THE FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT – PART 2 In this section, we’ll examine the following: Who bears the fruits of the spirit; How to manifest the fruits of the spirit and Who bears the fruits of the spirit? The word spirit in Galatians 5:22 “…But the fruit of the Spirit is…” has a capital “S”, thus many Christians assume it refers to the fruit of the Holy Spirit, but the Holy spirit does not bear fruit. It is erroneously thought to be so because the word ‘Spirit’, and also ‘spirit’ with a small letter “s”, came from the same Greek word “pneuma”. However in this context it refers to the fruit of your recreated human spirit, the fruit of the Christian. Jesus said “I am the vine. Ye are the branches…” (John 15:5). And we know that the fruits of a tree are seen on the branches; therefore the Christian is the one that bears the fruits. The capacity to produce the fruits of the spirit has been given to those who are born again. Isaiah 61:3 says, ‘To appoint unto them that mourn in Zion, to give unto them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness; that they might be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the Lord, that he might be glorified’ We are tress of righteousness, so we produce fruits of righteousness, and all of these are in our spirits. Don’t let the devil deceive you into wondering if you have the capacity to produce the fruits of the spirit. Don’t find yourself wondering if you can ever be gentle, meek or patient. The question to answer is: Have you received Christ? If you have, it means that you already have the fruit of the spirit and what is important is to keep sowing the seed of God’s Word into your heart. You are a tree of righteousness and you can multiply the good treasure in your heart through the Word of God. Keep sowing the Word seed into your heart and it would produce the desired result. You may not see the result of fruit bearing immediately. You will have to be patient because you’ll be tried and tempted, so that you bring forth fruit with patience (Luke 8: 11,15). HOW TO MANIFEST THE FRUITS OF THE SPIRIT Ephesians 5: 9-11: (For the fruit of the spirit is in all goodness and righteousness and truth;) Proving what is acceptable unto the Lord. And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them. In Ephesians 5:11, we see a negation of the fruit of the spirit; the unfruitful works of darkness. Unfruitful works of darkness are works that do not produce good fruits / fruits of righteousness. By saying ‘…have no fellowship with unfruitful works of darkness, the scriptures admonish us not to participate in works that don’t produce fruits of the spirit, but to reprove them. In our lives and relationship with others, we shouldn’t manifest the fruits of darkness because we are trees of righteousness. For example, a brother should not go to another brother to deceive him and steal money from him. The Bible says if you love, you will not steal; you can’t love your brother and steal from him. Doing that will mean that you’re manifesting works of darkness. 1 John 3: 14: ”We know that we have passed from death unto life, because we love the brethren. He that loveth not his brother abideth in death.” Here, John is not referring to someone who isn’t saved; this scripture refers to someone that remains /abides in darkness; one who hasn’t come out of darkness though life has been given to him. Such a person remains under the control of spiritual death. An illustration is having the prison doors opened to someone who is in prison, yet he still abides there, in spite of the fact that the doors have been opened. He remains/ settles in the prison. In listing the fruits of the Spirit in Galatians 5:22, we notice that the list starts with love as the number one product of the human spirit. The first fruit that is manifested in the recreated human spirit is love; it controls our conduct, our life and lifestyle, our thoughts and speech. The scripture doesn’t say that if you don’t love your brother, it means you hate him. It says if you don’t love your brother you remain in death; you are walking in the domain of death and are under the control and jurisdiction of death. This means that the spirit of death controls your life and the devil is running your life. 1 John 3: 15 addresses the issue of hate: ‘Whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer: and you know that no murderer hath eternal life abiding in him.’ Hate is a verb, which means that it is something a person does. Unlike the man who doesn’t love, the man who hates is not just abiding in death, he has spiritual death in him. Any Christian who finds himself walking in hatred must quickly repent because hatred is one of the works of the flesh (Galatians 5:20). If a Christian walks in the flesh, he can find himself hating without realizing that he is manifesting the works of darkness. As you grow in your Christian life, understand that you are not supposed to hate anybody.pastor chris~~
Posted on: Wed, 25 Sep 2013 14:35:01 +0000
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