Fruitless?

 

I felt a lump under my foot as we paused under an apple tree in the garden. I looked down. Several marble-sized apples litter the ground, and only a few remain on the tree. I had high hopes for that tree this year, as Don cleaned the ground round it and planted grass, fertilised it and tended it well. It’s always been a tree with a prolific crop, but the apples were marked and needed to be consumed quickly. I thought this year the tree would still bear a lot of fruit, this time unmarked.

But no. This year, like most of the rest of the garden, the crop is disappointing. Fruitless even. Effort wasted, apparently.

How many times are our hopes dashed in this world? We tend and feed a project, a relationship, an idea, only to find it falls to the ground, wasting away? I work hard, over years, on a piece of writing – the historical novel I’ve written with Onesimus as the main character, for instance. I feel inspired, even guided, and yet, it falls to the ground, bearing no fruit.

Paul wrote to the Corinthians, ‘Throw yourselves into the work of the Master, confident that nothing you do for him is a waste of time or effort.’

Today, even if the outcome of my labours seems to bear no fruit, I choose to put my confidence in the Master. Something good will come of it. May you, too, be encouraged even in the face of disappointment. God is good.