Displaying the Fruit

Gal 6:22 But the fruit of the Holy Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self control.  Against such there is no law.

I so desire to become more like God and I sometimes feel that I have to strive to achieve perfection.  Those of us, particularly stuck with this malady, would be the first to say it is unachievable and, in fact, frustrating and self-de-meaning.  If we don’t achieve our level of perfection, whatever it may be, we tend to get very down and critical of ourselves.  This is definitely not how God wants us to live, and I think that this is the outworking of a shame-based nature.  We don’t like to make mistakes because we don’t like to look like “idiots”.  We are often able to extend grace to others but are particularly harsh with ourselves.

I was thinking about the Cross of Christ on the way to work the other morning and was particularly stuck with the fact that Christendom has “sanitised” the cross, giving Jesus a loin cloth to cover His nakedness. But His death was a shameful death, and His nakedness was exposed to all.  This was an exchange.  Jesus took the shame of our missing the mark and the curse that comes with sin (our own or those perpetrated against us) and which causes deep-seated shame in our souls and gives us honour as Sons and Daughters of the Most High God.  He also gives us honour before the enemy of our soul, the accusing adversary, satan, (1 Pet 5:8) who can hold nothing against those washed in the blood.

Psa 23:5  You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies; You anoint my head with oil; My cup runs over.

When Adam and Eve sinned, God covered their nakedness, their shame with animal skins (“I was afraid because I was naked” Gen 3:10b).  They miserably tried to cover themselves with fig leaves (even as we always try to hide our sins) but God’s love is such that He sacrificed the first animals, shedding their blood, to lovingly cover the rebellion exposed in their lives.  And He lovingly gave Jesus, His only begotten Son, for us, where His blood flowed down, not to cover, but totally remove the stain of our sins and where we walk in the forgiveness made available to us.

We are called to imitate God, seemingly an impossible task, especially in the light of Galatians 6:22.  I realised afresh in meditating on the fruit of the Spirit, that it is everything God is, and it is His power through the Holy Spirit in us, to live a godly lifestyle. 

2Pe 1:2  Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord,

2Pe 1:3  as His divine power has given to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him who called us by glory and virtue,

2Pe 1:4  by which have been given to us exceedingly great and precious promises, that through these you may be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.

God is LOVE.  That is the first fruit of the Holy Spirit.  Love is the great motivator of the heart.  God loved us first, and when we received the revelation/knowledge of this truth we were able to receive it and experience it.  It is not head knowledge but revelation that came to our spirit/heart, and enabled us to “taste and see” that God is good. (Ps 34:8)  Everything else will fade but love will always remain. This is very challenging to me, but like everything, we receive God’s love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit (Rom 5:5) and faith, and then out of the overflow we minister to others.

Human’s who have not experienced and received God’s Love into their hearts, are incapable of the “agape” (total unconditional love towards others including enemies) which is the love the Father wants to lavish on us.  We cannot even strive to achieve this measure of love.  However, we are much more capable with Holy Spirit power and help. 

We can will, (with the Holy Spirit’s strength) to choose to love others, even when they have disappointed us, hurt us or let us down.  God demonstrated His Love towards us, that even while we were sinners, (wilfully going our own way and totally opposed to His Holiness and Character), Christ died for us.  (Rom 5::8)

Jn 4:10  In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.

When we meditate on God’s incredible and life changing Love for us, knowing that He loved us, even whilst we did not care for Him at all, we draw near to Him, fully confident in His forgiveness and mercy toward us.  We know, like the Loving Father He is, He is there with welcome-arms open and ready to receive us and pour out His grace and mercy upon us and in drawing near to Him, we become like Him.  In my own life, God has moved upon me to love the “unlovable” and the pure love that flowed was of God, definitely not of me.  We can allow the Holy Spirit to flow through us, through the rivers of living water, to refresh others and help bring healing to their lives. 

Please get this, that God doesn’t love us only when we do the right thing.  He loves us regardless of what we do.  The cross is proof of this.  Christ died for us whilst we were sinners.  He didn’t die for us when we began to behave better.  God’s mercy for us saw judgement come upon His own Son.  Jesus Christ, who is the truth, took our deserved punishment on Himself, so that we can have peace with the Father and live confidently by appropriating Christ’s righteousness to ourselves.  Hallelujah.  What a gift.

Psa 85:10  Mercy and truth have met together; Righteousness and peace have kissed.

The fruit of the Holy Spirit operates and flows through love.  There is no love, except for self love, in the works of the flesh.  Love covers, the flesh exposes.  Herein lies the will of love.  Do we spread gossip and bring disharmony, disunity or distrust, or do we stop gossip in its tracks? Do we go to a sister or brother which whom we have had or caused an offence and ask for forgiveness and reconcile, or do we hold the offence against them?

Love outworks through action and not just words.  Ask anyone who has fallen in love.  They sacrifice time and money to be with the one who has captured their heart.  Jesus said there is no greater love than to lay down one’s life for his friends. (Jn 15:13)  This is the outworking of love.  And this is what seperates us from the world, that "we love one another" as Jesus commanded.  This is what will bring thirst to those who do not know God, when they see love in action and desire to have and to be the same.

Let us "love one another".