Focus: The Spirit's Fruit In The Believer's Life (Pt.1)

Text: Gal.5:22-23

"But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance: against such there is no law."

Paul has declared, "For we are labourers together with God: YE ARE GOD'S HUSBANDRY, ye are God's building" (1Cor.3:9). That is to that we are God's field. J. B. Phillips translates, "You are a field under God's cultivation." The New English Bible says, "You are God's garden." The Berkeley Version says, "You are God's farmland." That is to say that we are God's tillage. 

The desire of Christ is to see us bearing fruit. In fact, He demands that we bear fruit. He says, "He who abides in Me, and I in him, he bears much fruit" (Jh.15:5). And again He says, "Even so, every good tree bears fruit; but the bad tree bears bad fruit" (Mt.7:17). God has planted us, and has given us the Holy Spirit to cultivate us, and ensure that we are bearing fruit. The Spirit is involved in the horticultural business. He is the Divine Horticulturist, living in us and cultivating our lives. 

As God's garden, His work is to cultivate and enable us to bear fruit. God wants us to bear fruit in abundance. God longs for a great harvest from us.

We have a role to play if we are ever going to be fruitful. We must let the Spirit do His work. We must constantly be filled with the Spirit. It is not enough for the Spirit to dwell in us; we must give Him the right of way. He has to be in charge. He has to control every aspect of our lives. Remember that He is the Spirit of the Lord, that is, He is the Lord. The Lordship of the Spirit must be acknowledged and surrendered to.

Gal.6:7-8 makes it clear that the kind of harvest we reap in this life and in the life to come depends on the kind of planting we do. It is either we are sowing to the flesh or to the spirit. Sowing to the flesh results in reaping corruption. Sowing to the spirit results in reaping life and all its good effects. We need to understand, as another has said, that "the Holy Spirit dwells in us, then, not as a prized exhibit to be showcased but as a cultivating power to permit spiritual fruitfulness."

Fruit is the evidence of life. It implies growth and maturity. It means that cultivation is happening.

We are God's garden; He requires fruit from our lives. God has the right to inquire, "why cumbereth it the ground," if our life is not producing fruit? (Lk.13:7). 

God wants to see us grow and bear fruit. He requires and expects nothing less than that. We can't afford to be fruitless in this life. Let it never be said of us that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit have labored in vain in our lives! Allow the Spirit to do the work He has been sent to do in your life and through your life! Yield yourself to Him completely! Let the fruits begin to come! Let the harvest begin! Let men see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven!

We'll continue tomorrow.

by Bishop Moses E. Peter