Beyond Sunday
Welcome to Beyond Sunday, the Podcast that takes you deeper into the Word of God throughout your week, with your Host Pastor Lee Day.
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Beyond Sunday
First Fruits: Giving God Your Best Morning Hour
Have you ever considered what it truly means to give God your very best? In this soul-stirring conversation, Pastor Lee Day and Brother Frankie Brown unpack the ancient biblical principle of First Fruits and reveal its transformative power for modern Christian living.
Drawing from Exodus 23:19, "The best of the first fruits of your ground you shall bring into the house of the Lord, your God," they challenge listeners to examine whether they're offering God their prime morning hours or merely the leftover scraps of their day. Through vivid analogies—from garden-fresh tomatoes to perfectly ripe avocados that brown as the day progresses—they illustrate how our spiritual receptivity naturally diminishes throughout our waking hours.
Brother Frankie vulnerably shares his own journey of answering God's call to rise earlier for devotional writing, noting how dramatically it has enriched his spiritual life. Meanwhile, Pastor Lee recounts a powerful testimony of how simply praying before his pre-dawn work shift resulted in a security guard immediately recognizing his Christian witness—simply by watching him walk across a parking lot.
The conversation expands beyond morning devotions to explore how First Fruits applies to our finances, travel plans, and work life. Both men emphasize that giving God our best isn't about obligation but hunger—a spiritual appetite that grows as we consistently feast on His presence first thing each day.
Whether you're struggling with consistency in your devotional life or looking to deepen your spiritual practices, this episode offers practical wisdom for anyone seeking to honor God with their best instead of their leftovers. Listen now to discover how the ancient principle of First Fruits can revolutionize your relationship with God and transform every aspect of your day.
Good morning, good morning, good morning or good afternoon, depending upon at what time you are listening to this podcast. I'm Pastor Lee Day. I pastor Christ Family Outreach Church, located in Amelia, virginia, and today, back at the table, I've got Brother Frankie Brown. We're going to be talking about First Fruits. So to the listeners out there, I'm excited to get going on this one, this whole topic of First Fruits.
Speaker 1:A few weeks ago, at the closing of a Thursday night Recharge Church service, I was praying and as I was praying, the Holy Spirit was just ministering to me and had me pray something that, going into the prayer, I wasn't already thinking about praying. You ever been there before? Right, absolutely. You start praying about one thing, you end up Another place, your spirit leads you to another place and you're praying about something completely different. And where the Holy Spirit had me go to in that prayer was that we as a people would offer Almighty God the first fruit of our lives.
Speaker 1:So ever since then, frankie, I've been kind of chewing on this thing, you know, just kind of marinate on what does the first fruit of my life look like? But a little deeper than that, right, what is the first fruit of my day look like, and that's really what we're going to talk about today, because it was a blessed time that night as we were praying as a church family what it looked like to offer God our best, to offer God our first fruit. But this episode is going to focus on what it means for Christians today to offer God our first fruits in the fact of first thing in the morning. So, brother Frankie, I'm excited. It's going to be a great episode. What's your thought process on the first fruits? First waking up with God in the morning and giving Him your best.
Speaker 2:Something I've been recently put into practice in my life is really dedicating that first hour I wake up to the Lord to get his word, and one of the ways I do it, um, is by writing devotionals. Um, I love, I love to write, man, and, uh, the Holy Spirit just really ministers to me and he's been calling me for a while now to get up earlier and, uh, I finally answered a call, but I wasn't always obedient to it either, yeah, but my life has looked so much more rich now because of it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, there's something about that early morning hour, brother Frankie, before the house gets stirred and woken, you know, for those who have children, you know what I'm talking about. It's that time, while everyone is still sleeping, that you can really get up early and just think, you know, or even maybe before the spouse starts stirring around and moving and causing your attention to be taken off of what you're doing and maybe onto what they're doing. I started to study a little bit this topic of first fruits in the Bible. Right, and the first fruit biblically refers to a yield from crops and it symbolized a couple things. It symbolized their dedication to God that they were going to offer this first fruit offering, and it also symbolized a gratitude towards God that he had provided them the opportunity to have a fruit, you know, and to offer the first fruit, right, so it was a time of thanksgiving for his provision.
Speaker 1:So listen to the following verse, my friends. It's found in Exodus 23, 19. If you got your Bibles, exodus 23, 19 says this the best of the first fruits of your ground you shall bring into the house of the Lord, your God. All right, so that's Exodus 23, 19. I'm gonna read it again the best of the firstfruits of your ground you shall bring into the house of the Lord, your God. So a question that I just want us to ask ourselves, just a little inventory question here are we giving God our absolute best of our day, our absolute best first thing in the morning? And let me say this before we get any deeper If we are not careful, we are going to take the best of our morning, brother Frankie.
Speaker 1:We're going to take the best of our morning and instead of giving it to God, instead of giving that best quiet time to God, we're going to divide it up and we give God a little bit and we give ourselves a little bit, we give other people a little bit and instead of giving that first fruit to the Father, other people a little bit. And instead of giving that first fruit to the Father, instead of going deeper into our study, deeper into our prayer time, we move on to something else before our day gets going and we really get things out of focus. So I'm not saying that we cannot do multiple things in our morning, don't get me wrong here. But we should not sacrifice the best morning. Don't get me wrong here. But we should not sacrifice the best. We should not give up the early quiet time in our home in order to get other things done. First we need to take the best and give it to God. What you take, brother Frankie.
Speaker 2:Amen. It's amazing how the Spirit works, man, because I got Exodus 23, 19 written in my notes here. Come on, man, look at that. But this one came out of the NIV. I'm just going to read the verse too, because it reads just slightly different. It says bring the best of the first fruits of your soul to the house of the Lord, your God. And as you're sitting there bringing that up, man, I'm thinking about soul of the heart, yeah, you know. So how can one not give the first fruit back when you understand that it is his word that changed the soul of your heart? Yeah, and it's his. And his word is the seed too. Ain't nothing wrong with that seed, man? We, that seed is perfect, yeah, but a lot of times, when we put it inside of our hearts and minds, if it doesn't produce fruit to begin with, then there's something wrong with the soul, yeah, so, right here saying, um, the first fruits of your soul, yeah, bring, bring the best of it to him.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's so good. I was just talking to our youngest son, josiah, he's 13. And I w I was giving him just kind of like this word picture of first fruits and and we were actually doing a little study. He and I were doing a little study in James, chapter one, and we were just talking about the importance of some things and and and and the topic kind of kind of pushed over in the chapter one and we were just talking about the importance of some things and and and, and the topic kind of kind of pushed over in the first fruit.
Speaker 1:And I was telling him I was like remember when we used to plant a garden and you kind of you coming out of the winter into the spring, it's been a long time since you had that fresh tomato, you know what I mean Right on the plant. And I was like remember when we plant that plant and how you have to really work it. You got to work the soil, you got to take care of the plant, you got to fertilize it, you got to water it, you really got to love it. You know what I mean. You really got to put love and nurture that thing. You do have to nurture it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I was like every day, remember how we would go out there. We would check like just the condition of the plant. And then all of a sudden you've seen this little green baby tomato on there and you watch this thing like like you know, like you are invested and it's because the truth is you are, that's right and you watch this green little tomato get bigger and larger and larger and larger and then it starts to change color, you know, and you're like hey, can't pick it just yet, it ain't right yet. Can't pick it just yet, it ain't right yet, until, finally, you know that it is at the spot where it's ready to end up on your sandwich. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2:Hey bro, how long is it before you put a fence around that thing too? Yeah, no, you're absolutely right, because you don't want to see something. Come eat that thing that you've been growing, you know?
Speaker 1:Yeah, you want to protect it right, absolutely, so we could get into this. We're to protect our first fruit time with the Lord. Protect our first fruit time with the Lord. Put the phone away, praise the Lord, unplug the phone, you know. Turn it off close the laptop.
Speaker 1:You know what I mean. Hey, tell your spouse this is my quiet time. If you're getting up, that's great. Go have your quiet time, but make sure you don't interrupt my quiet time. And eventually maybe even have quiet time together, right, but I need my quiet time with the Lord. So eventually that tomato gets to the point where it can hit the sandwich. And I was telling him how you know, later on in the season you don't get as excited about those tomatoes because you already had the first. You know. So that first fruit is so precious it really is. And that's where I'm at on this topic of giving that first hour that we're awake, or that first 30 minutes wherever somebody's at in their personal time with the Lord. Right now, gotta get that first fruit over to God.
Speaker 1:Brother Frankie, here's the deal when it comes to our quiet time with the Lord. It's just my personal conviction. We should not get up from our quiet time until we feel full. I'm a big believer in that. I like that, bro. We should not get up from the table until we feel full, just like at the breakfast table, the lunch table, the dinner table. We don't want to get up till we feel satisfied. That's right, you know, can I have some more of that please? You know what I'm saying. Can you pass that? Please Pass some red potatoes over here.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know so like we don't get up from the physical table until we feel satisfied, until we feel full, and I'm just going to say that we should not get up from our devotional table until we're full on the things of God. Why? Because just like physical food prepares us for our day, the spiritual food prepares us for the day.
Speaker 2:You know I don't mean to cut you off, Go ahead brother, I can kind of see where this is going, a little bit it's like. So what is your appetite for Right?
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Do you, do you get a little bit at the table when it comes to like real food or fresh foods, or do you have an appetite, really, for dessert? You know things that aren't so good for you, absolutely. What do you think about that, bro?
Speaker 1:If we get up from the table. It means if we get up early from the table, it means that we've left things on the table, which means we didn't clean our spiritual plate. And how many of us grew up in a home where your parents or grandparents looked at you and said you ain't getting up from that table until you finish that plate. So you know, I don't know where you're at with this, frankie, but the Lord showed me this in my life a long time ago. And I'm not perfect at it, man. By any means, I'm still working on my personal relationship with Jesus Christ. We all are, but oftentimes we have all been there. Oftentimes we get up from the devotional table, if you will. We get up from it early because we didn't sit down early enough to finish the meal and we got to get up because we got things we got to go, do I?
Speaker 2:was writing a devotion this morning, actually talking about being a facilitator of blessing. I was in Malachi Lord forgive me for not remembering the chapter or verse, but in there he was talking about giving a full tithe to the Lord and it said until the full tithe came in, that your barns wouldn't be overflowing or full. And I think a lot of times in our life, brother, that we give a partial tithe, wanting the fullness of the blessing. And I've been there in my life, man, but that's, that's what I've been seeing.
Speaker 2:Doing these devotionals and writing them is when I first started I'm not going to lie, man, it only took like an appetizer to word and I was satisfied, yeah. And I quickly realized I'm like Lord, like what, what? What has happened with my appetite? Like why, why do I hunger and thirst for things? I mean, I'm, I'm ready to like to put the word down, bro, and hit the work to paint, yeah, but I'm not here to paint, yeah, that's just. That's just a thing that he's allowed me to operate in so that I could be around other people to facilitate the blessing. What's your?
Speaker 1:take on it, brother. No, I think you're exactly right. People give a little bit, whether it be tithe or time or talent. They give a little bit over to the Lord, expecting to receive the full blessing. I want to take a moment and dive right into the Old Testament, brother Frankie.
Speaker 1:Leviticus 23.14 says that no grain was to be harvested at all until the first fruits offering was brought to the Lord. So think about that. No grain could be harvested at all until God was first offered up the first fruits that he was worthy of. So, in other words, you're not going to eat from this field, people, right? You're not going to eat from this field because you won't harvest this field until the first fruits, the best of the field, come to God, right? So think about that Before you go to work, before you go to work in this field for yourself, before you reap a reward or a return for yourself. You got to give God thanks with the first fruits of the field.
Speaker 1:So, brother Frankie, I've been guilty of leaving the house in the morning wanting to get the return of the field, but not giving God first fruits first. You ain't alone, you know, because I got a big day planned right, or because I wasn't feeling it, or because I wasn't feeling good, or because I was tired, because I stayed up late night before watching the big game on TV, right, and it's all me stuff, which means it's all me problems. You know what I mean. So I'm just, for whatever reason, ready to get out the door, ready to get the day going. I'm looking to receive the harvest of the day when I leave from the house, but I haven't yet given God the first fruits of the day. Man. And I think that that piece right there in Leviticus is so huge because it's days like that that I've got to force myself to slow down and remember to truly get with God.
Speaker 1:It reminds me of this scenario of a toll booth. It used to be before smart tag technology that you actually had to stop at the toll booth. You actually had to hand money over to an attendant if you did not have the exact change and there would be an actual verbal exchange with a real live person. But now you can avoid the interaction altogether. You don't even have to slow down too much. You could just like with a smart tag man, you could just roll right through that thing, right, you can simply blow right through it and the people still get the money, but there's zero interaction. That's right, so we're not careful. Our Bible time can look just like that toll booth experience with a smart tag we blow right through it with little to zero interaction with God, and I think that's really dangerous, man, when we have a quiet time, when we have a time where we're really going to get into a Bible study, but there's little to no interaction with God.
Speaker 2:Yeah, Brother, I was on the way over here today. I had already spent a little time trying to prepare for this, but, man, the Lord just quickened in me while I was driving to your house to record I love avocado, I love it, bro. But every time we go to the store, man, I'll get like three or four. Yeah, them bad boys will go bad if.
Speaker 1:I get a hold of them quick, right yeah.
Speaker 2:So what the Spirit ministered to me on the way over is like, like an avocado. You only have so much time before it starts to turn on you. Yeah, um. And there's times too when he was ministering to me that, like that avocado, if you ate it earlier in the week it would have been good, but if you wait to friday and saturday, that thing's starting to change colors, it's starting to mix. It don't look green, no more. You know, don't taste the same, it don't taste the same. But what? What he was ministering to me was this that avocado and that representation, what we just explained, that's what your day looks like. So in the morning, if you dive into the word spend the first fruits of the day first thing in the morning with him, it'll look the Word spend the first fruits of the day first thing in the morning with him, it'll look like a green avocado.
Speaker 2:But come back later that day, come back that evening when you've spent all your first fruits on everything else and you're going to have that mixed avocado that's just trash worthy.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, no, absolutely.
Speaker 2:It's trash worthy?
Speaker 1:Absolutely, because it's been weathered. It's weathered, bro, it's been weathered. It's weathered, bro, it's been weathered. I shared an analogy a few weeks ago at church, while preaching of a pie. And you know, you have one last piece of pie in the refrigerator, so you spend all day at work. You come home, you go to get it, you pull down the box and you look and the only thing left is a small piece of crust in the pan. And how upset you'd be right, how disappointed, right. Imagine how God feels, brother Frankie, when what we offer him in our lives is not the entire pie it's not even half the pie, it's not even a slice of the pie, but it's the crust.
Speaker 1:It's the crust, and sometimes maybe not even that. You know what I mean. So let me explain for a moment. You wake up in the morning with intentions to pray, with intention to study God's word and spend time with God Almighty. But you were really tired so you slept in saying oh God, forgive me, father, I will meet with you at lunch. I will get with you on my lunch break. We've all been there before. Right, at my lunch break I'm going to move to a quiet place and have devotions, except when lunch comes. You've already had the busyness of that first piece of your workday.
Speaker 1:So you get wrapped up in conversation or playing a game on your phone, surfing the Internet or the socials, and you say to God you know what God forgive me, father, but I'm going to do devotions when I get home. Problem with that? Is sounds like a great idea. But you get home, brother Frankie, and there's chores that got to be done, maybe got to clean up a little bit from where you left so quickly that morning. You left a little mess. The house needs to be picked up. And then, right after that man, sooner or later, dinner's coming fast, you know, yeah. So then you say, okay, god, after dinner. Father, forgive me, but I'm going to do this after dinner and we're going to have time.
Speaker 1:But then you get caught up in front of the TV or watching that game, or listening to that program or that podcast, or doing what you're doing, and you say, all right, god, I'm going to do when everybody goes to bed, because the house is just too noisy right now. Forgive me, god, I'll do it, I'll do it when everybody goes to bed. Then everybody goes to bed, right, the house gets quiet, and you lay down and you're too tired to remain focused for very long, start to feel a little guilty about it. So you simply say, oh, forgive me, father, I'll do it tomorrow morning. And yes, my friends, at that point, that's when we're giving God the absolute crust. There's 24 hours in a full day, and yet we've chosen, we've elected. Our choice is to give God the crust. So, my friends, god desires more than crust, he desires more than a slice, he desires more than a half, he desires the first fruits of our lives, and he alone is worthy of it all.
Speaker 2:He's more worthy than that rotten avocado that we give him, brother. Or that little bit of crust like he was describing yeah, given brother. Or that little bit of crust like you was describing, yeah, brother, what's your take on? Like what modern day first fruits would look like for the listener?
Speaker 1:Yeah, so today we're sitting here talking about the angle of first fruits. Is, you know, the first fruit in the morning, right? But there are other things, there are other things to. To me it would be the first of whatever you know. So so I look at the tithe. Tithe meaning 10%. Yeah, uh, to me that's another first fruit. It's a first fruit of my, of my income. You know, there's, there's, so there's so many different things that that we could, that we could give over to God.
Speaker 1:I mean, even when we just jump into something, I don't, I don't like, I don't like jumping into much of anything without prayer. So I'll give you a perfect example. This isn't just to boast me up, I'm just answering the question. Yeah, absolutely, if my family gets in a vehicle and we're going to the store right, and we got to go spend money we're going school shopping for the children, right, so we homeschool, but our oldest is away at college. Just the other day we went back to school shopping for him for clothes we get in the car.
Speaker 1:The first thing we do before that thing hits reverse is I'm praying, I'm giving God the first fruit of that time in prayer, like Lord, we are taking the next five hours, however long it's going to be, and we're going out here and we're spending money that you have blessed us with. That's right, and I don't want to be frustrated. I'm not a big shopper. You know what I mean. I don't like shopping, but at the end of the day, before we even move, I'm going to take the first piece of that five hours. I'm going to take the first piece of it and I'm going to go to God in prayer that God would protect us, that we would honor God even in public, that we would be the light of Christ shining and this may sound crazy man, but I do it all the time. Even for going to grocery shopping man, I'm asking God to just bless us with deals, bless us with sales.
Speaker 2:You know what I mean. Absolutely Nothing wrong with that.
Speaker 1:No, brother. So so that's a whole nother piece of first fruit. Thanking. You know, before we, before we leave, before we go on vacation, before we even hit it in reverse to back out of the of the driveway, I pray over the vacation, I pray over the family. I'm giving God the very first of that trip.
Speaker 1:So, so there's so many ways you can look at first fruits. You know so many ways. You just pull up to your job and you know you're getting ready to work the next eight hours. Take some time and pray. Take some time and pray. I did that. I'm going to share a quick testimony. I did that one particular place I was working and it was like 1.30 in the morning you know, two in the morning, it was really early and I'm servicing some vending machines at the time inside of a really large warehouse and I pull up into the parking lot and I just I backed the work truck in there and I just sit in the work truck as I'm getting ready to start my day and I just start praying, having a time of prayer, I'm giving God my first fruit right there before I start the work day.
Speaker 1:It's the first fruit of my work day.
Speaker 2:Nice.
Speaker 1:And at the end of the building, which was probably a few hundred yards, there was a toll booth there. Not a toll booth, it was a guard shack. It looked like a toll booth but it was a guard shack. And when I'm done having my prayer time, I get out the work truck and all honor, glory, credit and praise to god alone. Brother. I start walking towards that guard shack because I had to check in, to go in the building and service these vending machines and I think I only had to go there like once every couple weeks. I didn't even know who the guard was. They rotated all the time. Right, I'm walking towards this guard shack. It's 1.30, two o'clock in the morning, it's dark, middle of the night it's dark and when I get to the guard shack the guard opens up the windows.
Speaker 1:A lady. She says you gotta be a Christian and I said well, yeah, I'm a servant of the Lord. I said do you mind me asking how do you know that? She said because I just watched you walk all the way across that parking lot. And she said I could tell a difference in you just while you walked. Wow, she said I could see a difference in just how you carried yourself. Wow, well, can I just say that there's nothing special about me, but there's something special about the Lord who lives in me, amen, the Holy Spirit of God that lives in me and lives in me, the Holy Spirit of God that lives in me. And she saw the light of the presence of God. She saw my demeanor had changed simply because I just spent time I had given a first fruit of my day, my workday in that truck. And as I exited that prayer time and got out the truck, she could see impact that giving God my first fruit had over my life. I believe she saw your appetite too, bro hunger and thirst.
Speaker 1:When Jesus was preaching at the Sermon on the Mount, he said blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be satisfied, amen. So that's a question. You know, we've kind of talked about food here today just as an analogy, you know. But what do we hunger for, amen, brother? What do we thirst for? But what do we hunger for, amen, brother? What do we thirst for? Are we wanting to give God our best? Are we hungering for that first fruit hour, for that first fruit time? And I'm going to say this the more serious we become about that first fruit time, giving God our first. Amen, brother, the more we want to keep going to it and spending time in that first fruit season. Amen, brother, the more we want to keep going to it and spending time in that first fruit season Amen brother.
Speaker 2:I want to share a verse, brother, because I can see that this leads to like what the progressions of what first fruits are and like your appetite mindset. But the Spirit gave me this Luke 6, 38. Give and it will be given to you. Good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, will be put into your lap, for with the measure you use, it will be measured back to you.
Speaker 2:And I'm just here to remind anybody today, including ourselves, that you can't afford not to give. You can't afford not to give God your first fruits because he's going to put it back in your lap. But it's not meant for you to store into your storehouse. It's to be stored up so that you can give to. When the time of need comes for somebody, you can give to them If it's a legitimate need. You know you have something to give to those that are in need and I see that. I see that taking place in my life. So no longer and I'll be honest, bro, I'll confess this that there was a time that I was going out casting seed so that I could reap my harvest. The only issue with that is when I dove deeper into the Word, I realized that God is the Lord of the harvest, so he dictates and determines how it's measured and given back. And I just want to warn anybody out there today that if they think that they can sow seeds and and all this for their own storehouse, that God doesn't operate like that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's so good, bro, it's just like that, that, that that passage that I read in Leviticus earlier. We have to give our father the first fruit before we go reap anything in the field. Praise the lord, and we don't want to get that backwards, you know, but, but, but there's christians out there that'll try to do that. You know they'll leave the house and they'll go reap what's out in the field, but they haven't honored god almighty with the first fruit of their day, amen. So that's going to be a wrap on today's episode of giving God our first fruits and, as we've mentioned a couple of different things of what that looks like, I believe it's going to give the listeners a lot to consider, a lot to think about. But, brother, if you'll close this in prayer, it'd be an honor, absolutely.
Speaker 2:Father, we just come to you today and we thank you that we have an opportunity today to give you back the first fruits that belong to you. Father, I ask, in the name and the blood of Jesus, that you will forgive us, lord, for when we haven't done this, for when we don't do this. And, father, maybe today the listener is riding down the road, headed to work or has already started their day and they haven't given the first fruits. I'm here to remind you today that God is saying do it again. Do it. Do it If I give you another day, do it tomorrow. Or even give me that avocado that's rotten or that crust of the pie, because at least when you give that back unto me, it's what I've given unto you.
Speaker 2:But I want more than that and, lord, I just thank you that you're a God who satisfies, but you're also a God who allows us to hunger and thirst for your word, god, because it's only your word that will satisfy us at all, god. So I thank you for the first fruits that you've given us. I thank you for today and this message, lord, and I pray, god, that you would take this message beyond today, beyond Sunday, and that you would help us to truly apply it to our lives, because it will change our lives if we walk in it. We love you, lord. We ask all these things in your mighty name, amen.
Speaker 1:Amen and amen, Amen Until next time on Beyond Sunday. God bless and honor the Lord with the first fruits that he's worthy of.
