Experiencing the Satisfaction of Fruitfulness

Dannah Gresh: Are you too busy? Is your life bordering on unsustainable? Do you have friends or family members telling you, “You’ve got to slow down”? And you’re just frustrated at the end of the day because you know you were doing something all day long, but what?

That’s no life for you, my friend. God has not called you to be busy; He’s called you to be fruitful! 

Welcome to another episode of Revive Our Hearts Weekend. I’m your host, Dannah Gresh, and I’m so happy you could join me today. 

It’s true that a fruitful life is often a very full life, but busyness can actually be the enemy of fruitfulness. So, a woman’s life is a constant re-evaluation of: am I fruitful or just too busy?

I do have people tell me I’m too busy—often. And the truth is, sometimes I am. I love working, so people have to tell me, “Dannah, slow down! Smell the roses.” Busyness is a distraction from what God has actually called me to be: fruitful.

But, sometimes when people offer their advice to me, I have this deep sense in my spirit that they're saying is not true. Why? Because I know that what they are really seeing at that point in my life is fruitfulness. Lots of it. 

How do I know the difference? Stick around! I’ll tell ya! Because you need to know: am I just busy or am I fruitful?

Being fruitful is something that comes with intimately knowing Jesus. We’re going to see some examples of that today and talk about the beauty of seeing your fruitfulness at work in the lives of others. And, as promised, I’ll tell you how to know the difference between busyness and fruitfulness. First, what is fruitfulness? Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth is going to show us what God’s Word says about that.

Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth: I want to show you the concept of fruitfulness from the very beginning (in fact, Genesis means “beginning.”) So in the beginning of things, God intended that every living thing should be fruitful.

So, look at Genesis 1, first of all verses 11 and 12: 

Then God said, “Let the earth produce vegetation: seed-bearing plants and fruit trees on the earth bearing fruit with seed in it according to their kinds.” And it was so. The earth produced vegetation: seed-bearing plants according to their kinds and trees bearing fruit with seed in it according to their kinds. And God saw that it was good.

So when God made these trees, these shrubs, these plants, He made them in such a way that they were to bear fruit. In the fruit they bore there would be more seeds so that that fruit could produce more fruit. Fruit bearing that would go from one generation to the next.

So these trees, this vegetation, they were not just to exist for themselves. They were designed, they were created, to multiply, to be productive, to produce more just like themselves. The concept is introduced in verse 11 of the first chapter of the Bible.

Now, it wasn’t just plants and trees that were to be fruitful. If you go to verses 20–21 in chapter 1: 

Then God said, “Let the water swarm with living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the expanse of the sky.” So God created the large sea-creatures and every living creature that moves and swarms in the water, according to their kinds. He also created every winged creature according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. 

Now as we come to verse 22, notice the connection between God’s blessing and fruitfulness. So God made these birds, these living creatures, these large sea creatures—He made them with life. And then, verse 22, God blessed them, and He said to them: “Be fruitful, multiply, and fill the waters of the seas, and let the birds multiply on the earth.” 

So God created these birds, these sea creatures, He blessed them and part of His blessing was that they would be multiplied, they would produce others like themselves. And it wasn’t just plants and trees and animals that were to be fruitful.

As we continue in the creation account in Genesis 1, we see that human beings (that’s us), that we were created and commanded to be fruitful. Look at verse 28 in Genesis chapter 1. After God created male and female in His image, 

God blessed them, and God said to them, “Be fruitful [that’s the second time we’re seeing that connection—be blessed and be fruitful], multiply, fill the earth, and subdue it.” 

They were blessed to be a blessing. We have been blessed to be fruitful, to multiply, to reproduce.

Fruitfulness suggests that there will be a future, and there will be descendants, and they will be multiplied. So it’s not just us taking up space here and breathing air and doing life, but us giving life to others! We’ve been blessed by God to bless others.

I just had this picture cross my mind, of what if the people of God, what if women of God who listen to Revive Our Hearts—who have been blessed by it, who grow from it—what if God blessed our lives in such a way that we “multiplied, and increased rapidly, and became extremely numerous so that the land was filled with” women, men, people of God who know God, who love God, who walk with Him.

We long for women everywhere talking about Jesus, promoting the gospel, sharing the gospel with others, being light and salt and influencing their homes, their workplaces, their churches, their communities until the land is filled with the beauty of Christ shining through fruitful believers! It’s a vision we have for Revive Our Hearts. It’s God’s vision for His Church, so that one day “the glory of the Lord [will cover the earth], as the waters cover the sea” (Hab. 2:14).

How does it happen? How does it start? By you and me being fruitful believers! Now, in the Old Testament, fruitfulness is promised to God’s people mostly in relation to the land, crops, and physical offspring. Mostly when you read about fruitfulness in the Old Testament, that’s what it’s talking about.

Look at the first psalm in the Old Testament, Psalm 1. It’s talking about a righteous person who meditates on the law of the Lord. His focus, his heart, his connection is to the Lord. And it says, “He [will be] like a tree planted beside flowing streams that bears its fruit in its season, and its leaf does not wither. Whatever he does prospers” (v. 3).

So there you see it moving from the physical fruitfulness to talk about the spiritual reproduction of a man or woman who fears the Lord and walks with Him. The point is, where there is life there will be fruitfulness. That is the result of Christ’s life, His Word, His Spirit flowing in us, filling us and then flowing through us to others. 

We’re not supposed to sit like bumps on a log and just enjoy our sweet relationship with God, our sweet time at church, and just let all the rest of the world go to hell while we’re enjoying the gospel and Christ. No!

God wants us to be bearing fruit as we walk with Him. As our hearts become tuned to Him and we meditate on His law, we will bear fruit in the appropriate season. Our leaf will not wither, whatever we do will prosper.

You see a similar concept in Jeremiah chapter 17, beginning in verse 7: “The person who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence indeed is the Lord, is blessed.” Now, you tell me. We’ve been looking at the connection between blessing and fruitfulness. So when it says this person who trusts in the Lord is blessed, what do you think is going to be the result of that blessing?

He will be like a tree planted by water: [I think you’ve heard this before] it sends its roots out toward a stream, it doesn’t fear when heat comes, and its foliage remains green. It will not worry in a year of drought [and it will not] cease producing fruit. (Jer. 17:8)

This is the life of a person who trusts the Lord, who relies on the Lord for his righteousness and for his salvation. This is a picture of a person who is alive spiritually, and the evidence is that he is bearing spiritual fruit. He doesn’t just do it in good times, he does it in hard times. In a year of drought, when the heat comes, he will never cease producing fruit! 

Dannah: Yes, what a beautiful picture. That is what I want my life to look like! You, too? When we follow Jesus and know Him more each day, we get to be wholely satisfied in Him to have joy in every season, and that flows out of us into our daily lives. That bears fruit and that affects the people around us.

Now, we don't always get to see how God is working through our lives, but when we do, it is truly a humbling and rewarding experience.Well, remember, I’m going to tell you how to know the difference between busyness and fruitfulness. Stick around! I want to tell you about how I got to see this firsthand in the life of a young woman I discipled. Well, it started out as a mentoring relationship, but today she is one of my peers and best friends, and you probably know her! Erin Davis welcome back to Revive Our Hearts Weekend.

Erin Davis: Awe, Dannah those were nice things you said about me . . . thanks.

Dannah: I'm going to say even nicer things about you, Erin, to the point where I believe you will experience discomfort.

Erin: Oh . . .

Dannah: Hey, do you remember when we met?

Erin: Oh, I don't remember the moment. I remember the era. I was fifteen years old, and I had just given my life to Christ. There was a whole new world that opened up to me, including being a part of a Bible believing church and being connected to a youth group and all of those things that came with it. You were part of that. You were a volunteer with the youth group at the time, you and Bob were. You invited me to go on a little retreat. I say little because it was, I think, six girls, and you and maybe another adult or two. This is gonna sound like I'm hyping it up beyond what it was, but it really did change my life in very profound ways.

Dannah: That was a fun weekend. I think I remember wearing a cowgirl hat.

Erin: It was pink.

Dannah: I think it was pink. I wearing my jammies.

Erin: Yes, it was crazy.

Dannah: I remember the very first time I saw you. It's so strange, because I remember the very first time I saw my daughter-in-law, and I remember the very first time I saw you.

You were in the youth pastor’s office, curled up on the sofa, like propped up on the sofa sitting there. I was just drawn to you. I had no idea how to disciple girls. I mean, I was new to this youth group thing, but I was willing to try.

One thing we did was just “be with” time. I mean, grocery shopping with two year olds and Erin, cooking dinner kids in a living room and Erin, running errands with Erin. It was fun. Do you remember that?

Erin: I totally remember. I remember Lexi was little like maybe two or three, toddling around. Robbie was a little bit older. And so you were very much in that stage of parenting. That's what we did. I remember I would come to your neighborhood. You must have had a little creek nearby. You pushed Lexie in a stroller, and we would walk down and Robbie could throw rocks in the creek.

And the whole time the world of faith and truth was opening up to me rapidly. We could talk about these big things. My parents had recently gotten divorced. There was a lot going on internally. We would have those conversations as we walked your neighborhood.

Dannah: Yeah. Discipleship isn't always opening up to a Bible study or inviting women to a retreat. Sometimes it's just life on life, you know? There were questions. You were a new baby believer, as a teenager. There were some things maybe some of your peers and the youth group had gleaned from years of walking with the Lord. There was some catch up to do, and that's not going to happen in Bible study, although we did do Bible study.

Erin: Yes, I'd never been involved in Bible study. And you said, “Hey, you want to do a Bible study?”

And I was like, “Sure, I guess that's what Christians do.”

You invited me to do Experiencing God, that was my very first Bible study ever. I remember it just felt like my mind was being blown over and over and over again. A lot of that was brand new to me. So was the Bible! I mean, I owned a Bible, my mom had read the Bible, but it was seemingly meaningless to me apart from Christ. It was like gibberish. Then I come to Christ, and He gave me this instant hunger for His Word. But you really helped me get out a fork and a spoon and dig in. You gave me the tools.

Dannah: Yeah, that was fun. I still have that exact book that we went through, the prayer requests with your name and Sarah Peasley and all the different girls that were in that group. Prayer requests were in there. I look at that often it's a treasure.

Erin: I texted you just this weekend, Dannah, because I was doing Bible study prep at my dining room table. It was Experiencing God and that's the Bible study that my women's ministry at my own church is doing. I'm leading a group of women through it in my home, and it felt so full circle. It felt like this is the Bible study that Dannah put in my hands and said . . . You never taught at me. You walked through it with me.

And now, we won't say how many years, but it's several. All these years later in my living room, there's women that are walking through that same study. And so, fruitfulness does have that multiplicity. Maybe it's not always quite that parallel, but there's some beauty in the fact that I'm now leading women through the study you led me through when I was a brand-new believer and a teenager.

Dannah: I love that, and I wish I could be in that living room with you tonight, Erin Davis.

Erin: I would make you popcorn.

Dannah: I love popcorn. I do you know I do. And Erin, I just want to say that you're a treasure.

We're talking about fruitfulness today on Revive Our Hearts Weekend, and I think you are one of the most rewarding. It's hard for me to say this because I just felt like we were friends, and I walked beside you. But I also recognize that in some ways, you're a part of my fruitfulness. And now I think you're one of the most fruitful women I know.

What women see about you, though, they see The Deep Well with Erin Davis. They see Grounded. They see Revive Our Hearts Content Director. What they don't see is how you open your living room up every week, and it's packed full of women who are hungry for the Word. The same thing I did with you when you were fifteen, you're doing with and have done with countless women, teenagers, college age women, young adult women, new moms, older moms. You are the real thing, Erin Davis. It is my absolute joy to have a front row seat to see you be fruitful in the lives of other women.

Erin: That's so kind. You know we will all face Jesus someday, and we will give an account. It's not a salvation issue. Salvation is by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone period. But we will give an account for the things that we've done for the kingdom. I think any fruitfulness I've done for Jesus deserves to be credited to your account, in some ways, because you showed me that's what you do.

You showed me when you know somebody who's new in the faith, you invite them into your home. You showed me that the Word is where we go to over and over again as we're looking for answers for our lives. You showed me that being a part of a local body of believers is essential to the Christian life. You showed me that from the very first moments I was a follower of Jesus. So, I mean, I so appreciate your kind words. They were a little bit uncomfortable if I'm honest. Tonight is the night that my living room will be filled very soon with a lot of women. But you showed me how to do it, and so I'm so grateful for your example.

Dannah: Thanks for being with us today.

Erin: Thank you.

Dannah: Maybe you’re thinking about someone you can mentor, and I hope you go for it! In the meantime, did you know you already are a discipler? If you’re a mom, you know you’re discipling your children. But whether or not you intentionally mentor, remember, if you are a mom, you have someone watching your example. Even when you think what you are doing doesn't make a difference, God is using your fruitfulness in ways you may not expect.

Hunter Beless, host of the Journeywomen podcast and Laura Wifler, cofounder of Risen Motherhood give us some insight on this. They’ve both written children’s books about helping kids grow in faith. They're going to help you have joy in the process of being fruitful as you teach and disciple others. They’re both in the mothering small children phase of life. Oh, but what they share applies to all of us! 

Erin: Hunter, one of the things I know about your life from just being your friend, and honestly, from a lot of social media peeping, is that you use song to teach your kids about God's Word. I want to know more about that. How did that have a start in your family?

Hunter Beless: Well, I always remember things better as a song. It's such a wonderful thing to get to sing together as a family and just enjoy God's Word, to teach them to delight in God's Word. But really, I think the principle behind the singing is that our lives ought to testify to the wondrous works of the Lord. And so, our theology, our understanding of who God is, is naturally going to lend itself to doxology or a singing, proverbially speaking, but for us it does happen literally too. 

We always say, “Do whatever works.” You know, you can sing if it works for you. You can rap, you can bang on the table, you can scream, you can use a monster voice. Do whatever works for you to just get the words of God down into your heart. That's the goal, that we would reflect upon and remember the wondrous works of the Lord. And so, whatever it takes, that's what we're gonna do at our house, to be putting that into practice.

Erin: Before I move on to Laura. I love the story of how this became a book. Can you tell us the short version that began with those beautiful words every woman loves to hear, “I'll take the kids.” Tell the story.

Hunter: Well, my husband did take my kids one morning, and he offered me time just to sit with the Lord. And out of my own overflow of just delight in God's Word, I penned a poem, and I often pen poems. Laura knows this, you know this, Erin. And so, it just came out. 

I was trying to encapsulate what is it about God's Word that I love so much? And why is it that we want to be hiding God's Word in our hearts? It’s so that we can communicate the truth about what God's Word is, and what it does for us in the life of a Christian to our children, so that maybe, then they'd be a little bit more excited, whenever we say, “Hey, guys, let's sit down and read God's Word together. Or, Hey, let's memorize this Scripture together.” Because I don't know if you're like me, I know that I need to be teaching the commands of the Lord to my children, like Laura just taught us so beautifully. But oftentimes, that results in grumbling and complaining.

I think if we can just give our kids a little bit more of a biblical understanding of what God's Word is, and why it's so important in the life of a Christian. Then, maybe they'll come to the table with a little bit more eagerness and a little more willingness to engage with it.

Erin: I love that. I actually think the spirit of Deuteronomy 6 is delight and creativity. In your everyday life, write it on the walls, sing it while you're walking down the road, put it on your forehead, if you need to just find a way to remember it. And our kids are, of course, drawn to that. 

Hey, Laura, you've got your eyes set on a pretty lofty parenting goal, which is to give your children a biblical understanding of prayer. I've got a confession, which is that prayer is a discipline I often struggle with, and therefore, not an area of my spiritual life I focused on much with my kids. So, I hope to learn from you. Tell me about your approach and teaching your kids to pray.

Laura Wifler: Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think it's a struggle for all of us. So, just because I wrote the book on it, trust me, it is preaching to my own heart, and it is what I need to hear for sure. 

But when talking about prayer with our kids, I think sometimes I would overcomplicate it as a mom. I would really want there to be just robust, long prayer for my children that really acknowledged all the facets of God. I remember one time one of my girls said to me, whenever I wasn't gonna pray but it was gonna be my husband. She just goes, “Thank goodness, Mom's prayers last so long.” 

But really, the heart behind the book is just to show children the idea that the Lord has always made a way for prayer. Since the Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve, prayed to God. It's just simply talking with God. And so, we did that before sin, before the fall. And now we're doing it throughout the fall. 

And so, I hope to show just how prayer has changed, but that it's still something beautiful. It's something that we still get to practice. We still get to do that. God still made a way for us to talk with Him. 

Erin: Something I noticed about young moms and moms with young kids. Now I have a toddler, but I'm the old mom at the park. I'm not a young mom. But anyway, there's this renewed interest in catechizing our kids, which is not a new idea. In fact, it's a very old idea. But I wanted to talk about it in this episode. Either of you can take this ball. What does it mean to categorize our children or ourselves or women's discipleship group? I'd love to hear the ways that you guys have done this. Laura, you want to pick it up first?

Laura: Catechizing is simply teaching your children the truth of God. I mean, it's usually a call and response, or a question and an answer, where we ask the question of who made you? You know, why did God make you? A different simple question that really just teaches your children truth. 

Just a quick story. My youngest daughter is almost five. She has disabilities. In our family, we had been working through many different catechisms. I was mainly working with my older two children, because my youngest is not as verbal and just is delayed overall. One day I said to my kids, kind of like in review, because this was basic, I just said, “Who made you?” And my youngest daughter, who doesn't hardly speak very much, she just goes “God,” and just yelled it out. I just lost it. 

This is a truth that I don't know when it was planted in her heart. Because this was the first time, she had articulated it for us. But I just thought, “Oh, baby, I'm so glad you know this. I want you to know this.” It was such a joy to see something that maybe we have been working on in passing take root in her heart. 

I pray that is even for my other children who are regularly developing, that as they grow up and someone says, “You're not very smart, or you're not beautiful, or you're not good,” whatever, it may be probably much harsher than that; that they remember. “No, God made me.” Some of those catechizing type things, those are what really implant truths from the Bible. They give us language to be able to rebut lies, to be able to fight Satan, to just speak truth to our hearts and to other people. And so, I have really enjoyed catechizing my children. I haven't done it maybe as much as I have wanted to or felt like I should. But I think when we take time to do those things, they come out of us in moments when we need them the most.

Dannah: That was Laura Wifler and Hunter Beless talking with Erin Davis about being fruitful as you disciple others, particularly your own kids. 

Talk about busy! No other season of life feels as chaotic as those years of early parenting, am I right? But that’s not the only season we sometimes feel like we have more than we can handle. As promised, I want to tell you a quality that exists in your life when you’re fruitful rather than busy. The distinction is the difference between peace and unrest!

First quality of fruitfulness: it comes from the presence of Christ in your life! Listen to John chapter 15. This is verse 5 says:

I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.

NOTHING! I’m not working as hard as I am to get nothing done. What about you? But if you don’t do what you do as an extension of your time with Jesus—abiding in Him—that’s exactly what you’ll be doing! So, slow down today. Prioritize your time with Him. It makes a difference.

In my busiest, hardest seasons, if I slow down and spend time with Him, there’s a peace under the chaos. People are drawn to that. It’s lifegiving. But when I just let my calendar dictate whether or not I have time to spend with the Lord, I turn into what is just a busy woman! There’s no peace, and people receive that from me. Yeah, there’s often bad fruit that comes out of this girl when she gets busy and isn't fruitful.

There are seasons where we have too much: sick parents, two jobs to get out of debt, deadlines. But if Jesus is still the center of your world, you can do even those periods of life and be fruitful!

I hope this encourages you to say “no” to something or someone today so you can get your time in with the Lord. Or to keep pressing through a busy season because even there, you can be fruitful if you’re abiding.

There’s incredible fruitfulness just in letting people see that kind of peace in you in the things you. There’s someone specific we want to see that: the prodigals in the Church . . . so, so many of them! And this month we’re coming at you with tools to help!

We’ve officially launched a 30-day prayer challenge called While You Wait for Your Prodigal. You can sign up for the free email challenge to get each day’s content in your inbox. Get a copy of the challenge as a booklet and journal your prayers for your prodigal for your gift of any amount. Visit ReviveOurHearts.com to request it and sign up for the challenge. 

Also, next week on Tuesday, June 4, Revive Our Hearts is hosting our When You Love a Prodigal event. It’s the first in our new series of online events, and you won’t want to miss this encouraging experience. 

Join Mary Kassian, Joannie DeBrito, Dr. Christopher and Angela Yuan, and host Erin Davis for a hope-filled evening as our guests share wisdom for those living with the pain of a loved one gone astray. This event is just $29 to register, or you can bundle and save on all of the online events in our series coming up. Just go to ReviveOurHearts.com/help for more details. We hope to see you there.

The world is confusing, and it seems like it’s only getting more so. We’re going to be talking about finding clarity in the midst of confusion next week. Thanks for listening today. I’m Dannah Gresh. 

We’ll see you next time for Revive Our Hearts Weekend.

This program is a listener-supported production of Revive Our Hearts in Niles, Michigan, calling women to freedom, fullness, and fruitfulness in Christ.

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