FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT.

DAILY DEVOTION.

DAY NINETEEN.

GALATIANS 5:22-23.    But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering (patience), kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control, against such there is no law.
Paul in the context of what Galatians five is about is comparing the difference between walking in the flesh and walking in the Spirit. In verse 16 he says that if we walk in the Spirit we will not fulfill the lusts or the carnal desires of the flesh, he then goes on to describe what they are. We want to look at the fruit of the Spirit, it is important that we understand that it is the fruit of the Spirit, the manifestation of the character of the Holy Spirit as we walk in Him. Note that Paul says the first fruit is love, this is important, the love here is agape love, the same love that john 3:16 talks about, it's God's love, it's not just natural affection, it is sacrificial love. It is the kind of love that compels us to love God and to love others. If we don't walk in the love of God, then the other aspects of the fruit of the Spirit won't be there. You might ask, why is that? Because if we are walking in the love of God we will walk in obedience to His word and His will, if we are not doing that, then we are just walking in the flesh. The second aspect is joy, Why joy, joy is the bi-product of walking in the love of God and obedience to the will of God, Jesus talked about this in John 15:11. He had just shared with them the importance of knowing the love of God and walking in obedience to His will and His word and He then tells them that if they did this they would experience His joy, that His joy would be in them and as a result their joy would be full, and we know that the joy of the Lord is our strength. We need to be strengthened in spirit to walk in all that God has for us. Then we have peace, Jesus said in John 14:27 that He would give us peace, not the same as the world has, but His peace. When we have the peace of the Holy Spirit we can know peace in whatever circumstances we might find ourselves in. Peace of mind comes when we know that we are walking in the love of God and in His will, it is not a natural peace, but it is the peace of God which guards our hearts and our minds and keeps us in fellowship with Jesus. It's interesting because the next fruit is longsuffering or patience. Now there are two aspects to this, one is longsuffering, which does not mean that you are going to suffer for a long time, but it actually means slow to anger, so when things don't go our way or someone wrongs us we don't fly off the handle or as Galatians 5:20 calls it outbursts of wrath. This gives us the ability to show people leniency, to give them grace, note to condone any wrong doing, but to be able to show them love and grace to help them. The other aspect of this is endurance, the ability to stay strong and single minded and focused on what God wants in the face of adversity, when it appears that things are going wrong. In James 1:1-5 the word patience there means endurance. When we are going through the trials we rejoice in the Lord, we thank Him for His joy, for His strength, for His ability to endure, to remain focused and to remain in His will and purpose. The next aspect is kindness, or the ability to treat others well, to consider their welfare, It deals with how we treat others who may be testing our patience, those who need us to be lenient with them, those who need our love and grace. The next aspect is goodness, the ability to walk a virtuous lifestyle, to demonstrate goodness. Faithfulness is the ability to remain in faith, the inner conviction that we know that God is true and His word is true, the ability in the face of opposition to stand on our conviction that God is faithful. The next aspect is gentleness, this can also be translated meekness, which is not a weakness or someone who is weak but it is the actually power under control, it is being even tempered, tranquil and the ability to forgive or pardon where necessary and correct people with a right spirit. The last aspect is self control, or temperance, the ability to keep oneself in check, the ability to say no I am not going there, when temptation comes we can reign in the desires of the flesh and so no. We have that choice, and the fruit of self control gives us the ability to say no. So, do you notice how it all flows on from one aspect to the next, walk in love and obedience, you experience the joy of the Lord, which is our strength, we then experience the peace of God which guards our hearts and our minds, so when we come under pressure we are able to walk in the patience, the ability to show people love and grace where needed and the ability to endure and stay strong, out of that we are able to treat others with kindness, to be able to demonstrate the goodness of God, to know that God is faithful and to remain faithful, We have the ability to walk the strength of the Spirit but under control, we now have the ability to say no to the desires of the flesh.  And of course against this there is no law, Why? because when we walk in the love of God and the fruit of the Spirit we are not under the law. So let this be the thing that motivates us that we will walk in the love of God and the fruit of the Spirit. AMEN.