Why Bearing Good Fruit Matters a.k.a. THIS Changes Everything

Join Desireé in Episode 6 of Season 2, as she uses her trips around the sun to throw encouragement around like confetti!

In Episode 6, Desireé continues the journey to living your best life by talking about the harvest. What does that even mean exactly? The harvest is the fruit we bear. We are all bearing fruit – producing something in our lives. Desireé offers a contradiction, some words of caution, an up-close and personal account of her trip to Comparisonville, USA and ends with a mic drop. This is an episode you don’t want to miss!

Topics include:

• The Great Contradiction (3:26)
• A word of caution (4:52)
• The Fruits of the Spirit – and they are beautiful (7:42)
• BRB, Imma drop the mic real quick (9:51)

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Transcript

Desireé Melfi Bozzo: 0:06

Ciao and welcome to Life out loud. I am your host Desireé Melfi Bozzo. We are going to use this space to share experiences and help you find lasting, unshakable unwavering unmessable-with joy and gratitude. We're going to be throwing around encouragement, a little bit like confetti and giving you support to live your very best life. Ciao friends, welcome to episode six of season two of the life out loud podcast. I am your host Desireé Melfi Bozzo. I want to welcome you to this space today. I am so very glad you're here, spending a few minutes of your day with me. If you've hung around, I've spent this season laying down a life map of sorts for us. And I want to continue laying those pieces for that in this episode. So kicking off season two, I talked about our position really establishing us as leaders in our lives. And then we talked about the past abiding in the present and a joy filled future. And I even spent an episode on the power of our words. If you missed any of them, I truly encourage you to go back and check them out. I think what you're going to find are some good nuggets that you can apply in your life. Maybe they're new, maybe they're things you've known. But at any rate, they might be a good reminder and a helpful one too. So today I want to start talking about the harvest. Now, by this point in the season we've done all the things healed all the things and now it's time to really talk about bearing the fruit. We find the concept of bearing fruit maybe you've heard of it before right be fruitful. We've we find the concept all over the Bible from the command that we're given in Genesis one of Be fruitful, all the way to Revelation when chapter 22 Oh gosh, it talks about when Eden is restored and the Tree of Life bears and I'm going to quote “12 crops of fruit yielding its fruit every month. And the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations.” That gives me such just a feeling of peace and this idea of fruit and fruitfulness we see it sprinkled from Genesis to Revelation we see it sprinkled everywhere in between too. And so what I've learned is that when we walk in lockstep with the Holy Spirit, we can't help but bear good fruit. Because the fruit that we're producing in our lives is his fruit. In Galatians, five, its way towards the back of the Bible verses 16 to 18. Paul, the writer gives us the instructions. And he says so I say, walk by the Spirit and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh for the flesh desires, what is contrary to the spirit and the spirit, what is contrary to the flash, they are in conflict with each other so that you are not to do whatever you want. But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law. I read this passage and I wonder how many of us identify with the contradiction of flesh and spirit? I know I do. In the last episode, I talked about the things of this world, and they're enticing, and they pull at the desires of our flesh. When I think about these contradictions, I think back to the times when I'm in the kitchen cooking and how many times over the years have I pulled a beautiful bell pepper or roma tomato out and I wash it off and cut it open. Only to find the inside full of rot and decay. How many of you cooks out there feel me here? The outside was beautiful. Dare I say Instagram-worthy right? But a peek on the inside showed us something dark and dirty and completely different. And so I can't help but wonder how many of us are walking around at first glance bearing good fruit pretty fruit, Instagram-worthy fruit on the peek inside shows us something less than stellar shows us the rot and the decay shows us the state of our hearts. Friends, we must ensure that we're walking lockstep with the spirit to bear his fruit. We can only pretend for so long that the fruit we're bearing in our lives is healthy. It's so enticing to feed the flesh. Trust me. I've lived it I know. But I offer you the warning that it only Ever leads to brokenness. There have been seasons in my life. And I'm sure yours too, when I've lived this way. And I think if we're being honest in the space, we've lived through the seasons where it all looks so pretty, and so picture perfect, but the reality was rotten. I truly think it's part of our human nature to cover up the ugly, we did it. We did it right after the fall, we did it in the garden. God came by and we hid like, we hid the ugly, we hid the sin. But my question is, what if we didn't have to cover it anymore? What if we didn't have to cover it? Because it wasn't there? What if we could invite Jesus in to clean out our hearts and clean out the rot and clean out the decay and cultivate a place where we can bear good fruit? It's possible friends. It's possible in my life, and it's possible in yours. I know because I've done it. Jesus promised us that the spirit would lead us and teach us. And Luke 12:12. He says, For the Holy Spirit will teach you at the time what you should say. When we walk in lockstep, and we live life by the Spirit, the words we need to say, when we need to say them will be on our mouths, the things we need to do will start to show up. How many of us have prayerfully sat with a friend in crisis. And we knew exactly what to say not because we knew, but because the Spirit led us in what to say. I can think back on the countless times I have prayed before big meetings before presentations before some sort of big event. And what followed? It flowed - the words, the timing, the message. The spirit is there every day leading us and teaching us the way to go. We have to be willing to listen, to follow to obey the promptings. To clean out our hearts and let the good fruit take root. I think once this seed has a fertile place to take root. The next question I think of is how do we know when the fruit we bear is good? Well, I think we go back to Galatians. We recognize and we recognize the fruits of the Spirit because they're the good in life. They're the things that make life rich. They're the things that just feel right, right. In

Galatians, 5: 7:42

22 and 23. We see that the fruits of the Spirit are listed there love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and probably the hardest self control. Could you imagine a world where these things were in abundance? Where we loved one another, like truly loved our neighbor as ourself. Where we live to seek joy and not just a fleeting happiness, but a true joy no matter the circumstance that we found our life in. With the gospel of peace was with us every step of the way. Where patience was our go to yes, even in traffic. Could you imagine a world where kindness and goodness were evident in our excellent character? Were faithfulness guided everything we believed. A world where gentleness and self control kept our hungry egos firmly grounded. In life, we're called the unity with each other, right? This unity happens through the good fruit we bear. Good seeks good, right? We all want to be around people who bear these fruits of of love and peace and patience and kindness. And… we all want to be around people like that because it just feels good. We're able to come alongside each other and love and care for each other in those spaces, were able to lift each other up instead of tearing each other down. Now, when we talk about bearing fruit, I need to have a conversation because I need to share a reminder that I have to often more often than I'd probably ever admit. I have to offer it to myself. We got to bear good fruit. But we also got to bear our fruit. You bear your fruit. I bear my fruit. I'm offering this encouragement to all of us because I am so guilty of this. It is so easy like hear me on this one. It is so easy to hop on the train and ride right to Compairisonville, USA, where the grass is greener, the highlight reels are in full bloom. And let's be honest, you never quite measure up. Friends, I am telling you this because I need to hear it myself on a consistent basis. Now, if you follow me on social media, you know, I use it a lot to market this podcast and my coaching services and, and all of that. But in full transparency, I have to exercise a lot of self control in that space. I have to be careful because if I spend too much time there, it starts to make me feel like my life doesn't quite measure up and I need more. Makes me feel like I need more vacations, more fashionable clothes, better golf courses to golf at. I've noticed that too much liking other people's fruit makes me think that maybe our sweet son needs to be in more activities or Hubbz and I need fancier date nights. I know it sounds bananas when I say it out loud. And I kind of cringe a little bit because do I really want to put this out in the world. But friends, this is my truth. And I'm willing to bet that maybe somebody out there might need to hear it too. I remember one time at one point, I was convinced that we needed a boat. Now, I'm going to I'm gonna defend myself a little bit here. It was the middle of summer in the Great Lakes State. Okay, we literally have water all over. My sweet husband, this amazing man who keeps me so grounded in my ways. And in my thinking, so lovingly reminded me and I remember I was standing in my kitchen. And after he looked at me like I had three heads, he so lovingly said, “Sweetheart, I would buy you a boat, but you don't like the water.” You guys he was right. I mean don't get me wrong. I like the water but like from the shore where my feet are firmly planted on the sand and there's no sharks, or like in an infinity pool overlooking the Pacific. But that's another conversation for another day. One might argue that the Great Lakes are unsalted and shark free. And that's super cool on a sweatshirt. But we all know that bull sharks live in freshwater. It's an irrational fear. I digress. Friends, In all seriousness, make sure you are always bearing your fruit. This is a fruit that God put you on this earth to bear. You can try and bear someone else's fruit but it's always going to be just that someone else's fruit and not your God ordained fruit that this world needs. I don't know who needs to hear this, but it's on my heart and I can't shake it. And I need to tell you that God created you with a purpose. Whether you believe in him or not. He gave your life a purpose that only you can fulfill. It’s a purpose that will be lost. If you don't do the work to bear the good fruit. The world needs your fruit. In Matthew 9, verse 37, we are reminded of Jesus's words to His disciples. The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. For those of us who know the Lord, Friends, we must bear good fruit. Each of us, you and me. We must bear good fruit and find ways to share it every day. According to our own gifts and within our own means. The harvest is plenty but the workers are few. Friends let's go share. Friends let's go to work. Sharing love, encouragement and blessings to the people and the communities we live in. Love joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self control. Because it's exactly what this world needs more of. Friends I hope you enjoyed this episode. I hope it bears fruit in your life. Send me a message let me know what you thought you know, I always love hearing from you. Come back next time we're going to throw more encouragement around like confetti. But be careful if you get too close. You're absolutely most definitely going to get some on you and remember, no matter what, there is always, always always something to be Thank you for joining me Desireé Melfi Bozzo for this episode of thankful for. Ciao. Life out loud. I would love to hear from you. Leave me a comment. Tell me what topics you want to talk about and how you take your coffee. If you enjoyed what you heard, text a friend the link share it on social media or if you're interested in becoming a supporter, be-bop over to my webpage life out loud.me and sponsor a cup of coffee that keeps this podcast fueled. Until next time sweet listeners.