The mainspring of the Christian life is death and resurrection. As we abide in Christ trouble comes to us each day and also a portion of grace by which we can overcome the trouble. If we learn our lesson for that day, the next day we experience more trouble and more grace. Day by day, moment by moment, year by year, we die and we live; we die and we live; we die and we live.

The end result is the forming of Christ in us. The fruit we are to bear is Christ. He alone has the Personality and behavior that God accepts. As we are willing to give place to Him, He comes forth in our life. Then the Farmer is receiving the benefit of His planting.

Christ is the Vine, the very Rootstock from which the Kingdom of God proceeds. The Christian religion is of use only as it fosters the growth of Christ in the believers. Each church activity must be serving, directly or indirectly, to nourish the growth of Christ in the believers. When it does not it should be discarded.

Now let us think about why fruit is so important that if it is not borne in us we are removed from our place in Christ.

Before the earth was created, apparently, a rebellion occurred in Heaven around the Throne of God. As one preacher said, this was the first church-split.

It may have been true that prior to the rebellion of Satan, who was seeking to be a god other than the Father, there was no consciousness of good or evil. Perhaps the eternal moral Nature of God was not known.

When Satan exercised his own will against the Father (and all sin has proceeded from Satan's self-will), there came a need for the knowledge of good and evil and of Divine judgment.

Then God formulated in His mind a tremendous plan. He would create a new race and make the angels servants to it. He would make the people He created a living revelation of His eternal moral law, and they would judge the angels and put an end to rebellion.

So God created man and put him in a garden. In the middle of the garden God placed the Tree of Life, which is the Lord Jesus Christ, and the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, which is the eternal moral law of God.

God told the man not to eat of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil because God knew the man was unprepared to cope with the fact that he was living in nakedness, in a shameful condition.

It was not until God wrote the Ten Commandments on tablets of granite that angels and people understood the moral law of God. Prior to this time it had been in the conscience. But now it was written where there could be no ambiguity.

His intent was that now, through the church, the manifold wisdom of God should be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly realms, (Ephesians 3:10—NIV)

To be continued.