To be fertile (literally or figuratively)
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G2592 describes bearing or producing fruit, literally in growth imagery and figuratively for the results of receiving the word, living toward God, spreading the gospel, or serving sinful passions. Fruit is not automatically good merely because something multiplies; the seed, soil, allegiance, kind of work, and destination of the produce determine whether the outcome serves life with God or death.
Reader summary
Full entry for καρποφορέω (G2592) · Open the biblical lexicon
G2592 describes bearing or producing fruit, literally in growth imagery and figuratively for the results of receiving the word, living toward God, spreading the gospel, or serving sinful passions. Fruit is not automatically good merely because something multiplies; the seed, soil, allegiance, kind of work, and destination of the produce determine whether.
The BSB source-word alignment has 8 aligned rows for this entry. Common renderings include bearing fruit (3), produce a crop (2), bears fruit (1), produces a crop (1), we might bear fruit (1).
The source-word alignment first shows this entry at Matthew 13:23. Its strongest book concentrations include Colossians (2), Mark (2), Romans (2), Luke (1).
G2592 describes bearing or producing fruit, literally in growth imagery and figuratively for the results of receiving the word, living toward God, spreading the gospel, or serving sinful passions. Fruit is not automatically good merely because something multiplies; the seed, soil, allegiance, kind of work, and destination of the produce determine whether the outcome serves life with God or death.
In Col. 1. 6, the gospel is bearing fruit and growing across the world and among the Colossians from the day they truly understood Gods grace. In Luke. 8. 15, jesus describes good soil as people who hear the word, hold firmly to it, and bear a crop through perseverance. G2592 opens teaching on fruit as the visible result of what has been received and cultivated, while keeping growth dependent on grace, perseverance, and the kind of life being formed.
It corrects productivity-centered discipleship that measures people by speed, numbers, income, family status, or constant output, and it corrects claims that every expanding activity is spiritual fruit. G2592 gives fruitfulness a gospel-shaped direction: Colossians says the gospel bears fruit as people truly understand the grace of God, Jesus parable connects a crop with hearing, holding fast, and persevering, and Romans says believers belong to the risen Christ in order to bear fruit to God rather than producing the deathward outcome of sinful passions.
For G2592, responsible teaching keeps lexical meaning, passage context, canonical synthesis, and present application distinguishable. The verb does not make visible productivity the measure of human worth, promise biological fertility, or permit churches to ignore seasons of rest, disability, hidden faithfulness, grief, and slow growth.
G2592 appears across passages that develop fruitfulness, gospel growth, persevering reception, good works, union with Christ, moral outcome, patience, and grace. For G2592, the immediate setting decides which part of the range is active, so the witnesses must remain distinct rather than being merged into one formula.
That has come to you. All over the world this gospel is bearing fruit and growing, just as it has been doing among you since the day you heard it and truly understood the grace of God.
The gospel is bearing fruit and growing across the world and among the Colossians from the day they truly understood Gods grace.
But the seeds on good soil are those with a noble and good heart, who hear the word, cling to it, and by persevering produce a crop.
Jesus describes good soil as people who hear the word, hold firmly to it, and bear a crop through perseverance.
Therefore, my brothers, you also died to the law through the body of Christ, that you might belong to another, to Him who was raised from the dead, in order that we might bear fruit to God.
Paul says believers belong to the One raised from the dead so that they might bear fruit to God.
BSB source-word alignment connects this entry to exact verse rows, English rendering, source form, transliteration, and parsing.
How English Renders ItA compact distribution from source-word alignment before the full evidence tables.
Greek word. To bear fruit metaphorically represents spiritual productivity and moral conduct resulting from faith or instruction.
To bear fruit metaphorically represents spiritual productivity and moral conduct resulting from faith or instruction.
to bear fruit: χόρτον, Mrk.4:28 (cf. Wis, l.with). Metaphorical, of conduct: Mat.13:23, Mrk.4:20, Luk.8:15, Rom.7:4-5, Col.1:10; mid., Col.1:6.
Textus Receptus witness, full corpusGreek token appearances from Scrivener 1894 Textus Receptus in the full New Testament corpus.
8 Greek text appearances shown. Linked morphology labels have verse guides.
I bear fruit
Read verseI bear fruit
Read verseI bear fruit
Read verseI bear fruit
Read verseI bear fruit
Read verseI bear fruit
Read verseI bear fruit
Read verseI bear fruit
Read verseFull New Testament corpus: 260 chapters, 7,957 verses, 140,628 tokens. Data source: honza/textus-receptus (data only), with authority check against byztxt/greektext-textus-receptus.
How mood, tense, and voice shift the force of this verb in context.
This verb appears through different tense, voice, mood, or stem patterns. Those forms help readers see how the action is presented in context.
Verse guides are not available for this word yet, so verse references remain plain evidence markers.
How this verb appears across 7 occurrences in the NT discourse index (MACULA Greek SBLGNT).
Aspect reflects grammatical form — not authorial emphasis. Participles and infinitives are verbal adjectives and nouns respectively.
Clause data: MACULA Greek (Clear Bible, CC BY 4.0) · SBLGNT (Logos/SBL, CC BY 4.0)
Selected passage-level study witnesses for this word. This section is not the full occurrence list.
Showing 2 selected witnesses from 8 lexical occurrence verses.
καρποφορέω is built from this root:
Compound and idiomatic phrases that include this word. Follow a link to study the phrase and how its parts work together.
G2592 gives fruitfulness a gospel-shaped direction: Colossians says the gospel bears fruit as people truly understand the grace of God, Jesus parable connects a crop with hearing, holding fast, and persevering, and Romans says believers belong to the risen Christ in order to bear fruit to God rather than producing the deathward outcome of sinful passions. G2592 describes bearing or producing fruit, literally in growth imagery and figuratively for the results of receiving the word, living toward God, spreading the gospel, or serving sinful passions.
The selected witnesses keep the teaching concrete: Col. 1. 6 shows that the gospel is bearing fruit and growing across the world and among the Colossians from the day they truly understood Gods grace. , while Luke. 8. 15 shows that jesus describes good soil as people who hear the word, hold firmly to it, and bear a crop through perseverance.. Rom. 7. 4 adds that paul says believers belong to the One raised from the dead so that they might bear fruit to God..
G2592 opens teaching on fruit as the visible result of what has been received and cultivated, while keeping growth dependent on grace, perseverance, and the kind of life being formed. It corrects productivity-centered discipleship that measures people by speed, numbers, income, family status, or constant output, and it corrects claims that every expanding activity is spiritual fruit.
A church teaching G2592 faithfully will name both the promise and the boundary carried by these contexts, attend to vulnerable hearers, and refuse to make the lexical item prove more than its passages support. The verb does not make visible productivity the measure of human worth, promise biological fertility, or permit churches to ignore seasons of rest, disability, hidden faithfulness, grief, and slow growth.
Col.1.6
G2592 is a Greek verb built from the noun for fruit and the verb for bearing; active and middle forms can stress producing a crop or showing fruitful effect, with complements and context naming its moral direction.
The Old Testament uses vine, tree, harvest, and firstfruits imagery for creation, covenant life, judgment, and hope. The New Testament centers fruitful life in the received word, union with the risen Christ, the gospel of grace, and Spirit-formed good works without flattening every image into one growth formula.