Be Patient with One Another
Be Patient with One Another
I love pineapples! They’re one of my favorite fruits.
Several years ago, I learned that you can plant the top of a store-bought pineapple in the ground, and it will turn into more pineapples. I thought this would be an easy way to make a little go a long way. So I bought several pineapples at the grocery store, ate them, then planted the tops in my backyard.
And then I waited…
The pineapple tops took root and began growing leafier and leafier. Beyond that, though, I have no idea what ultimately happened with them, or if they ever actually bore fruit.
Why? Because we moved away about a year later, and what I failed to research beforehand was the fact that pineapple plants take several years to mature to the point of bearing fruit; and once they do finally start bearing fruit, they typically only grow a single pineapple. Furthermore, that one pineapple will take about a year to go from flowering to a fully-ripened fruit that’s ready to be picked and eaten.
So yes, you can produce more pineapples from a pineapple… but it’s a slow, drawn-out process that requires patience and persistence. Especially since the real multiplication magic for pineapples happens after the first harvest, when a single plant produces multiple pups, which can each produce another pineapple (in another few years).
Needless to say, this wasn’t exactly what I had in mind when I set out to grow pineapples. But I think the mindset I had about growing pineapples is similar to the mindset we often have when it comes to bearing spiritual fruit…
When we became Christians, we may have been expecting to see exponential growth in our lives, in the areas of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control (Galatians 5:22-23), simply because we put our faith in Jesus for salvation and started following Him.
But the reality is, the kind of fruit that the Holy Spirit produces in our lives is cultivated over time, and it usually requires some work.
It takes allowing God to soften and prepare the soil of our hearts and mind, so that He can plant seeds. And just like with real plants, those seeds have to break open and take root.
It takes the right amount of watering and fertilizing and exposure to the Son.
Not to mention, different types of spiritual fruit grow best in different types of environments. (For example, patience is best grown around people who try our patience — or our lack thereof — and who push our limits; whereas faithfulness often grows best in situations where our hopes are dashed and our fears are realized.)
The beautiful reality is, though we might be disappointed with ourselves when we can’t see any marked spiritual growth in a season of our lives despite our striving to follow God, God isn’t disappointed. Even when we might feel ready to give up, He’ll keep patiently working, ever full of faith in what He’s accomplishing and what He will eventually produce in us, in just the right season.
Our role is to keep on following after Him. To keep on striving to keep in step with His Spirit. To keep spending time studying Scripture, meditating on God’s Word, praying, listening, and walking our faith out alongside other Christians who are also on this journey of fruitful living. And to be patient with ourselves, knowing that some kinds of fruit take more time to mature than others.
Also, you and I need to be patient with one another, recognizing that the work God’s doing in our hearts right now might not be the exact same work He’s doing in the hearts of our fellow Christians. But whatever work He’s doing in each of us — it’s good, and it’s always in season.
The gospel of Luke records a parable that Jesus told about this very truth:
And he told this parable: “A man had a fig tree that was planted in his vineyard. He came looking for fruit on it and found none. He told the vineyard worker, ‘Listen, for three years I have come looking for fruit on this fig tree and haven’t found any. Cut it down! Why should it even waste the soil?’
“But he replied to him, ‘Sir, leave it this year also, until I dig around it and fertilize it. Perhaps it will produce fruit next year, but if not, you can cut it down.’”
- Luke 13:6-9, CSB
Jesus was saying that, while it’s true that you can tell a tree by it’s fruit (Luke 6:43-45), we shouldn’t be too quick to judge one another simply because we haven’t seen genuine growth or the kind of growth we’d been expecting to see in what we felt was a reasonable amount of time.
I was shocked to learn that pineapples take several years to produce. I was also shocked by how little fruit is produced at harvest — just one pineapple per plant.
You know what’s even crazier, though? There’s a type of bamboo that doesn’t break ground for the first five years after being planted. From the surface, it might seem like nothing is happening, but underground, the plant is growing like crazy, forming roots deep and wide. And this is extremely necessary, because when that bamboo shoot finally does break through the surface of the dirt, it’s going to grow about 90 feet tall in just five short weeks!
We don’t always know the work God’s doing inside of other people. Often, we’re not even fully aware of the work He’s doing inside of us. That’s why it’s so important that we learn to be patient with one another, even when we can’t see any outward sign of spiritual growth.
I think this is why, when the Apostle Paul wrote about the need for Christians to “grow up” in their faith, he said that we are to “walk worthy of the calling you have received, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love” (Ephesians 4:1-2, CSB).
Back in 2021, after we’d moved into our new home, I bought a whole bunch of pineapples, again.
I ate them, then planted the tops in our then-new front yard.
And then for two years, I watered them and patiently waited…
Last year, one of the pineapple plants finally flowered, and just last month, I finally picked my first home-grown pineapple!
It took three long years…
Imagine if I’d thrown the towel in. I could’ve dug that plant up to make room for something “more productive.”
Sure, I might’ve grown something else in its place, but I would’ve missed out on the tastiest, juiciest pineapple I’ve ever eaten, and the joy that came from finally seeing the fruit of my labor!
And that one plant produced three pups! So maybe next harvest, I’ll get three times as many pineapples — that is, if I don’t give up on the process.
Let’s not give up on the good work that God’s doing inside of us, even if we can’t see the fruit just yet. And let’s not give up on one another. Let’s trust the process, and continue to let God work in each one of our lives, however He sees fit, full of faith that at just the right time, His work will bear good fruit!
Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up. - Galatians 6:9, NIV
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