What's Growing in Your Garden: Fruit of the Spirit Introduction
Galatians 5:16-26
Last week we took a critical look at the prevailing religion among American teenagers, MTD – Moralistic Therapeutic Deism, which at its heart, tells its followers to be good: don’t do bad things. Last week we looked at Jesus’ words where he boiled it down to this: avoiding sin isn’t good enough. Instead of simply stopping doing bad things, we have been called to turn 180 degrees and to do good. On our own, we aren’t capable of it; we keep on doing bad things. But we’re not called to do it on our own.
1 Thessalonians 5:22 tells us Avoid every kind of evil. But Paul continues: May God himself, the God of peace, sanctify you through and through. May your whole spirit, soul, and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. The one who calls you is faithful and he will do it.
Our calling is by a God who fills us with His Spirit. We cannot get to today’s scripture without understanding this. We are told to live by the Spirit – we can’t live by the Spirit unless we are filled with the Spirit. We can try to live out a holy life on our own, but in the long run, it just doesn’t work.
So often I have heard people talk about the Fruit of the Spirit as if those are goals we strive toward. If you do this, then you can achieve that. If you try hard enough to love people, then you’ll exhibit the spiritual fruit: love. If you put on a happy face, even in the midst of troubles, then you’ll eventually have joy.
It doesn’t work. Did you notice that Paul makes a contrast: he contrasts the sinful nature with the Spirit (Galatians 5:17) For the sinful nature desires what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the sinful nature. They are in conflict with each other, so that you do not do what you want.
He goes on to delineate some of the acts of the sinful nature, that is, what we do on our own, with the Fruit of the Spirit. The acts of the sinful nature are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery; idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God (Galatians 5:19-21).
The contrast is this: these are the acts of the sinful nature, but the Fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law (Galatians 5:22-23).
Notice that there is more than just the contrast between bad deeds and good deeds; all of the acts of the sinful nature are certainly bad deeds that each of us is completely capable of doing, but the alternative isn’t just good deeds! The alternative scenario is the Fruit of the Spirit! This fruit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control, isn’t fruit that comes by us just working harder to be more loving, patient, gentle, etc. It comes from the Holy Spirit!
Think of it this way: if you want fresh apples off a tree, would you stand around looking at your maple tree, just willing it to bear apples? Would you staple apples on the maple tree? This, my friends, is not how you get an apple tree! You get an apple tree by planting an apple tree. In Romans 11:16b, Paul tells us If the root is holy, so are the branches. The Holy Spirit is the holy root who makes His branches holy, who bears fruit of the Spirit.
In Matthew 12:33, Jesus talks about fruit trees: Make a tree good and its fruit will be good, or make a tree bad and its fruit will be bad, for a tree is recognized by its fruit. What does your fruit look like? Does it look like the Holy Spirit or not? Remember, you are recognized by your fruit.
The Holy Spirit is the only One who can make a tree good. He does that by totally transforming it, replacing the root and grafting the rest on to Himself. The only way that we are able to do good deeds at all is by the grace of God. After Jesus tells his audience that a tree is recognized by its fruit, he goes on to say in Matthew 12:34-35 You brood of vipers, how can you who are evil say anything good? For out of the overflow of the heart the mouth speaks. The good man brings good things out of the good stored up in him, and the evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in him.
This is key – the Holy Spirit is the one who grows the fruit. It’s not because of us or who we are; it’s all about God. This leads me to the next important point: the purpose of the Fruit of the Spirit. We already see from the scripture that against these things there is no law. And who can argue against love? Who doesn’t want joy and peace? We seem to inherently know that kindness is a good feature.
But the purpose of the Fruit of the Spirit is not just to make us feel good. The Holy Spirit does not cultivate this fruit in us just to make us happy. If we want to know its full purpose, we have to look a little more deeply at the analogy.
What is the purpose of fruit? If you answer “to eat” you’re only part right. The purpose of fruit is to protect and carry seeds, to reproduce itself. God was really creative when He created fruit-bearing plants. They have these attractive and extremely edible parts on them, and people and animals naturally eat them. In the middle of the fruits are… seeds. Think of a bird who eats its fill of raspberries. What happens next? Well, the seeds pass through the bird’s digestive system unscathed, and then they return to the ground where they grow more raspberry bushes.
The purpose of fruit is to reproduce itself, to make more fruit trees. Likewise with us. Our mission statement, as United Methodists, is to “Make disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world.” This isn’t just all about our work in designated disciple making ventures; it’s about the natural harvest of a life lived and controlled by the Holy Spirit. For when we exhibit such attributes as love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control, then people stand up and take notice. These aspects are absolutely counter-cultural. They aren’t the way our country runs. Our culture prizes lust over love. Dissatisfaction over joy. Anxiety over peace. Right now over patience. Look out for #1 over kindness & goodness. What have you done for me lately over faithfulness. Ruthlessness over gentleness. And our economy is based on a lack of self-control.
And when we as Christians live out these cultural values, we will bear no fruit. Last year Arnie and Lori Dupler brought us a whole bunch of delicious peaches from their trees. They were so good! We made peach pies and we canned peaches; they are so good. We were looking forward to having more peaches this summer, but unfortunately the late freezes killed them all. We didn’t get any peaches.
Friends, when we live out the values of this culture instead of living by the Holy Spirit, it’s like a freeze that kills our fruit. It kills our ministry to those who don’t yet know Jesus Christ when they see us living like the world. Do you want to know why the United Methodist Church is in decline? Because we’ve lived like the world for years and years and years. We have not lived by the Spirit. We have not been characterized as those filled with love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. And because we have not exhibited that fruit, we have not made disciples, and we have not transformed the world. And that is a sad state of affairs.
Over the next nine weeks, we will look in depth at the Fruit of the Spirit, one aspect at a time. But understand that these are different than spiritual gifts. When we talk about spiritual gifts, the Holy Spirit gives every Christian gifts. We usually receive one or two primary gifts with several others as secondary. These are gifts like preaching, teaching, evangelizing, helping, administrating, healing, prophecy, music, arts, and so forth. When we are talking about the Fruit of the Spirit, they are not separate gifts, but rather, they are all facets of the same Spirit, and therefore all of them should be present in the life of all Christians.
So even though we will look at them separately, they are not separate. They all work together. As we grow in the Holy Spirit, these will grow in us, and the more they are present, the more we will look like Jesus Christ, and the more we look like Him, the more others will take notice.
Last week we took a critical look at the prevailing religion among American teenagers, MTD – Moralistic Therapeutic Deism, which at its heart, tells its followers to be good: don’t do bad things. Last week we looked at Jesus’ words where he boiled it down to this: avoiding sin isn’t good enough. Instead of simply stopping doing bad things, we have been called to turn 180 degrees and to do good. On our own, we aren’t capable of it; we keep on doing bad things. But we’re not called to do it on our own.
1 Thessalonians 5:22 tells us Avoid every kind of evil. But Paul continues: May God himself, the God of peace, sanctify you through and through. May your whole spirit, soul, and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. The one who calls you is faithful and he will do it.
Our calling is by a God who fills us with His Spirit. We cannot get to today’s scripture without understanding this. We are told to live by the Spirit – we can’t live by the Spirit unless we are filled with the Spirit. We can try to live out a holy life on our own, but in the long run, it just doesn’t work.
So often I have heard people talk about the Fruit of the Spirit as if those are goals we strive toward. If you do this, then you can achieve that. If you try hard enough to love people, then you’ll exhibit the spiritual fruit: love. If you put on a happy face, even in the midst of troubles, then you’ll eventually have joy.
It doesn’t work. Did you notice that Paul makes a contrast: he contrasts the sinful nature with the Spirit (Galatians 5:17) For the sinful nature desires what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the sinful nature. They are in conflict with each other, so that you do not do what you want.
He goes on to delineate some of the acts of the sinful nature, that is, what we do on our own, with the Fruit of the Spirit. The acts of the sinful nature are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery; idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God (Galatians 5:19-21).
The contrast is this: these are the acts of the sinful nature, but the Fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law (Galatians 5:22-23).
Notice that there is more than just the contrast between bad deeds and good deeds; all of the acts of the sinful nature are certainly bad deeds that each of us is completely capable of doing, but the alternative isn’t just good deeds! The alternative scenario is the Fruit of the Spirit! This fruit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control, isn’t fruit that comes by us just working harder to be more loving, patient, gentle, etc. It comes from the Holy Spirit!
Think of it this way: if you want fresh apples off a tree, would you stand around looking at your maple tree, just willing it to bear apples? Would you staple apples on the maple tree? This, my friends, is not how you get an apple tree! You get an apple tree by planting an apple tree. In Romans 11:16b, Paul tells us If the root is holy, so are the branches. The Holy Spirit is the holy root who makes His branches holy, who bears fruit of the Spirit.
In Matthew 12:33, Jesus talks about fruit trees: Make a tree good and its fruit will be good, or make a tree bad and its fruit will be bad, for a tree is recognized by its fruit. What does your fruit look like? Does it look like the Holy Spirit or not? Remember, you are recognized by your fruit.
The Holy Spirit is the only One who can make a tree good. He does that by totally transforming it, replacing the root and grafting the rest on to Himself. The only way that we are able to do good deeds at all is by the grace of God. After Jesus tells his audience that a tree is recognized by its fruit, he goes on to say in Matthew 12:34-35 You brood of vipers, how can you who are evil say anything good? For out of the overflow of the heart the mouth speaks. The good man brings good things out of the good stored up in him, and the evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in him.
This is key – the Holy Spirit is the one who grows the fruit. It’s not because of us or who we are; it’s all about God. This leads me to the next important point: the purpose of the Fruit of the Spirit. We already see from the scripture that against these things there is no law. And who can argue against love? Who doesn’t want joy and peace? We seem to inherently know that kindness is a good feature.
But the purpose of the Fruit of the Spirit is not just to make us feel good. The Holy Spirit does not cultivate this fruit in us just to make us happy. If we want to know its full purpose, we have to look a little more deeply at the analogy.
What is the purpose of fruit? If you answer “to eat” you’re only part right. The purpose of fruit is to protect and carry seeds, to reproduce itself. God was really creative when He created fruit-bearing plants. They have these attractive and extremely edible parts on them, and people and animals naturally eat them. In the middle of the fruits are… seeds. Think of a bird who eats its fill of raspberries. What happens next? Well, the seeds pass through the bird’s digestive system unscathed, and then they return to the ground where they grow more raspberry bushes.
The purpose of fruit is to reproduce itself, to make more fruit trees. Likewise with us. Our mission statement, as United Methodists, is to “Make disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world.” This isn’t just all about our work in designated disciple making ventures; it’s about the natural harvest of a life lived and controlled by the Holy Spirit. For when we exhibit such attributes as love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control, then people stand up and take notice. These aspects are absolutely counter-cultural. They aren’t the way our country runs. Our culture prizes lust over love. Dissatisfaction over joy. Anxiety over peace. Right now over patience. Look out for #1 over kindness & goodness. What have you done for me lately over faithfulness. Ruthlessness over gentleness. And our economy is based on a lack of self-control.
And when we as Christians live out these cultural values, we will bear no fruit. Last year Arnie and Lori Dupler brought us a whole bunch of delicious peaches from their trees. They were so good! We made peach pies and we canned peaches; they are so good. We were looking forward to having more peaches this summer, but unfortunately the late freezes killed them all. We didn’t get any peaches.
Friends, when we live out the values of this culture instead of living by the Holy Spirit, it’s like a freeze that kills our fruit. It kills our ministry to those who don’t yet know Jesus Christ when they see us living like the world. Do you want to know why the United Methodist Church is in decline? Because we’ve lived like the world for years and years and years. We have not lived by the Spirit. We have not been characterized as those filled with love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. And because we have not exhibited that fruit, we have not made disciples, and we have not transformed the world. And that is a sad state of affairs.
Over the next nine weeks, we will look in depth at the Fruit of the Spirit, one aspect at a time. But understand that these are different than spiritual gifts. When we talk about spiritual gifts, the Holy Spirit gives every Christian gifts. We usually receive one or two primary gifts with several others as secondary. These are gifts like preaching, teaching, evangelizing, helping, administrating, healing, prophecy, music, arts, and so forth. When we are talking about the Fruit of the Spirit, they are not separate gifts, but rather, they are all facets of the same Spirit, and therefore all of them should be present in the life of all Christians.
So even though we will look at them separately, they are not separate. They all work together. As we grow in the Holy Spirit, these will grow in us, and the more they are present, the more we will look like Jesus Christ, and the more we look like Him, the more others will take notice.
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