Category: Galatians

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness…  (Galatians 5:22)

When I was a little kid, I tried to be a good boy.

No, seriously…I did.  And, except for a few experiments with alcohol fires and the unexplained throwing of a rock at my neighbor’s window–seriously, I don’t know why I did that–I was good.

Well, I mean, there was that time I hit the neighbor kid with a golf club, and the time my cousin’s cap gun went missing and ended up in my pocket, and the time I tried to teach myself to drive and mowed down a fence with my mom’s car, and the time I “egged” a guy’s house–and father–because, well, yeah, and the time I employed evasive driving maneuvers against the police because one more ticket would cost me my license, and of course the tickets leading up to the need for evasive maneuvers…

So maybe I wasn’t so good.

And maybe neither are you.

But remember, the Holy Spirit is at work in you, and he will produce fruit.

So you do what you can, and he’ll do what he can.

And there will be good.

Happy Monday, Beloved.

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience…  (Galatians 5:22)

I could make a bunch of patience jokes, but who has time for that?

Ba da Bing!

The essence of patience is that you put yourself on God’s time rather than your own.  You acknowledge that God knows everything you know, plus everything you don’t.  You recognize that he sees far beyond the moment in which you’re stuck behind some…person…who doesn’t seem to know what the pedal on the right is for.  You admit that maybe God has it all–even your commute–under control.

You trust him.

Beloved, when we come right down to it, the impatience that you feel is just another part of the whole control thing.  You want it your way and in your time because you want to be Captain, to be Master,

to be God.

If you can just release that need for control and trust the Holy Spirit at work within you, you will procure a profound peace and a plethora of patience.

At least, that’s what they tell me.

Happy Friday, Beloved.

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace…  (Galatians 5:22).

In this corner…

Mortgage

Taxes

Orthodontist

Broken car

Broken home

Broken heart

Job stress

Family stress

Financial stress

Politics

Illness

Age

Loneliness

In this corner…

Jesus

No contest, whatsoever

Happy Thursday, Beloved.

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy…  (Galatians 5:22).

Not happiness

Not joviality

Not glee

Joy

The deep and abiding knowledge that you are loved, that you are whole.  It lies there beneath the surface of our life, unaffected by the storms of the moment.  Joy is much bigger than the moment.  

From time to time it rises to the surface, bubbling up to take us by surprise and sweeping us off our feet with an intensity that leaves us breathless.  Then it recedes, knowing that our physical frame can only take so much.

But someday…

Someday we will trade this frame for a new and improved model that can handle joy at full strength.

That’ll be nifty.

May Joy bubble up in your life today.

Happy Wednesday, Beloved.

Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends (John 15:13).

Thank you, Veteran.

Thank you for leaving your home behind in order to protect it.

Thank you for setting aside your freedoms to help safeguard mine.

Thank you for fighting for my right to protest, even when my protest saddens or angers or disgusts you.

Thank you for shouldering a rifle, or climbing into a chopper, or racing toward a bomb blast, knowing that this could be the day that you were called to give “the last full measure of devotion.”

You must have been terrified.

You went anyway.

For me.

Thank you.

I pray that on this holiday you will know the love of a grateful nation, and the love of the One who gave his life that you might live…forever.

Happy Veterans Day, Beloved of God

But the fruit of the Spirit is love…  (Galatians 5:22).

On the count of three, I want you to create a mango.

Ready?  One…Two…Three!

TaDaaaa!!

Hey, where’s your mango?

Oh, that’s right.  You can’t make a mango, because a mango isn’t in your nature.  It’s a fruit of the mango tree.

As love is a fruit of the Spirit. 

Beloved, you can do loving things–and you should–out of obedience to God.  But that feeling of unselfish love, of wanting someone else’s good above your own…you can’t manufacture that.  It comes from the Holy Spirit, and it develops and ripens in its own time and on His schedule.  So don’t force it, and don’t kick yourself for not feeling what you think you ought to feel.  Just let the Spirit work in you.  Be obedient to his commands, and the fruit will mature right on schedule.

His schedule.

Happy Monday, Beloved.

But the fruit of the Spirit is…  (Galatians 5:22).

There are places in the Bible where we believers are compared to strong trees or lush vines producing good fruit.

This is not one of those places.

Here, please note, the fruit is produced by the Spirit of God.

So where are we in this analogy?  Well, the Holy Spirit lives in us, and a fruit tree lives in…

dirt.

Yes, Beloved, we are dirt.  I mean, you can go with rich, fertile soil or even jars of clay, but it’s all still dirt.  We don’t produce the fruit or bear the fruit; we simply allow the Spirit to be planted in us.  We endure the rains because they allow the Spirit to sink his roots deep.

I could continue the analogy by talking about how some days fertilizer gets dumped on us, but I don’t want to put that picture in your head.

Oops…too late.

Well, let’s hope today is not a fertilizer day.

Happy Friday, Beloved. 

The acts of the sinful nature are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery; idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambitions, 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).

Well, now–there’s a happy start to your day.

Look, we’re not going to go into details here.  Some of the items on this list are vague, while others are quite specific.  But let’s take a moment to discuss what this list is not.

One, it’s not a comprehensive check-off list.  Don’t look at this and think, “Whew, I don’t see myself here, so I’m good.”  Because, first of all, look closer–you’re on here.  Besides, Paul’s not listing all sin.  He’s giving examples of the fruit produced by a life lived apart from God.  

Two, it’s not a mark of doom.  When you see yourself on this list–and you will–it doesn’t mean that you are not God’s.  Paul doesn’t say, “Those who commit any of these acts will not inherit the Kingdom of God.”  He says,  “Those who live like this…” It’s a lifestyle.  What you see above are the effects, not the causes, of a life without Christ.  

So, Beloved, when you look at this list and it seems all too familiar, return to the Cross, bathe in his grace, and remember whose you are and how much you are worth to him.

Then live like it.

Happy Thursday, Beloved.

But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under law (Galatians 5:18).

The Law doesn’t lead you.  It drags you.  You’re chained by the hands to the rear bumper of a Buick.  As the car drives away you walk, then jog, then run, then race, trying desperately to keep from stumbling, because when you stumble you will fall, and then you will be dragged by chains of guilt through streets of shame.

How’s that for pushing a metaphor, huh?

By contrast, the Spirit leads you.  It’s your favorite person in all the world looking over his shoulder with a smile and a wink and saying, “Come with me.  This is gonna be amazing!”

Go with Spirit over Law, Beloved.  

Every time

Especially today

Happy Wednesday

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 (Galatians 5:17).

Guest post today by C.S. Lewis:

Legion

Lord, hear my voice, my present voice I mean,

Not that which may be speaking an hour hence

(For I am Legion) in an opposite sense

And not by show of hands decide between

The multiple factions which my state has seen

Or will see. Condescend to the pretense

That what speaks now is I; in its defense,

Dissolve my parliament and intervene.

Thou wilt not, though we asked it, quite recall

Free will once given. Yet to this moment’s choice

Give unfair weight. Hold me to this. Oh strain

A point—use legal fictions; for if all

My quarreling selves must bear an equal voice

Farewell, thou hast created me in vain.

Yep; that about covers it.

Happy Tuesday, Beloved.