that—behind-the-scenes and quiet, unshared ways. She has been fruitful and thriving as she has cared not only for her husband, but for her family. She said it's been extremely difficult. I want us to acknowledge that this is not an easy season. Getting old is not for sissies. There are things that start not working and parts of us that get tired and weary. We can't move as fast or as energetically, perhaps at some point, as we were able to in the past. Sometimes getting old can be very hard. She said,

This has not been easy. It's been extremely difficult. But at the same time, God has given treasures in the darkness. [That's a phrase from the book of Isaiah.] Treasures in the darkness that I would have never known without this season. I want to always abide in the vine in Christ, saying, “Yes, Lord,” to whatever He has. 

That is where fullness of joy is found. That is where we thrive and flourish, in the presence of God, in our old age. Planted in the house of the Lord, they will thrive in the courts of our God, they will still bear fruit in old age, healthy, and green. 

So, what's the goal of all of this, just so we can have a thriving old age? 

Well, the goal is clear. It's in the last verse of Psalm 92. 

They will still bear fruit in old age
to declare the Lord is just;
he is my rock,
and there is no unrighteousness in him. (v. 15)

Listen, the point isn't that we can have a healthy, flourishing, thriving life. The point is that we can be fruitful so we can point people to Christ, so we can rave about him. We can brag about him. We can if we can't talk anymore. We can point people to His Word. If, like Corrie ten Boom, we're at the place where we can't talk and we can't point, we can pray. Whatever God gives us the capacity to do at any given age, the point is to point people to Jesus. To declare not I am great, or I am good, or I am fruitful, or I am having a thriving life. But the Lord is just, He is my rock, and there is no unrighteousness in Him. 

 

We talked in verse 2 about declaring to others the lovingkindness, the faithfulness, the steadfast love of the Lord. And now we're declaring to others He is good. He is faithful. He is steadfast, and we worship Him. 

On my sixty-fifth birthday, I wrote a tweet. I guess they don't call it tweets anymore. They call it . . . what do you call it? An “X”? It used to be Twitter, used to be a tweet. I wrote out some thoughts as I was meditating on this passage. And this season of my life that I'm entering into at sixty-five, and Lord willing at seventy-five or eighty-five, or however many or few years the Lord gives me; I hope there will be fresh and new insights. 

But this was what was on my heart on my sixty-fifth birthday, based on Psalm 92.

Birthday Week
Sixty-five years

Sweet gatherings
Longtime friends
Food, laughter
Rich memories
Singing, prayer
Profound gratitude

World’s plan:
Retirement ahead

God’s plan:
Still flourishing
Still growing
Still fruitful
Still serving

Still proclaiming
His Word
His faithfulness
His goodness
His gospel

Pressing on
Poured out
For Him
For others

Strengthened, sustained
By grace
By faith
Yes, Lord!

Yes, Lord. Psalm 92:12–15: 

The righteous thrive like a palm tree
and grow like a cedar tree in Lebanon.
Planted in the house of the Lord,
they thrive in the courts of our God.
They will still bear fruit, in old age,
healthy and green, 

to declare, “The Lord is just,
he is my rock,
and there is no unrighteousness in him. 

That's my prayer for myself. And that's my prayer for you whether you're twenty-two or forty-two or sixty-two or eighty-two or like Aunt Lois, ninety-two. Can I just pray for you? 

Oh, Lord. Thank You that freedom and fullness and fruitfulness are found in Christ. Thank You that we can thrive and we can grow in every season of life. In the midst of adversity, in the midst of fires in the midst of a world on fire. We can thrive and grow because Christ is in us and He never ceases to thrive and to help us to grow. 

So, Lord, we want to be fruitful. We want to be fruitful in every age. I pray that for my friend listening today. I pray for a fruitful life, a flourishing life, a thriving life. I don't pray for a problem-free life. I think of my sweet friend Michelle who is today dealing with the challenges of this four-year-old special needs Blair, the daughter You've given to them. I pray that she would thrive, that she would flourish. 

I pray for Aunt Lois in her nineties that she would thrive, that she would flourish, that she would bear fruit. 

And I pray for the one listening now, that they would find a place of fruitfulness, that You might receive all the glory, and that together we might be able to declare to our world: God is great. God is good. He is faithful. He loves us. He is the one who makes us. I pray in Jesus’ name.

Dannah: You can be fruitful in every season. As Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth showed us today, fruitfulness doesn't have an age limit, you can still thrive in Christ and live out His purposes for your life regardless of your age. 

Nancy shared quite a bit today about how Psalm 92 resonated with her in fresh ways when she turned sixty-five. 

Erin Davis experienced something similar. When she turned forty, she turned to Psalm 92 for insight for a new season of life. On the The Deep Well podcast you can hear Erin's teaching about how she's asking the Lord to help her flourish in her season of life. The Deep Well is part of the Revive Our Hearts podcast family, you can hear all the podcasts by visiting ReviveOurHearts.com. 

The podcast family is just one example of how Revive Our Hearts wants to meet the needs of women in every season of life. 

Nancy: Whether young or older, single or married, empty nest or in a season of raising little ones, we are always encouraged to hear the fruit of how the Lord is working in the lives of women through this ministry. Here's a woman named Sarah who told us how she was impacted by a recent Revive Our Hearts teaching.

Sarah: As a mom of seven precious blessings ages five to fourteen. I just want to thank you from the bottom of my heart for your message on raising discerning children as part of your Revelation series. I'm so encouraged and built up as I listened to Holly and Kim discuss the important ways of standing for the truth of God. 

Holly Elliff (from Revelation series): But our kids already are facing pressures that we never experienced at that age. And so, we do need to raise kids who are discerning, who look at an issue based on the reality of God's Word, and not on the current culture. If they can't discern between those two things, they will be in deep waters. 

Sarah: There were several moments I wanted to stand up and cheer as I heard them stand for truth in different situations and reject the world's philosophies.

I see so many Christian parents softly compromising, barely realizing it is happening. Thank you for reminding us to stand firm in the truth, do not compromise, and to hear that soft check in our spirits. My husband has a saying as we raise our children, “Sarah, we can never take our feet off of the gas.” Thank you for encouraging us to keep our feet on the gas pedal of truth. Our eyes and hearts and minds are always alert.

Nancy: Thank you, Sarah, for sharing that sweet encouragement. You know, each program we produce, like that one that was so powerful for Sarah, is made possible because of people like you—listeners who partner with us through their prayers and financial support to help women become fruitful in every season. 

Every year, a large part of our funding for the year comes in during the month of December. And once again, we're trusting the Lord to provide for us as we come to the end of this year. 

Now, I want to emphasize that we don't want to take away anything from your regular giving to your local church. But if the Lord would have you to give to Revive Our Hearts this month, I'm thrilled to let you know that your gift will make double the impact thanks to a special matching challenge from friends of Revive Our Hearts, who are matching dollar for dollar every gift given this month. If you'd like to take advantage of that matching challenge, that's available right now. If you'd like to make a difference in the lives of women around the world, you can give at our website, ReviveOurHearts.com. You can also call us at 1-800-569-5959. Thank you so much for your support and for your prayers in this important season. 

Dannah: Thanks for joining us today. Next week we'll hear from two young women who have each been transformed by God in their thinking in and in their lives. We'll meet Mariah whose story includes identity crisis, panic attacks, and addiction. And we'll hear from Ashley, who's learned to trust God in spite of childhood sexual abuse. I hope you can join us and be encouraged next week on Revive Our Hearts. 

Revive Our Hearts with Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth calling you to freedom, fullness, and fruitfulness in Christ.

All Scripture is taken from the CSB.
 

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