If you hear someone referring to the Fruit of the Spirit, they’re probably referencing Galatians 5:22–23, which gives a list of qualities that the author, the Apostle Paul, says come from the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit. What those verses say is this: “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. The law is not against such things.”
All of us need to have a regular habit of checking ourselves to see what kind of fruit we are producing.
If we are careful to observe just those two verses, we see that the first word quoted is “But.” That tells us this fruit of the Spirit is presented as a contrast to something else that came before it. And if we back up just a few verses, we can see what that other thing is: it’s another list. But this first list is of “works of the flesh.” And the entries on this list are not meant to inspire us; it includes things like hatred, strife, and selfish ambition, just to name a few. Those are a far cry from love, peace, and kindness.
That contrast is precisely Paul’s point in this chapter. At this point in the letter, he is providing a kind of assessment tool we can use to take stock of our own lives. Galatians was originally written to Christians whom Paul could see were struggling to recognize what difference the Holy Spirit should make in how they were living. So he essentially said, “If you let your flesh dictate how you’re living, you’re going to get these terrible things. However, when you let the Holy Spirit influence what you do, the outcome will be these other pure, godly things.”
Just like the Galatians, then, we can use these lists to help us evaluate how well we are paying attention to the Holy Spirit. All of us need to have a regular habit of checking ourselves to see what kind of fruit we are producing. To aid us in this effort, we will use the next several weeks of this Commentary to learn more about the Fruit of the Spirit and what it looks like for us to exhibit these qualities.
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1 Comment
A very important topic for these times (Of course, it always seems to be “these times” lol. Thank you!