SILOAM SPRINGS — Ashort drive through the Boston Mountains and the bright tingesof fall color brought my family and me to the apple trees.

Arkansas Blacks and McIntosh apples covered the ground beneath the trees.

Watch where you step! Some of those round beauties weren’t too pretty on the bottom. I was encouraged to look up. Wow! The trees were heavy with fruit.

The Arkansas Blacks looked puny this year, but after one slice, maybe two or three, from a freshly picked McIntosh and I was ready to go.

I started on the ground looking for easy low-lying fruit. There were so many apples, however, I decided I could be discriminating and go just for the biggest and brightest.

I extended the pole on the apple picker and went after fruit a little higher. Eventually, I couldn’t resist breaking out a ladder.

Those apples on top touched first by the rain and languishing longest in the sun were shiny, without blemish, and large. After carefully climbing to the top of the ladder and with the help of the fully extended apple picker, I just could reach the fruit on the very top of the tree.

This ladder had seen a few trips to the apple trees before me.

A couple of buckets later and it was time to go home where it was time to cook.

Hot oatmeal for breakfast with fresh diced apples;

warm apple cake fresh from the oven, neck deep in a hot butter sauce; upside down pecan praline apple pie served hot with a scoop of vanilla ice cream; hot apple bread topped with praline sauce served with a hot cup of full-bodied French press coffee; dried apples; chicken topped with fried onions and apples cooked in a brown sugar cider vinaigrette;

grilled apple salad with pecans and feta cheese; easy apple crisp made with oatmeal and nuts served hot and with, of course, a scoop of vanilla ice cream for an afterdinner snack.

I still haven’t gotten to the apple dumplings or the apple pancakes. Now we’re cooking!

A little fruit can make a lot of good things happen. Different fruit can make even more good things happen.

For example, warm sour cream pear pie with a brown sugar crumb topping mixes in quite nicely with apple entrees.

Or, fresh pears diced up and surrounded by a cloud of low fat vanilla yogurt can almost make you think you’re having dessert instead of a healthy snack.

Fresh fruit can bring an enticing aroma and sweetness to our spiritual lives, too. The Christian missionary andApostle Paul wrote a letter to people in a part of the world called Galatia. In what we know today as the fifth chapter of that letter, he described the result of following Jesus and his instructions for cultivating spiritual lives.

Things like giving financially or of our time and talents can be painful.

We often think, “I can’t give this away because I might need it later.” Jesus teaches that when we cultivate generous hearts it breaks up the crustiness of our hearts so the “son shine” and dew of the Holy Spirit can permeate our lives. In time fruit is born from the tree of our life.

Paul’s list of spiritual fruit lists nine different varieties including: Love for God and others; joy in the good times and difficult; peace on the inside when the world around us is storming; and kindness and goodness are two fruits that reach out to others.

Kindness responds to the needs of others, while goodness does not return evil but absorbs the offense before returning some positive action.

The distinguishing characteristic of the fruit of faithfulness is that of a reliable person. The fruit of gentleness is known for submitting to the will of God, being teachable, and considerate.

Last on the list is self-control.

This fruit is produced only by the person who has mastered their desires and love of pleasure.

It is crucial to remember that these fruits can be produced by a diligent personapart from God.

However, the best, longest lasting, and most productive fruit is always born from trees of life rooted in a living relationship with God through Jesus Christ.

Mmmm. Do you want a life full of beautiful sweet fruit? It’s time to get down to business with God.

Now you’re cooking!

- Dr. Randy Rowlan is pastor of First United Methodist Church and comments are welcomed at randyrowlan@yahoo.com.

Religion, Pages 10 on 10/21/2009

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