“But the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against these things!” Galatians 5:22-23

It's time to get "fruitier"!

So here we are… we’ve looked at each individual section of the “Fruit of the Spirit.” It’s quite a list. It’s actually pretty exhausting if we think about producing them in our lives! If we started each day by thinking we had to produce them on our own, we’d probably just crawl back into bed, defeated before we start. But that’s the best thing about the Spiritual Fruit that’s displayed in our lives; we aren’t the ones who produce it.

Here’s a “bite” from each section of fruit we looked at:

Love: If the first “fruit section” that we display to the world is love, we’ll have their attention. If our motive stems from love … there’s hope that they’ll stay around long enough to see Jesus.

Joy: People need to see joy in our lives. Like love, there is an attractiveness that pulls people’s attention to it. There are times to feel grief, but within those times, the joy of the Lord becomes our strength.

Peace: Our sense of peace comes from our joining with Christ! Our peace is founded in the assurance of our salvation… and because of that we have nothing to fear, and we are content with life. Contentment is another attention-getter.

Patience: Someone said that this word “patience” is the opposite of “short-tempered.” We literally become “long-tempered.” The Spirit produces in us the ability to “remain under” the thing that is upsetting us.

Kindness: Kindness is like a proviso to patience; it’s a “conditional stipulation.” …This word “kindness” has a facet of the other person’s welfare to it.

Goodness: This goodness more closely resembles righteousness. It refers to a moral goodness, uprightness, and becomes the motivation for a Christian’s good works.

Faithfulness: … our “new creature” way of thinking includes Holy Spirit produced faithfulness! It is the ability to remain faithful to what we believe in, without wavering.

Gentleness: There are times when the “fruit section” of gentleness is our “loudest” way of witnessing. But remember it is Spirit produced. The power of the truth under the control of the Spirit, is displayed in gentleness.

Self-Control: The term “self-control” is evidence in itself that there is a battle raging: There is something my “self” wants, but I need to “control” that desire…. I, within myself, can’t control “this” issue, but do I have faith that God the Spirit, dwelling within me, CAN? If I do, it is a victory of God’s faithfulness and power, not mine, that will testify to those around me.

Remember, Christian maturation is a process, including these 9 Fruit sections. The initial blossoms might not resemble the fruit to be harvested, but they hold the promise of what is to come. Our responsibility is to keep nurturing the tree, staying deeply rooted in Christ.  If we do, our “new creature,” Spirit powered DNA will produce and grow these wonderfully attractive fruits whose seeds will be planted in other’s lives and be used to reproduce a new child of God.

Reminder: We are known by our fruits… (Matthew 7:16a)