Don’t be Successful, Be Fruitful

The more important commandment from God is to love and honor God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength. When you love God with everything, things happen. Teach your children how to honor God. Fathers need to teach their children. Fathers who have a relationship with God follow the commands of God. They teach their children to follow the commands of God. (Deuteronomy 6:5-7)

The primary obligation of parents is to put the Word of God into your children. The Bible needs to live in their minds. The Bible needs to become their friend. The Bible needs to be their direction and guidance. The Word of God gives wisdom, tenderness, understanding, boldness, and healing. (2 Timothy 3:16-17)

When you pray for your children, see them through the eyes of God. Don’t pray the same thing for all of your children. Bless them and speak over them according to their hearts. You cannot bless sin. Pray for them according to what you see in their lives, seeing them through the eyes of God.

When Jacob was 147 years old, he gathered his children together and prayed for them. He blessed, cursed, or corrected his children, depending on the seed they had planted and the fruit that they bore.

Reuben was cursed because of what he did to his father (Genesis 49:3-4) but Judah received a powerful, awesome prayer in Genesis 49:8-10. Jacob prayed that the scepter would never depart from Judah. A scepter represents a king’s authority. Shiloh means “peace.” Jesus is the Prince of Peace. Jesus was born to Judah’s bloodline – this was a prophecy about Jesus. King David also came from Judah. Judah became father to the line of the kings of Israel and Judah.

Joseph was very rich and successful. Why? His father taught him to honor God. He remained faithful to God and honored Him throughout his trial and time in Egypt. Genesis 49:22 refers to what Joseph went through. The archers shot at him. Joseph’s life was not too easy. He was always targeted. When his young, his brothers were very jealous of him and shot arrows at him over and over. When he went to Egypt, the steward’s wife shot false accusation at him. Then he went to jail. He went through trial after trial. Those trials made him strong. What held him up through it all? His father’s godly teaching. Godly teaching made his arms strong through it all.

Joseph saw everything through the eyes of God. He saw his trials through the eyes of God. Teach your children to see life through the eyes of God.

Genesis 45:7-8
7 And God sent me before you to preserve a posterity for you in the earth, and to save your lives by a great deliverance. 8 So now it was not you who sent me here, but God; and He has made me a father to Pharaoh, and lord of all his house, and a ruler throughout all the land of Egypt.

If you want to see through the eyes of God:
#1 Have a fruitful life

It is more important to have a fruitful life than to be successful. God commands us to be fruitful, not successful. Success is based on a humanistic idea. Seeking success is looking up from the bottom. Being fruitful is going out and looking around, to see what you can do to help. There are many people who are successful and going to hell when they die.

We need to teach our children to be fruitful. That is what is important. God will not check your bank account or your resume. He is looking for your fruit. He will judge your fruit.

Be fruitful. Be a blessing to others. Those who have fruit have everlasting life.

#2 Know that trials are painful but they are also a training time.

Through training we become a bigger vessel. If you go through your trials with human thinking, you will become discouraged and depressed. If you see your trials through the eyes of God, you will trust that there is a purpose. You will be able to grow through your trial instead of just going through your trial.

God has a plan for your life. If you follow His pain even through the pain, He will teach you and help you bear fruit. Teach your children to bear fruit. Teach your children to see trials as times of growth.

#3 Overcome trials by the power of God.

When you overcome trials, you do it by the power of God. You cannot overcome trials by your own understanding. Teach your children that it is the power of God. If you believe that you can overcome by your own strength, you have already lost. Teach children that when we are weak and powerless, God will lift our arms.

God bless you,
Pastor Sun East