The root of faith

I’ve been looking through my notebook from Summer Camp (2010) and I found a neat note (with all sorts of stars around it, of course…):

Build yourself up in faith and truth… Be concerned with the root of your faith, and wait patiently for the fruit. We live in a “now, now, now” culture but our faith should not be affected by that. The fruit will be great when the roots are strong.

I remember that the pastor who was speaking made a lot of analogies to plants. He works on an herb farm, and he said that often, people come in to the farm at the beginning of the season and want herbs for their cooking or other things. He said that they want them so bad that they don’t care that the “fruit” is much, much better later in the season. If they would wait until the end of the season, they would be so much happier. The plant needs time to take root, to build up its roots and then it will have the best yield.

Our faith is the same way. Often, we want to bear fruit – by witnessing or serving – but we don’t want to wait until our roots are firm. We want to go forward, but we aren’t ready. We often move forward in our own strength and then the fruit we wanted so badly is small and not ripe.

“Wait on the Lord; be of good courage, and He shall strengthen your heart. Wait, I say, on the Lord!” – Psalm 27:14

Jesus should be the root of our faith! Don’t get caught up in emotions and drama and what you think is right. Jesus is the only way! Don’t worry about what other people think! HE is all that matters!