The Birth of 'Fruit That Lasts' - Our Latest Assignment From the Lord

 Long lasting friendships are the best - especially when the friendship goes all the way back to first grade, which means Kristi and Nena have been through all kinds of interesting stuff together! The best by far - and we TRULY mean by far - is our ministry, 2 Ordinary Women: 1 Extraordinary God. When a friendship is grounded on the foundation of serving Christ and mighty faith in our Lord then spectacular miracles happen. We have come accustomed to expecting miracles - small ones and great big ones. We also get to experience the most awesome joy because we never know what the Lord will assign for us to do next. Even though we always know the ultimate purpose of any of our assignments will be to create a vehicle to lead others to Christ, we are blown away by the creative ways the Lord chooses.

We just simply come together for regular prayer time (on the phone since we live 8 hours away from each other), and ask God, "What would you have us do next, Lord? What is Your exciting assignment for us, two ordinary women, who have learned that living a life devoted to You is the only way to live out our time on earth?" THEN...we listen and watch for His direction, which comes in the most supernaturally imaginative ways - ways that only our amazing Lord and Savior could do. We continue to ask for gifts of the Holy Spirit so that we can become more and more intimate with Christ. The Holy Spirit residing in us is the absolute key to being able to understand what the Lord is saying.

One such time was in 2012 when Kristi had a vivid dream where the Lord revealed that we would write a book together called, Fruit That Lasts. We had a wonderfully amazing peace that this assignment was for a later time and that the Lord would show us when to begin and the specifics of what to write. It is very cool to learn to rest in the Lord's timing when He communicates something for the future. The human side of Kristi and Nena would want to rush and begin the assignment right away but the Holy Spirit prompts us so profoundly when to wait and when to act.



Extraordinary God 2013 photos

After Extraordinary God 2013 - a beachfront worship service that we coordinated at The Kiawah Island Sanctuary Resort, we began asking God what was next. Through much prayer we both sensed that the Lord wanted us to seek His guidance about what to write for Fruit That Lasts. Since our ministry is 2 Ordinary Women: 1 Extraordinary God, we assumed our book would be a women's devotion book so we began to research different fruits mentioned in the Bible and looked for ways to connect those to a weekly or monthly devotion format. The research was quite fun but just didn't seem to be in full alignment with the Lord's plans so we pressed in with more prayer. The idea sounded like it would be pleasing to the Lord but we have learned to seek the 'peace that surpasses all understanding' and we did not have that. The really neat part of doing assignments together is that we ask God to give us both peace so we TRULY know. We have learned so well to respect when one is hearing something different. Now...we have to admit that there are times when Kristi or Nena will be shocked when one is hearing something different from the other so we seek Him in prayer and He brings us both in alignment. It is the coolest part of walking together with the Lord.

After praying about the women's devotion book, the Lord began revealing scripture to Nena about trees that bear fruit. First He revealed Ezekiel 47:12 'Fruit trees of all kinds grow on both banks of the river. Their leaves will not wither, nor will their fruit fail. Every month they will bear fruit, because the water from the sanctuary flows to them. Their fruit will serve for food and their leaves for healing.' Next He showed her Genesis 1:11 'Then God said, "Let the land produce vegetation: seed-bearing plants and trees on the land that bear fruit with seed in it, according to their various kinds." And it was so.' Then He directed her to Revelation 22:2 'On each side of the river stood the tree of life, bearing twelve crops of fruit, yielding its fruit every month. Next He took her to Psalm 1:3 'That person is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither - whatever they do prospers.'

The more we prayed the more we just knew our book would focus on fruit that grew on trees and couldn't wait to listen to see what the Lord said next. We were in absolute awe of the scripture that He had revealed and how three of the scriptures were in the beginning (Genesis), middle (Psalm) and end (Revelation) of the Bible. We still had no idea what type of book we would write BUT we rested in God's timing of each step. He always has the most awesome surprises so each day is filled with wonder.

In January 2014, Kristi had a strong urge that she and Jeff were to come to Charleston for a long weekend so we could spend time in person praying about Fruit That Lasts. She knew the Lord would reveal amazing details about the book once we were together. On Saturday morning we decided to walk over to Hampton Park, sit by the pond and listen to God. It was during this time that we heard clearly from the Lord that Fruit That Lasts was a children's book, which literally made us laugh out loud.

Having fun with Burger King crowns

The Lord also revealed the most incredible aspect of the book, which was that we would share the Gospel to children by using a fruit tree analysis and photosynthesis.
In an instance, he showed us that the book would have trees planted by water and the water would represent God. The water would help the trees grow and develop branches with leaves. The leaves would reach to the sun, which represents Jesus, which gives them the light energy needed to produce blooms. In order for blooms to turn into fruit they have to be pollinated. God revealed we would use the wind to present the Holy Spirit, which provides the necessary pollination to produce fruit that lasts. 

We left the park that day filled with excitement and still a bit surprised that God wanted us to write a children's book. There was a definite assurance in us that in no time He would be pouring out the specifics of what we were to write.



Rue Rue and Nena

A few days later, God put it on Nena's heart that the book would have 'tree characters' representing Kristi and her. Nena would be a pomegranate named Poly Pomegranate, or Pom Pom for short, while Kristi would be a fig tree named Franny Fig. We also heard from the Lord that the book would have older trees with heavy crops of fruit that represented our own grandmothers, Nana and Rue Rue - two women of God that prayed earnestly for both of us throughout our lives.

Nana

 As weeks past, we had a blast writing a rough draft of the book and designing Pom Pom and Franny. Kristi even surprised Nena with a painting of Pom Pom for her birthday in March. We also knew that the book would be for young readers and be written in poetry form with subsequent chapter books for older readers. Next Kristi began writing the beginning verses of the poem.



Unfortunately, during this time frame Jeff received a diagnosis that his cancer had spread. We began putting all of our focus on having faith in God healing Jeff and put Fruit that Lasts on hold. In June, Jeff was hospitalized with pneumonia and was very sick, which meant that Kristi spent days and nights at the hospital. It was during this time that God began speaking boldly to Nena that Kristi was supposed to be writing the poetry for the book. Nena wrestled with the Lord over this because she didn't want to share this with Kristi because of all she was going through with Jeff's illness. The Lord was persistent that the time was now and told Nena boldly to tell Kristi that all He wanted her to do was to hold a pen and paper then He would do the writing. 

Tears welled up in Kristi when Nena shared this message from the Lord because she had just received a gift in the hospital from a friend. The gift was pretty paper and fun colored pens so Kristi knew the message from the Lord was correct. She obeyed and the poem flowed effortlessly out of her and onto the pretty paper. Fruit that Lasts was born and Kristi felt like she was floating on a cloud. Also, on the first day that she picked up the pen and paper, Jeff's white blood cells dropped and he began to get better. He was soon feeling well enough to be released from the hospital! Was this connected to Kristi's obedience to begin allowing the Lord to write through her? We definitely believe so!



Pom Pom & Franny 



After the poem was complete, Nena found an on-line site that we could use to create a prototype of Fruit That Lasts while Kristi and her family began painting the illustrations for each page - which flowed out on paper as quickly as the poetry did. The Lord was moving through Kristi and the experience was absolutely beautiful!



There is another special repeating feature in the illustrations for Fruit That Lasts – rainbows. We view rainbows as God's way of 'winking at us'. During the beachfront worship service at the Sanctuary Resort on Kiawah Island in July 2013 the Lord literally gave us a ‘fireworks-like’ show of rainbows throughout the evening. We knew the rainbows were the presence of the glory of the Lord with us when we received this verse from a dear friend the following morning - 'Like the appearance of a rainbow in the clouds on a rainy day, so was the radiance around him. This was the appearance of the likeness of the glory of the Lord.' Ezekiel 1:28. 

Nana &  Rue Rue in Fruit That Lasts

So now we present Fruit That Lasts, a children's book that we pray will be a wonderful tool for grandparents, parents and others to share the amazing Good News of Christ to their little loved ones. The first copy of Fruit That Lasts was given to Aubrey Jane Baker, Nena's first grandchild that was born on March 29th, which was the same weekend that Kristi wrote the first verse of the poem for the book. God-incidence? Absolutely!

Aubery Jane Baker - 4 1/2 months

We joyfully dedicate this book in memory of our faithful grandmothers, Nana and Rue Rue and in honor of Aubrey Jane Baker and our many other grandchildren yet to be born.