Bring Forth Fruit

To my daughter, 

               Recently you got up one morning and were excited to see some of the white flowers growing in our backyard. You grabbed the watering can, filled it up, and ran outside to water them to help them keep growing. You told me how you were going to make sure they had enough sun and water, which is indeed exactly what they need to grow. The care that you were taking over those flowers reminds me of the invitation that Alma gave the Zoramites. He compared the word of God to a seed: “Now, we will compare the word unto a seed. Now, if ye give place, that a seed may be planted in your heart, behold, if it be a true seed, or a good seed, if ye do not cast it out by your unbelief, that ye will resist the Spirit of the Lord, behold, it will begin to swell within your breasts; and when you feel these swelling motions, ye will begin to say within yourselves—It must needs be that this is a good seed, or that the word is good, for it beginneth to enlarge my soul; yea, it beginneth to enlighten my understanding, yea, it beginneth to be delicious to me.” In other words, he compared planting and growing a seed to reading the word of God and gaining a testimony of its truthfulness. On one of the key words that he used was nourish: “And behold, as the tree beginneth to grow, ye will say: Let us nourish it with great care, that it may get root, that it may grow up, and bring forth fruit unto us. And now behold, if ye nourish it with much care it will get root, and grow up, and bring forth fruit” (Alma 32:28, 37). In order to help something grow, it takes great nourishment and care, and that is especially true when it comes to developing our knowledge of spiritual things. As you nourish your faith in God through prayer, studying the scriptures, and going to Church—with the same devotion that you nourished those flowers—you will come to know for yourself that your Father in Heaven and Jesus both love you and have a plan for you here on earth.

               This summer you have also been excited about the raspberries that we grew in our yard, and you got to enjoy that fruit as it became ripe. Like the flowers, it took time and nourishment for those to grow and become ripe—it is a slow process. The most important ingredient is the sun, and through a process that you’ll learn about some day in school (called photosynthesis), they convert the sunlight into energy to grow. Without the sunlight, those raspberries would not have grown at all. That is very symbolic for us, for we too need the Son to help us in everything we do. Jesus is the Son of God, and we need Him for all of our growth too. He used a metaphor of a vine to teach us this: “I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing” (John 15:5). If you cut a branch off of a tree, the branch withers and dries up. It the same manner, if we are not connected to the Savior, we are spiritually without life. We can do nothing without Him, for He has given us life and He will help us to return to our Father in Heaven through His sacrifice. I hope that as you care for plants and watch them grow, you will always remember that you need Jesus. He will abide with you whenever you invite Him to.

Love,

Dad