Hey family.<\/p>\n\n
If you made it through this week honestly, you probably landed somewhere uncomfortable. You saw Derek’s lunch and recognized a meeting you’ve been in. You watched Marcus in the front seat and thought of a ride home you would handle differently now. Craig’s kitchen felt a little familiar. Tyler’s group chat looked like a phase you’d rather forget. And Ray’s phone call sounded like advice you’ve given, or received, or both.<\/p>\n\n
That discomfort is the Spirit doing something. Don’t waste it.<\/p>\n\n
“For the righteous falls seven times and rises again, but the wicked stumble in calamity.”<\/p>\n
Proverbs 24:16 \u00b7 ESV<\/p>\n <\/div>\n\n
The accidental Pharisee is always confident in his own assessment of his fruit. That is precisely what makes him accidental. He grades himself on his intentions while the people living with him grade him on their experience. Those two grades are rarely the same.<\/p>\n\n
Paul writes in Galatians 6:4, “Let each one test his own work, and then his reason to boast will be in himself alone and not in his neighbor.” The Greek word for “test” here is “dokimazo,” meaning to examine, to approve through testing, to prove by putting to trial. It is the same word used for testing metal to see if it is genuine. Paul is not saying to evaluate yourself favorably. He is saying to actually test yourself, to subject your own work to honest scrutiny, independent of comparison with others.<\/p>\n\n
The honest test is not “do I know the Bible?” or “do I go to church?” or “do I have correct theology?” The honest test is what Pastor Jeff put so plainly: what do the people who actually live with you say about your fruit? What does your spouse say? What do your kids say when you’re not listening? What do your coworkers actually think about you?<\/p>\n\n
“You don’t get to be the measurer of your fruit.”<\/p>\n
Pastor Jeff Little \u00b7 Fruitful Series<\/p>\n <\/div>\n\n
The good news, and it is genuinely good, is that Proverbs 24:16 does not describe a righteous man as one who never falls. It describes him as one who gets back up. Seven times. The number is not literal; it is the Hebrew way of saying “as many times as it takes.” The mark of genuine spiritual maturity is not the absence of failure. It is the refusal to stay down.<\/p>\n\n
So here is the question for the weekend. Not “did I fail this week?” You probably did. We all did somewhere. The question is: am I willing to get up, adjust my posture, and ask honestly of the people closest to me what the fruit has actually been like? That humility is not weakness. It is the beginning of the kind of transformation that produces something worth tasting.<\/p>\n <\/div>\n\n
ASK SOMEONE THIS WEEKEND<\/p>\n
“What has it been like to be on the receiving end of my faith this week?”<\/p>\n
Ask your spouse. Ask your kid. Ask a coworker who will actually tell you the truth. Then listen without defending. What they tell you is the most honest report card on your fruit you will ever receive. God loves our progress, not our perfection. But progress requires honest feedback from the people tasting what we’re growing.<\/p>\n <\/div>\n\n
CLOSE WITH THIS<\/p>\n
Lord, I don’t want to be the fig tree that looks alive and can’t feed anyone. I want to be a man whose presence actually nourishes the people around him; whose wife feels known, whose kids feel safe, whose coworkers see something worth asking about. Forgive me for the ways I’ve majored on minors and missed the people right in front of me. I get back up today. Adjust my posture. Point the finger inward before I point it anywhere else. Let the Spirit produce in me what I cannot produce in myself. Amen.<\/p>\n
See it from God’s seat. You were made for fruit, not just leaves.<\/p>\n
Stay in step with the Spirit.<\/p>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n\n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/body>\n<\/html>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
GROW DEEP. LIVE FULL. Hey family. If you made it through this week honestly, you probably landed somewhere uncomfortable. You saw Derek’s lunch and recognized a meeting you’ve been in. You watched Marcus in the front seat and thought of…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":74,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-73","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-fruitful","category-relationships"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/stumbleup.me\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/SU_20260307_BLOG.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stumbleup.me\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stumbleup.me\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stumbleup.me\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stumbleup.me\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stumbleup.me\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=73"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/stumbleup.me\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":75,"href":"https:\/\/stumbleup.me\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73\/revisions\/75"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stumbleup.me\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/74"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stumbleup.me\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=73"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stumbleup.me\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=73"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stumbleup.me\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=73"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}