Ripe Reflections: Blueberries and Spiritual Nourishment

A few weeks ago, my mother-in-law received an email that the local berry patch had a crop of blueberries ripe and ready to be picked. With as much as I enjoy eating blueberries, I have never picked ripe blueberries off the bush. Just thinking about the fresh from the patch blueberries with a generous scoop of Cool Whip made my mouth water. Are you tasting it already to as you read this, too?

With our three younger children in summer school, my mother-in-law, oldest daughter, and I made the trip one early June morning and gathered our white plastic buckets ready to be filled. As someone who hasn’t done this before, I wasn’t sure what to expect from the experience. I imagined that it might be a bit tedious to pull off each individual blueberry. However I didn’t realize how satisfying it could be to look carefully through each branch to uncover the ripe blueberries that were hidden beneath the leaves. My mother-in-law taught me that the darkest shade of navy berries were the sweetest. My hunch is the Crayola color experts might refer to this shade of blueberries as midnight. The berries that were the lighter shade with a hint of pink and purple some even still with a tinge of green were not ready to be picked yet.

As we slowly walked up and down the rows of blueberry bushes, I couldn’t help but stop to watch as two gardeners meticulously hoed the soil to eliminate any pesky weeds that might try to break through. If these weeds were given the time and space, they could have threatened to steal the precious resources from the bushes. Without careful daily attention to ensure each plant had enough water, the rows and rows of bushes might not have thrived.

After the gardeners inspect each bush, they might have an estimate of when they think the fruit might ripen, however they can never know for certain. Taking care of a blueberry harvest requires daily attention of watering, pruning, and protecting each bush and looking for signs that the berries might be ready. Once they are ripe the window of time for picking starts ticking away. These berries won’t last indefinitely!

This experience made me think of the spiritual fruit that the Lord is growing within us and our children. Daily time with the Lord reading His word, communicating with Him through prayer, and spending time with other believers empowers us to prune back the thoughts, habits, and behaviors that are holding us back in order to give our spiritual fruit the space to thrive.

Currently my ladies’ Bible study group is studying through the IF: Gathering study Not Alone. One of the teachers Amena Brown read-aloud the familiar passage about the fruits of the spirit from Galatians 5:22-23 from the Message translation:

Amena encouraged us to think through these verses about the Fruit of the Spirit kind of like a reflection quiz we did as pre-teens and teenagers in our favorite magazines. As we look through these verses, let’s take time to think through:

• Our affection for others-do we have a sense of compassion when others share the hurt on their hearts?
• Our outlook on life-are we filled with both an exuberance about life and a serenity with the season we are in?
• Our conviction about our thoughts, behaviors, and habits: are we striving for a basic holiness that permeates our lives?
• Our commitments: are we loyal to the people, professions, and passions God has stirred within our hearts and are we directing our energy wisely?

In our own strength, we can’t prune back the areas that detract from these fruits and cultivate the fruits of the spirit. However the life-giving reality is that we have a master gardener, Jesus, who empowers us to cultivate this fruit through His strength and not our own.

After getting home with two bags of blueberries filled to the brim, I followed my mother-in-law’s directions to freeze most of them, so that we could unthaw and enjoy them for several weeks to come. Now when I bring out another serving size of these frozen berries, I can’t help but to ask the Holy Spirit to show me:

• how He wants me to cultivate my affection, outlook, conviction, and commitments to more closely align to His.
• the areas of fruit that are ripe inside my children and the ones that need to be nurtured a bit more before they are ready.

Friend, I wonder if you took the “Fruit of the Spirit” self-reflection quiz, which of these areas of fruit resonates with you?