This may not be the ordinary season to have fruit, and yet you are in season and do have fruit. You know, I love summer, because I enjoy fresh fruit. Think what it would be like in the dead winter, to have fresh water melon, or to go out and pick some delectable peaches right off your own tree. This is not something you buy in the can or send away for, to be shipped to you. It’s not the normal time for fruit and yet you have these fresh fruits available. That’s what it means, “In season, out of season.” The believer is to be this exact way. When it’s not the season, he is still in season. As far as the hour in which we live and in the thinking of the world, it’s not the season. It’s not fashionable to live a godly life, didn’t you know? The characteristics of a true Christian life are not stylish for this modern-day g e n e ra tio n . So, here’s the challenging message, even
though it may not be the season .for fruit-bearing, we’re still to bear fruit. The Lord Jesus said in John 15:2, “Every branch in me that bear- eth not fruit he taketh away; and every branch that beareth fruit, he purgeth it, that it may bring forth more fruit.” A number of years ago, one of my secretaries, in our early days of as sociation with Biola, was engaged to be married to a friend of ours. She lived in a farming area north of Los Angeles. We arrived at her home the afternoon of the wedding, and her brother very kindly showed us over the ranch. He pointed out this tree and that one, telling us what they all were. Coming to one, he simply remarked, “That’s a shy bear er.” He explained, “It’s a plant that has just enough fruit on it so that we know what kind of a tree it is. But actually it doesn’t have enough fruit to be of any value whatsoever in the time of harvest.” I couldn’t but think of what a picture that is of people. There are so many Chris tian lives like that. You know what kind of a tree they are, you realize they’re Christians, but as far as their usefulness to God, they bear very little fruit. It’s the time of harvest, but there is nothing to commend the tree. It is not bringing forth God's fruit, in God’s appointed season. We are, each one of us, to be used to bring a blessing in our own way. C hapter T hree When we were first married, my wife and I lived in Chicago for two years. We had the privilege of work ing with the radio ministry of WMBI, broadcasting voice of the Moody Bible Institute. Coming from the West Coast where I had been reared, I did not enjoy the fact that there in the Midwest, in the winter time all of the trees lost their leaves. In autumn, those leaves had turned gorgeous fall colors, but in the dead of winter, nothing seemed quite so
It was in 1924 that Ernest W. Stuchbery was gradu atedfromBiota where he remained working on the staf until 1936. Mrs. Stuchbery, pictured above, of Swedish ancestry, recently celebrated her 88th birthday. She represents the host of faithful prayer partners and members of the Biola Fellowship who stand by the work month by month. So often on these pages we picture our students, faculty, and staff members. We wanted to reverse the tables this month and let you see some of the people who enable us to broadcast the Gospel in this manner. 12
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