Fruit Consistent with Repentance

While John the Baptist was baptizing people the Pharisees and Sadducees came to him and this what he said to them in Matthew 3:8 - "Produce fruit in keeping with repentance. ⁹ And do not think you can say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father.’ I tell you that out of these stones God can raise up children for Abraham."

As a person who grew up in a Christian family and attended church faithfully as a child, we can not base our salvation on this. We can't base our salvation on another persons faith. As believers we have been saved by grace through faith in Jesus the Christ. Yet, we must not rest in this fact and live like we want. We can't rest on what God has done in our lives in the past, but we need to daily live for Him. We need to daily seek his face and will. We need to live lives that are pleasing to God. We need to bear fruit.

John 15:1-5 says, "I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. ² He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful. ³ You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. ⁴ Remain in me, as I also remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me.⁵ “I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing."

God is seeking fruit bearers, not people who  do good works. There is a difference. A fruit bearer does not actually bear the fruit but the vine or tree is bearing the fruit. It comes out of their relationship with Jesus Christ. While one who does good works comes from the flesh. It comes from their own strength. God wants us to bear much fruit that comes from us abiding in him, and yielding to His Spirit.