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My eight-year-old lime tree (‘Limey’) has provided me with limes throughout the winter. Now as Limey has spent a few wonderful warm spring weeks on the patio, I’m starting to see more blossoms where hopefully more limes will be produced.

Limey is also the inspiration of many mornings of prayer and mediations about ‘spiritual fruit bearing.’ The lime tree just follows nature’s course and provides limes. The limes over a period of time grow from embryonic little green dots to heavy, juicy limes. Limey’s small branches bear the weight of the limes until I pick them off. I am always amazed at the amount of juice I squeeze from a single lime. Limey provides me with excellent fruit.

My morning meditations often center around how Limey, by nature, is a source of good, abundant fruit, producing limes in all four seasons. The mediation is based on the Scripture from Galatians 5:22-23 “For the Fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Ever notice how there are many attributes of the Fruit of the Spirit, but the singular word ‘is’ used, not the word ‘are’?
Although Limey produces much fruit, the nourishing sap running through the branches is one sap, one source of life-giving nourishment for the tree.

Last week, for Passion Week Services, an awesome fellowship of churches came together and provided an abundant source of sermons and fellowship that were life giving, Spirit producing nourishment for all who attended in person or by social media.

I wanted to publicly thank Aaron Lewis, Pastor of Spring Garden Baptist Missionary Church for organizing the Fellowship of Churches, and to all the pastors and churches that were a wonderful part of the services. Those churches were St. Luke Church of Christ-Pastor Vernon Collins, St. John Missionary Baptist Church-Pastor Wiiliam F. Whitehead, Evergreen United Holiness Church-Pastor Kenneth Simmons, Beebe Chapel Christian Methodist Episcopal Church-Pastor Joniece Carroll, Metropolitan African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church-Pastor Darnell Mathews, Beebe Memorial Christian Methodist Episcopal Church-Pastor Doris Gorham, and Spring Garden Baptist Missionary Church-Pastor Aaron Lewis. What a fellowship! I want to be like my lime tree in a way, producing good fruit and in my case, the ‘Fruit of the Spirit’ through all the seasons of my life. I want to produce much fruit for my Lord. Thank you to all who are helping me to do just that.