\u201d\u02dcWithout doubt\u2019, according to Bishop J.B. Lightfoot, \u201d\u02dcColossae was the least important church to which any epistle of St. Paul is addressed.\u2019 Impolite, perhaps, but probably true. What had once been a prosperous city had declined in size and significance, and was largely populated by low-born people who eked out a living as shepherds and slaves, wool dyers and market traders.<\/p>\n
And yet it is ones like these for whom Paul thanks God, excited that the gospel which has been \u201d\u02dcbearing fruit and growing in the whole world\u2019 has also been bearing fruit and growing among them. That fruitfulness is then applied to the Colossians again as Paul prays for them to be \u201d\u02dcbearing fruit in every good work\u2019.<\/p>\n
Far from being incidental, his references to \u201d\u02dcbearing fruit\u2019 here and elsewhere in his letters tap into a rich seam which runs through the Bible from beginning to end. We find fruit on the first and last pages of Scripture \u201d\u201c in the garden of Eden and the new Jerusalem \u201d\u201c and almost everywhere in between. Look more closely, and it becomes clear that God\u2019s desire for fruitfulness is as extensive as the gospel \u201d\u201c with what God has done in Christ in bringing men and women back to himself and in setting in motion his plan to restore the whole of creation.<\/p>\n