The Fruit of the Spirit is...

 Read Galatians 5

So where have we been so far? There is no other gospel.

Salvation is by grace through faith.

The law is no longer our guardian or governor. I like to say it’s our mentor or guide to good living.

I am crucified with Christ.  Christ lives in me.

You foolish Galatians, did you really think that the law could do what Christ Jesus himself has done for you? If the law could get you to salvation, Christ died for nothing.

I could talk more about circumcision and living by the law, but let’s just jump to the good part.  What’s that?  The fruit of the Spirit, of course.

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit. Let us not become conceited, provoking and envying each other.

The fruit of the Spirit is in concert with what Paul will call a new creation or new creature in other writings.  We are new.  The old is gone.  The new is here.

We died to the flesh.  We were crucified with Christ.  Now the Spirit of Christ lives within me.

I am crucified with Christ.  Christ lives in me.

So the Spirit of God, of Christ lives within me—what then will I produce as good fruit?

Let’s start with love.  Back in the day, punctuation wasn’t a big thing.  In fact, it wasn’t much of a thing at all.  One way to read this scripture would be to place a colon after the word love.  It would go like this.

But the fruit of the Spirit is love: joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.

The fruit of the Spirit is love.  Those other things listed are aspects of love—joy and peace, patience and kindness, goodness and faithfulness, and gentleness and self-control.

That’s one way to look at it, or we can consider all as stand-alone qualities—the fruit of the Spirit if you will.

When we think of love, think of the scripture that says greater love has no man than this, that he lay down his life for his friend.

Jesus told us to be known by our love and he told us to love like he did.  Jesus showed us love by washing feet, healing the sick, speaking the truth to a lost people, and giving his own life for us.

When we think love, think what good is it to gain the whole world and lose your soul? Love is to take the lowly position of a servant in this life and trust that God will reward you in the next.

When we think of the fruit we call love, it is a fruit of giving and sacrifice and service.

Love is manifest in joy, even when we are sacrificing.  Our joy is in the Lord and not in our circumstances.

Love is manifest in peace.  We have a peace that goes beyond our own understanding and surely baffles the world.  We can be a humble servant in this world and know more peace than the richest or most powerful person on the planet.

Love is manifest in patience.  Let’s skip that one. I don’t have time to be patient.  Patience has to be a real challenge in the age of immediate gratification.  Patience is taking the trials of life in the context of eternity while still living in the moment.

If you can exhibit patience in this modern century, the Spirit of God must be at work in you.  That patience also applies to trusting God for answers to our prayers.

Our love is manifest in our kindness and goodness when the world says look out for number one first and foremost.  Our love is manifest in kindness when the world is doing it’s best to make us transactional.

Our love is manifest in our goodness because we know that every human has a sinful nature and we can only be good by surrendering to God’s nature.

We see love manifest in our gentleness.  We may need to speak the truth in love and that truth may be uncomfortable, but we can deliver it with the fruit of gentleness. 

The last noted fruit that I would say is also a manifestation of love is self-control.  How good is your self-control?  Drive on the interstate for an hour.  Do you feel like killing someone or can you continue your journey without thinking about who deserves what or conveying digital signals?

My cruise control automatically puts a safe distance between the car that just cut into the space-and-a-half between cars so it could arrive three-tenths of a second ahead of me. Left to my own devices, I might be riding that car’s bumper for the next few miles.

Sometimes it’s hard not to gratify the flesh.  That’s why we must surrender completely to God’s Spirit that lives within us.

Paul notes there is a battle between flesh and spirit.  Jesus having experienced human flesh for over three decades noted that the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak.

How do you know if you are winning the battle?  Look for the fruit of the Spirit.

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit.

Let us keep in step with the Spirit.

Amen.