Yesterday we talked about fruit as a receipt. Fruit looks backward and says, “Something happened here. But cut open an apple and you’ll discover something else. There’s seed inside the fruit. That changes the way we look at the harvest. Fruit isn’t only the end of a process. God designed fruit to contain the beginning of another one. Inside what was produced yesterday is the potential for something to be planted tomorrow.

Jesus gave us a picture of how God’s Kingdom works. In Mark 4, a farmer scatters seed. The farmer has a responsibility—he plants. But he can’t make the seed grow. Growth happens in ways beyond his control until eventually there is a blade, then a head, then full grain and finally a harvest. The farmer scatters. God produces. We create the conditions. God causes the growth. And it all begins with a seed.

Too often we want God to give us a harvest while we’re unwilling to plant anything. We want stronger relationships without planting forgiveness. We want children and grandchildren who follow Jesus without planting God’s Word into their lives. We want people to know Christ without planting invitations, conversations and acts of kindness. We want a fruitful church without people planting their gifts, time, prayers and service.

But the Kingdom works through seed. Something gets planted before something gets produced. Jesus took this principle even further in John 12. Speaking about His own death, He compared Himself to a kernel of wheat falling into the ground. To everyone watching the cross, it looked like Jesus had been buried. It was finished. But heaven saw something different.

The Seed wasn’t merely being buried, the Seed was being planted. And planting means something is coming. Jesus died. Jesus was buried. Jesus rose again. One life given became a harvest of countless lives. What looked like an ending was actually carrying a beginning. That means we shouldn’t look only at what God has produced. We should also ask what He has placed inside what He has produced.

The fruit of yesterday contains the seed for tomorrow.