The Fruit of the Star Trek Replicator

We want drive-through peace and instant hope;
Our shallow faith, it has left us broke.
Oh, oh God forgive us! - for KING & COUNTRY 



Part of attending a Christian college involves taking a Bible class with a lot of people who come from just about any theological background. It can make discussions interesting (in all meanings of the word). This past week, the question "What makes a church healthy? What do you want when you walk into a church?" was posed to us. I said nothing out loud due to a sore throat, but a chorus of similar answers rose out of a sea of raised hands.

"I want to walk in and feel connected."

"I want good relationships."

"I want to feel understood."

"Relationships."

"Relationships."

"Relationships."

I chewed on my lip. A thought bubbled up in the back of my head. Since I was more focused on the disappointing fact that nobody mentioned that they wanted to hear a good sermon, I didn't really consider said bubble of thought.

Until the following Sunday.

The adult Sunday School teacher, an elder at the church I attend at college, has been teaching on the fruit of the Spirit and Christian virtue on and off for a couple of years now. As we all opened up to Galatians 5 again, he said something I hadn't previously considered.

"The fruit of the Spirit is not a list of individual categories that we are supposed to work on. It's not, oh, today I'm going to focus on patience, or today I'm going to work on self-control. These are all the same fruit. The fruit of being like Christ. And fruit takes time to grow."

Lightbulb.

****

Have you watched Star Trek? Do you know what the replicator is? It's a machine that instantly provides whatever food you vocally order upon demand.

We are a generation of instant results. Perhaps we don't have a replicator quite yet, but we want everything now. Insert minor effort, take out results.

Except there's a real providential reason why God had the Bible written in an agricultural era rather than in the era of the Golden Arches.

Fruit takes time to grow.

The problem with the church is not relationships. It is not the lack of programs. It is not the music, nor political division. The problem is that we expect it to give us the fruit we crave instantly.

We expect the church to give us relationships, healing, and whatever we are seeking as fast as the replicator gets Captain Picard his Earl Grey, hot. We forget that these things take time to grow. That they are just fruit. That we should instead be seeking fertile soil and generous waters where those fruits can grow: namely, the preaching of the Word, the giving of the sacraments, and a community where everyone is encouraged to become more like Christ. From there comes the fruit we so desperately seek, and even then, it takes time. We have to struggle through the small talk and the service and the problems that come with living in a sinful world. We have to be willing to give churches, others, and relationships time to grow.

And perhaps even more importantly, we need to learn to give ourselves time to grow. Sanctification, the process by which the Holy Spirit helps us become more like Christ, is slow and dirty business, but it's the means to the fruit of the spirit. The temptation comes to despair, give up, quit, and backslide, and perhaps even question God when the results don't come as fast and as easy as we are used to getting everything else. Beware of jumping between complacency and panic. Instead, give yourself time. Healing takes time. Growing takes time.

Remember, the faith is a marathon for all of us, and fruit takes time to grow.

Galatians 5:22-23: "But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law."