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Fruits of the Spirit III ...

Thursday, June 13, 2013. We are discussing the role of the Holy Spirit in our life. In Galatians 5 the apostle Paul writes about what he calls the “fruits” of the spirit. But can that work? Do we need to twist our interior to act like that? Lets have a look and then raise important questions …

Some important questions …

We are discussing the passage of the apostle Paul about the fruits of the spirit: 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.

Paul tells us that when the spirit fully influences our life, we will generate love, joy, peace and kindness in our life. That is a fantastic promise. But the question is: is it our main experience? What is with all the difficulties? What with being upset and angry about stupid things in our environment? What with the behavior of others, who hurt us, who insult us, who are ignorant and sometimes evil?

I have been working with responsibility for many years now. When you are responsible for things, you need to make sure things work. It is a management task, which you are given. And you will not solve problems by always being nice and friendly only. You will not solve problems without clear words and without clear decisions. When we hear words about “love, peace, friendliness”, does it contradict the needs of management? Does it contradict the needs of conflict?

Upset and angry …

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Paul lists many character features in his list. One is “love”, but another is “self-control”. He also talks about “endurance” or “forbearance”. It is not that all these features are equally active every moment of your activity. They are all important. They are all active. But their role will vary.

It might be that we are upset and angry about injustice. We might be upset and angry when someone does not do his work properly. When we are let down, we might be angry. That is natural, and it is completely ok. Then, we need self-control, to balance our anger with our love, with our knowledge about the help of the Lord, with our love, which still sees the other person, even if he or she messed up and guilt is obvious.

The words which Paul speaks here are truly words of the Lord as well - inspired scripture. Taking them, thinking about them, using them to be guided … all this is part of “living faith”. We can learn unlimited wisdom, by taking the words about the fruits of the spirit (together of course with the other parts of the biblical books) into our life every single day! … (Roland Potthast) ... more texts

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