We could subtitle this today: This is Who You Are!
Today we are going to continue to look at the Holy Spirit’s work in our lives. This week we will look at the changed life that the Spirit brings. Next week we will look at the power that the Spirit brings.
Galatians 5: 13-26: You, my brothers and sisters, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the flesh; rather, serve one another humbly in love. 14 For the entire law is fulfilled in keeping this one command: ‘Love your neighbour as yourself.’ 15 If you bite and devour each other, watch out or you will be destroyed by each other. 16 So I say, live by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. 17 For the flesh desires what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the flesh. They are in conflict with each other, so that you are not to do whatever you want. 18 But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law. 19 The acts of the flesh are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery; 20 idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions 21 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. 22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. 24 Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. 25 Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit. 26 Let us not become conceited, provoking and envying each other.
One of the things I hear a lot of today in Christian circles are statements like: “God understands, I can live this way, hey we’re under grace, so my [insert behaviour] is OK.” It is true that we are under grace and it is true that being sanctified is a process, but is is a process in which movement and change is expected:
2 Corinthians 3: 17-18: For the Lord is the Spirit, and wherever the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. 18 So all of us who have had that veil removed can see and reflect the glory of the Lord. And the Lord—who is the Spirit—makes us more and more like him as we are changed into his glorious image.
The fruit of the Spirit is contrary to the way we used to live, the way the world lives. A new paradigm, model, of living comes to the fore when we become Christians. This is best seen in the way we live but also in the being of who we are. We are changed from the inside out not the outside in.
The fruit of the Spirit begins to grow within us when we are saved. This is not false piety or keeping rules and regulations; it is a new way of life that comes from within as the influence and the presence of the Spirit of God grows within us.
Being under grace means being filled with the Spirit and His fruit, not ours, growing in us! Fruit takes time to grow. Some grow quickly, some are only seen in certain seasons, and so in God’s grace there is time to grow.
You might feel like a caterpillar at times but there’s still a butterfly within you.
The Fruit is Planted at Salvation
The Spirit’s fruit is placed within us at salvation, they are part of the seal-deal:
2 Corinthians 1: Now it is God who makes both us and you stand firm in Christ. He anointed us, 22 set his seal of ownership on us, and put his Spirit in our hearts as a deposit, guaranteeing what is to come.
Ephesians 1:13-14: And you also were included in Christ when you heard the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation. When you believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, 14 who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of those who are God’s possession – to the praise of his glory.
The Gifts are Given at Holy Spirit Baptism
The Spirit’s gifts are given to us at a separate time, maybe only separated by seconds, milli-seconds in some cases, at baptism in the Spirit:
Acts 1:8: But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.’
Acts 4: 31: After they prayed, the place where they were meeting was shaken. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God boldly.
We will look baptism in the Spirit more next time.
Living By The Spirit!
16 So I say, live by the Spirit…
I think there are times when we make this phrase of scripture more mystical and certainly harder to understand than needs be. I have heard it said living by the the Spirit is to hear the still small voice of God in circumstances or situations, having a heavenly intuition about what should be done, or even prophesying or having words of wisdom in the work place. All those things may indeed happen, but in the context of what is being said about the fruit of the Spirit, that is not what it means.
To life by the Spirit means to live a new life, in God. A new character begins to be formed within us. If we continue reading verse 16 we discover:
16b…and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh.
Living by the Spirit means that the desire of my body, my flesh as the Bible puts it, doesn't come first. My body begins to come under the control of the Holy Spirit within me. When I spoke about the health of the soul a few weeks ago I didn’t go this far then, but we know our flesh will fight against our soul, and we are told here, For the flesh desires what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the flesh. They are in conflict with each other, so that you are not to do whatever you want (Gal. 5:17).
Living by the Spirit means that we make choices to follow our new inclinations, the fruit of the Spirit. We used to make choices to show the acts of the flesh (the body):
Galatians 5: 19-21: The acts of the flesh are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery; 20 idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions 21 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.
Notice these are called acts of the flesh. These things should end at salvation but sometimes they don’t. You’ll know from your own experience that some things in your life changed quicker than others. It tends to be the more public things that change for many people quicker. So whilst you may not swear like a sailor anymore, there may still be signs of idolatry, jealousy, selfish ambition, envy and so on.
Internal thoughts seem to take longer:
Romans 12:2: Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is – his good, pleasing and perfect will.
2 Corinthians 10:5: We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.
How do you take a thought captive? Not by thinking about it! The emphasis is making all thoughts obedient to Christ.
In motor racing your eyes can be drawn to things on the track. A racing driver has to pay close attention to where his or her eyes are looking. If they see derbis on the track and look at it they will hit it. If they keep their eyes on the apex of the next corner, the next braking point, the next rise, then that’s where they’ll go.
So many times people try to war against their thought life by focussing on the bad thoughts and then wonder why they end up thinking about them and, eventually, following through on them. Think about the right stuff (Philippians 4:8)
When we are faced with situations to live by the Spirit is to make a choice to follow the new fruit that is being established in our lives. People used to wear those little bracelets, WWJD? Perhaps a more apt one would be: WWTSD - What Would The Spirit Do?
Living Free in the Spirit
Galatians 5:18 But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law….23b Against such things [fruit of the Spirit] there is no law.
Freedom is not a licence to do what you want, whenever you want. Freedom in one sense is an illusion in society, for no one can truly do what they want all the time, for there are laws that govern how people in a society should act and behave towards each other. There are some who desire to say that there are no absolutes anymore (that there’s no law, no moral right and wrong). That all sounds utopian until it’s challenged; try kissing the girlfriend of a moral abolitionist and see what happens (I’ve never tried).
Freedom is a licence to do what you want if you are led by the Spirit! More correctly, freedom is a licence to do what the Spirit wants. Why?
23b Against such things there is no law.
The following things have no law against them:
Galatians 5: 22-23: But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.
- Which one is the most important?
Paul when he lists these he does not class them as separate fruits but refers to them as the fruit of the Spirit. Rather than a bowl of mixed fruits, perhaps we are better off as thinking of them as a bunch of nine grapes, all from the same vine (Christ), nourished by the same sap (the Spirit), or as segments of the same orange.
We could all identify which ones we’re weakest on. They are all important, but for me I think they are flow from the hallmark of love in the believer’s life.
Jesus placed a high value on the love His followers would show:
John 13:34: ‘A new command I give you: love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. 35 By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another
We are not talking about being nice people. There are lots of nice people who are not Christians. We are talking about those who have experienced the love of God and who, therefore, love others with God’s love. The fruit of the Spirit kind of love.
Paul placed a high value on love when, in the middle of his teaching on the gifts of the Spirit, he says:
1 Corinthians 13:1-3: If I speak in the tongues[a] of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. 3 If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast,[b] but do not have love, I gain nothing
In all of these verses, the word love is agape, God’s love.
- Displaying these will make you an attractor of people.
If you want to have friends, show some fruit! Mike Alcock, when he visited and spoke a few months back, reminded us that we cannot love that which do not like!
We cannot say, “I love you with the love of the Lord, but I don’t like you.”
I think this is one of the reasons that we need the fruit of the Spirit for the church is made up of people, and other people can test our fruit!
Think for a minute about the contrast between the fruit of the Spirit and the acts of the flesh. Who would you rather hang around?
When we display the fruit of the Spirit we become the kind of person who others will want to be with. The fruit of the Spirit, if He is like Jesus (John 14:6 & 26, see last week’s notes), are actually Christlikeness. Jesus always attracted people. How attractive are we to others? We could all do better right? So we have to keep yielding to the Spirit.
- These are not personality traits, but character traits.
God is more interested in your character than your gifts.
The fruit of the Spirit are not personality traits. They begin to change the being of who we are, inside out. Personality is inborn, but is guided by character. Character is who we are when no one's looking. The fruit of the Spirit are the implanted character of Jesus within us.
Let me try an illustrate this: When you become a Christian you don’t necessarily get a new sense of humour, you get a sanctified sense of humour. You’ll still laugh and the same technical structure of a joke, but you will begin to desire clean material, not crass material.
Living In Step With the Spirit
25Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit.
Again we can over spiritualise this as some seem to think this phrase in isolation means some kind of spiritual hypersensitivity to what is happening around us. That tends to be the domain of the gift of discernment of spirits (1 Corinthians 12:10)
Keeping in step with the Spirit has to do with how we walk through life on a daily basis. How we begin to live this new fruit infused life. Three things to keep us in step with the Spirit:
- Don’t wander from the path
Matthew 7:13-14: ‘Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. 14 But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.
The narrow way does not mean narrow minded or bigoted. It does mean that there’s a right way to live. Our flesh will want to pull us away from the right path. Don’t flirt with the acts of the flesh. Why walk on the edge of the path when the best place to walk is in the centre?
- Don’t struggle
Don’t run when he’s walking, don’t walk when He’s running, don’t sprint when He’s standing.
Think of being in step with the Spirit as a three legged race. Let Him take the lead. He is not tied to you, you are tied to Him!
- Don’t get frustrated
You may be thinking you’d like to see more of a particular fruit. Allow these to grow naturally as you water your life with the Word of God, prayer, fellowship and seeking Him.
I’m not a gardener. The extent of my skills is potting plants. This year I have put some out. I water them, feed them, and nurture them. I cannot dictate the speed at which one plant responds to all this care. Some I have to wait for the flourish, whilst others seem to do well immediately.
Some fruit will be more apparent than others in your lives at any given moment. You don’t need to pray for them, they are implanted with the seal. You do need to nurture them by staying in step with the Spirit.
Wrapping This Up:
Next week we will look at the gifts of the Spirit.
The fruit of the Spirit show my maturity.
The gifts of the Spirit show my ministry.
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