Notes of Faith August 31, 2025
Pumpkin-Flavored Everything
By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another. — John 13:35
It always happens around the beginning of September. One minute there is nothing, and the next minute, everywhere you look, there are signs of fall in the form of pumpkin-flavored everything. There are pumpkin muffins, pumpkin cheesecakes, and the ever-popular pumpkin spice lattes. Just the other day I noticed spiced pumpkin pecan ice cream at the local grocery store. Apparently nothing is off-limits. Even without a single glance at a calendar, the prevalence of pumpkin would give the season away in a flavorful way.
Similarly, there should be an abundance of love present in the life of a believer. Love should be evident in the way we treat our neighbors. There should be love in the way we honor our parents. Love should spur us to serve within our communities. Without uttering a word about church affiliation or conversion experiences, the prevalence of love in our lives should make our relationship with Christ abundantly clear.
There should be a trail of brotherly love everywhere we go, and no one should be off-limits.
Is our “love for one another” the most obvious thing about us? Would someone watching the way we conduct ourselves and the way we interact with others know that we are disciples of Christ? Is there something about us that sets us apart as different and identifies us as belonging to God? The essence of Jesus’ words was that acts and attitudes of love should be as common in the lives of Christ followers as pumpkin spice lattes in the fall. Just for the record, that is really common.
What would it look like if we were all known for our love for one another? How would it change our families, our workplaces, and our towns if we truly loved one another? I believe it can be done. If someone can make pumpkin- flavored potato chips and convince people to buy them, we can make brotherly love the theme of the season. Let’s make it obvious that we are Jesus’ disciples.
For every creature of God is good, and nothing is to be refused if it is received with thanksgiving. — 1 Timothy 4:4
Fall Trees
I will restore to you the years that the swarming locust has eaten. — Joel 2:25
It’s always exciting when the leaves begin falling from the trees and blowing in the crisp breezes of fall. We ooh and aah over the myriad of colors. There comes a point, however, when all the leaves have finished their falling, and the trees stand bare. How do you feel when you see the fall trees without their leaves? At first glance, perhaps, they seem empty, as if everything has been stripped away. They are left standing stark on a gray landscape, and, well, they often seem a little sad and alone. They appear barren.
In time, however, those very same trees will begin to show signs of new growth. Buds will hint at the beauty of things to come. In due time, fresh flowers and leaves will appear, and the trees that appeared dead will spring to life again. So it’s important to remember in the cold days of fall that bare is not the same thing as barren.
Life is full of seasons.
There are times when we feel things being stripped away from us and we are left standing bare before the world. Others looking at us may see no signs of life and believe us to be barren. But our God is a God of restoration, and no loss goes unnoticed by Him. Many times, what looks like barrenness to the world is only a season of bareness.
Our fruitful days are coming, and God is about to do a work in our lives that only He can do.
Through the prophet Joel, God promised restoration to His people. He promised to restore the years the locusts had eaten. These were locusts that God Himself had sent to swarm among them. The Lord knows when things need to fall away from our lives, and we can trust Him also to bring us again to a season of growth and new life. Just remember that whatever the season you’re currently in, bare is not the same as barren and that anything stripped away is leaving room for God to do something new.
Therefore be patient, brethren, until the coming of the Lord. See how the farmer waits for the precious fruit of the earth, waiting patiently for it until it receives the early and latter rain. — James 5:7
Excerpted from Devotions for the Fall by Stacy Edwards, copyright Thomas Nelson.
I am seeing the ads for pumpkin everything too! And I am succumbing to them! Dairy Queen has a pumpkin flavored blizzard! I want to try it. I like pumpkin… pie, cheesecake, coffee, ice cream…even my chickens like pumpkins!
But the point of the story is the stripping away of the old and the restoration of the new. God does not do this in us in the “Fall” season. He is always working at stripping away the old man so that the new man in Christ can produce fruit! Just think, if we were to work with God and shake the leaves of the old man off, waiting patiently for the new growth God creates in us to bear fruit for His glory, what daily lives we could lead with excitement and expectation.
The “Fall” season is not comfortable or beautiful or easy, as things are being stripped away from our lives. But those things must die so that God can use our lives to bless others who suffer from the same or similar struggles in their lives.
I am praying for you this morning, that whatever “Fall” season God has you going through, that you are able, like Jesus in His persecution and death, to look forward to the glory that God is preparing for you, in this life and the next! Be strong and courageous in Christ. Know that you are loved and have an intimate relationship with the King of kings! He will bring His bride to glorious perfection.
He who began a good work in you, will be faithful to complete it!
Pastor Dale