By Request: Fruit of the Spirit

Spirit Fruit

Wednesday 10/02/19

Series: Thru the Bible

Message – By Request: Fruit of the Spirit

Fruit of the Spirit (Inciting Desire II March 26, 2017

Gal 5:16-26,  “(16) This then is what I mean. Let your lives be guided by the Spirit, and then you will certainly not indulge the cravings of your lower natures.  (17) For the cravings of the lower nature are opposed to those of the Spirit, and the cravings of the Spirit are opposed to those of the lower nature; because these are antagonistic to each other, so that you cannot do everything to which you are inclined.  

spirit fruit

Paul addressed this state by candidly speaking of his own personal struggles with the flesh in Romans 7 beginning in verse 16. Here he makes the case for our good actions coming from our reborn human spirits and our evil actions coming from the influence of our flesh.

Rom 7:16-23,  “(16) But if I do that which I do not desire to do, I admit the excellence of the Law,  (17) and now it is no longer I that do these things, but the sin which has its home within me does them.  (18) For I know that in me, that is, in my lower self, nothing good has its home; for while the will to do right is present with me, the power to carry it out is not.  (19) For what I do is not the good thing that I desire to do; but the evil thing that I desire not to do, is what I constantly do. (20) But if I do that which I desire not to do, it can no longer be said that it is I who do it, but the sin which has its home within me does it.  (21) I find therefore the law of my nature to be that when I desire to do what is right, evil is lying in ambush for me. (22) For in my inmost self all my sympathy is with the Law of God; (23) but I discover within me a different Law at war with the Law of my understanding, and leading me captive to the Law which is everywhere at work in my body–the Law of sin.”

spirit fruit

It is not the purpose of this teaching to point out the role of the enemy in all of this, but it is rather obvious. God influences us towards our inner likeness to Him (our Spirits) and the Devil tempts us towards our outer tenancies of the flesh.

(18)  But if the Spirit is leading you, you are not subject to Law. 

Three key passages: Rom. 2:12-15; 8 & 1 Tim. 1:8-11

Rom. 2:12-15, “(12) For all who have sinned apart from the Law will also perish apart from the Law, and all who have sinned whilst living under the Law, will be judged by the Law.  (13) It is not those that merely hear the Law read who are righteous in the sight of God, but it is those that obey the Law who will be pronounced righteous. (14) For when Gentiles who have no Law obey by natural instinct the commands of the Law, they, without having a Law, are a Law to themselves;  (15) since they exhibit proof that a knowledge of the conduct which the Law requires is engraven on their hearts, while their consciences also bear witness to the Law, and their thoughts, as if in mutual discussion, accuse them or perhaps maintain their innocence”

Rom 8:1-14, “(1) There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus;  (2) for the Spirit’s Law– telling of Life in Christ Jesus–has set me free from the Law that deals only with sin and death.  (3) For what was impossible to the Law–powerless as it was because it acted through frail humanity–God effected. Sending His own Son in a body like that of sinful human nature and as a sacrifice for sin, He pronounced sentence upon sin in human nature;  (4) in order that in our case the requirements of the Law might be fully met. For our lives are regulated not by our earthly, but by our spiritual natures. (5) For if men are controlled by their earthly natures, they give their minds to earthly things. If they are controlled by their spiritual natures, they give their minds to spiritual things.  (6) Because for the mind to be given up to earthly things means death; but for it to be given up to spiritual things means Life and peace. (7) Abandonment to earthly things is a state of enmity to God. Such a mind does not submit to God’s Law, and indeed cannot do so. (8) And those whose hearts are absorbed in earthly things cannot please God. (9)  You, however, are not devoted to earthly, but to spiritual things, if the Spirit of God is really dwelling in you; whereas if any man has not the Spirit of Christ, such a one does not belong to Him. (10) But if Christ is in you, though your body must die because of sin, yet your spirit has Life because of righteousness. (11) And if the Spirit of Him who raised up Jesus from the dead is dwelling in you, He who raised up Christ from the dead will give Life also to your mortal bodies because of His Spirit who dwells in you.  (12) Therefore, brethren, it is not to our lower natures that we are under obligation that we should live by their rule. (13) For if you so live, death is near; but if, through being under the sway of the spirit, you are putting your old bodily habits to death, you will live. (14) For those who are led by God’s Spirit are, all of them, God’s sons.”

1Tim. 1:8-11, “(8) Now we know that the Law is good, if a man uses it in the way it should be used,  (9) and remembers that a law is not enacted to control a righteous man, but for the lawless and rebellious, the irreligious and sinful, the godless and profane–for those who strike their fathers or their mothers, for murderers,  (10) fornicators, sodomites, slave-dealers, liars and false witnesses; and for whatever else is opposed to wholesome teaching (11) and is not in accordance with the Good News of the blessed God with which I have been entrusted.”] 

(19)  Now you know full well the doings of our lower natures. Fornication, impurity, indecency, idol-worship, sorcery;  (20) enmity, strife, jealousy, outbursts of passion, intrigues, dissensions, factions, envyings; (21) hard drinking, riotous feasting, and the like. And as to these I forewarn you, as I have already forewarned you, that those who are guilty of such things will have no share in the Kingdom of God.  

The FRUIT (singular) of the Spirit/spirit

(22)  The Spirit, on the other hand, brings a harvest of love, joy, peace;

It is only fitting that Paul begins with love. In this word is seen the former statement of not being under the law. For love guides and governs itself – it needs no law to do so. Barclay has some useful insights on this first mentioned fruit or product of our union with Christ through the Spirit.

“Agape has to do with the mind: it is not simply an emotion which rises unbidden in our hearts; it is a principle by which we deliberately live.” It “means unconquerable benevolence. It means that no matter what a man may do to us by way of insult or injury or humiliation – we will never seek anything else but his highest good. It is therefore a feeling of the mind as much as the heart; it concerns the will as much as the emotions. It describes the deliberate effort – which we can make only with the help of God – never to seek anything but the best even for those who seek the worst for us.” (Barclay)

We are told that this love is spread abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit within us…and it may be in this way that my thoughts of this being the fruits of our reborn human spirits – brought to a reality through the direct influence and intervention of the Holy Spirit – MUCH like Praying in the spirit is “Our spirit BY the Holy Spirit praying”….so the fruit of the spirit is the outward expression of the new nature of the tree of our spirit, make effective and able to be outwardly expressed  – winning the fight as it were against the influence of the flesh and thus giving outward expression to the inward reality of being made new “Now all things are of God.”

This would also agree with my understanding of 1Jn. 3:9. I am not typically a fan of the J.B. Phillips translation, I believe this offers some advantages to others in the way it words this passage. I found it interesting to discover that someone I greatly admire does in fact like this translation and that is Os Guiness, 1Jn 3:7-10,   “(7-10)You, my children, are younger than I am, and I don’t want you to be taken in by any clever talk just here. The man who lives a consistently good life is a good man, as surely as God is good. But the man whose life is habitually sinful is spiritually a son of the devil, for the devil is behind all sin, as he always has been. Now the Son of God came to earth with the express purpose of liquidating the devil’s activities. The man who is really God’s son does not practice sin, for God’s nature is in him, for good, and such a heredity is incapable of sin.  (10) 10 Here we have a clear indication as to who are the children of God and who are the children of the devil. The man who does not lead a good life is no son of God, nor is the man who fails to love his brother.”

If you remember from a while back I taught you that the word “commit” is poieo and in this verse is figuratively spoken of a state or condition, or of things intangible and incorporeal, and generally of such things as are produced by an inward act of the mind or will; to make, cause, bring about, occasion. 

Since John is here pointing our the “seed” of Christ remaining in us as the purpose for why we cannot “commit” it stands to reason that this is not so much about being a repeated action, but about where the action is coming from. As children of God, we cannot PRODUCE sin out of our new nature – because that is of God and everything about our spirits is now OF Him. Quite literally a good tree cannot PRODUCE bad fruit. Let’s look at that famous verse in Mat 7:15-20…

[As I have studied these truths over the years I have often recalled these words of Jesus but this was the first time I remember ever actually looking it up…and guess what? The word for “bear” or “bring forth” is the same as it is here in 1 Jn 3:9. So PRODUCE is a very superior word to use in this passage. ] 

“(15) Beware of the false teachers–men who come to you in sheep’s fleeces, but beneath that disguise they are ravenous wolves.  (16) By their fruits you will easily recognize them. Are grapes gathered from thorns or figs from brambles? (17) Just so every good tree produces good fruit, but a poisonous tree produces bad fruit.  (18) A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor a poisonous tree good fruit. (19) Every tree which does not yield good fruit is cut down and thrown aside for burning. (20) So by their fruits at any rate, you will easily recognize them.”

So let’s go back to our verses in Gal. 5 where we left off in verse 22 and read this understanding into the verse,

(22)  The Spirit, on the other hand, brings a harvest forth from our spirits of love, joy, peace; patience towards others, kindness, benevolence;  (23) good faith, meekness, self-restraint. (24) Against such things as these there is no law. Now those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified their lower nature with its passions and appetites.  (25) If we are living by the Spirit’s power, let our conduct also be governed by the Spirit’s power. (26) Let us not become vain-glorious, challenging one another, envying one another.”

So, if this is our state. If while we live in these bodies we are going to be constantly under siege in a tug of war between our spirits and our flesh – HOW do we tilt the scales in the favor of our spirits?

I like a quote from Guzik which sums it up nicely,

How do we fight against the flesh? 

  • First, we have to be able to say “No” to the flesh and its sinful desires.
  • Second, we have to be able to starve the flesh from bad influences. fruit
  • Third, we have to strengthen ourselves in the Spirit of God, and follow His influence.”

Useful quote from Luther,

“When the flesh begins to cut up the only remedy is to take the sword of the Spirit, the word of salvation, and fight against the flesh. If you set the Word out of sight, you are helpless against the flesh. I know this to be a fact. I have been assailed by many violent passions, but as soon as I took hold of some Scripture passage, my temptations left me. Without the Word I could not have helped myself against the flesh.”

This agrees with the whole of the bible. David begins his collection of psalms says, Psa 1:1-3,  “(1) How happy is the man who does not follow the advice of the wicked, or take the path of sinners, or join a group of mockers! (2) Instead, his delight is in the LORD’s instruction, and he meditates on it day and night.  (3) He is like a tree planted beside streams of water that bears its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither. Whatever he does prospers.”

Later he says it another way, Psa 119:9-11, “(9) How can a young man keep his way pure? By keeping Your word.  (10) I have sought You with all my heart; don’t let me wander from Your commands.  (11) I have treasured Your word in my heart so that I may not sin against You.”

Paul tells Timothy, 2Tim. 3:14-17, “(14) But as for you, continue in what you have learned and firmly believed, knowing those from whom you learned,  (15) and that from childhood you have known the sacred Scriptures, which are able to instruct you for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus.  (16) All Scripture is inspired by God and is profitable for teaching, for rebuking, for correcting, for training in righteousness, (17) so that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.”

And a final quote which tells us the same thing is found in our next book of study – Joshua and it is very applicable since “the Land” is the New Heart for the child of God,

Joshua 1:6-9,  “(6) Be strong and courageous, for you will distribute the land I swore to their fathers to give them as an inheritance.  (7) Above all, be strong and very courageous to carefully observe the whole instruction My servant Moses commanded you. Do not turn from it to the right or the left, so that you will have success wherever you go.  (8) This book of instruction must not depart from your mouth; you are to recite it day and night, so that you may carefully observe everything written in it. For then you will prosper and succeed in whatever you do.  (9) Haven’t I commanded you: be strong and courageous? Do not be afraid or discouraged, for the LORD your God is with you wherever you go.”

Blessings! 

I hope this message will bless you richly…not because I taught it, but because it reveals Christ. He alone is our blessing and if in any way – whether big or small, 100% accurate or even just partially so – I have revealed our great God and Savior to you in a relationally knowable way, then this was time well spent on both our parts.

We at Living Grace Fellowship encourage you to place your trust in Jesus Christ, deliberately choosing Him and bowing the knee to Him as your Master and Lord, so as to come to realize Him as your Savior.

You have a special place in God’s family & kingdom. The fact that you exist… that you are His creation, says you were in His heart, you are His delight!

If you do not know Him, please reach out to us. Give us a call at the number located on every page of this website or use our ‘Contact Us‘ page. We would be deeply honored, if you gave us the privilege of introducing you to the Lord. Neither money nor attendance at our church will EVER be mentioned.

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Blessings!

Hi my name is Mark and though I am opposed to titles, I am currently the only Pastor (shepherd/elder) serving our assembly right now.

I have been Pastoring in one capacity or another for nearly 30 years now, though never quite like I am today.

Early in 2009 the Lord revealed to me that the way we had structured our assembly (church) was not scriptural in that it was out of sync with what Paul modeled for us in the New Testament. In truth, I (like many pastors I am sure) never even gave this fundamental issue of church structure the first thought. I had always assumed that church structure was largely the same everywhere and had been so from the beginning. While I knew Paul had some very stringent things to say about the local assembly of believers, the point of our gatherings together and who may or may not lead, I never even considered studying these issues but assumed we were all pretty much doing it right...safety in numbers right?! Boy, I couldn't have been more wrong!

So needless to say, my discovery that we had been doing it wrong for nearly two decades was a bit of a shock to me! Now, this "revelation" did not come about all at once but over the course of a few weeks. We were a traditional single pastor led congregation. It was a top-bottom model of ministry which is in part biblical, but not in the form of a monarchy.

The needed change did not come into focus until following 9 very intense months of study and discussions with those who were leaders in our church at the time.

We now understand and believe that the Bible teaches co-leadership with equal authority in each local assembly. Having multiple shepherds with God's heart and equal authority protects both Shepherds and sheep. Equal accountability keeps authority and doctrine in check. Multiple shepherds also provide teaching with various styles and giftings with leadership skills which are both different and complementary.

For a while we had two co-pastors (elders) (myself and one other man) who led the church with equal authority, but different giftings. We both taught in our own ways and styles, and our leadership skills were quite different, but complimentary. We were in complete submission to each other and worked side-by-side in the labor of shepherding the flock.

Our other Pastor has since moved on to other ministry which has left us with just myself. While we currently only have one Pastor/Elder, it is our desire that God, in His faithfulness and timing, may bring us more as we grow in maturity and even in numbers.

As to my home, I have been married since 1995 to my wonderful wife Terissa Woodson who is my closest friend and most trusted ally.

As far as my education goes, I grew up in a Christian home, but questioned everything I was ever taught.

I graduated from Bible college in 1990 and continued to question everything I was ever taught (I do not mention my college in order to avoid being labeled).

Perhaps my greatest preparation for ministry has been life and ministry itself. To quote an author I have come to enjoy namely Fredrick Buechner in his writing entitled, Now and Then, "If God speaks to us at all other than through such official channels as the Bible and the church, then I think that He speaks to us largely through what happens to us...if we keep our hearts open as well as our ears, if we listen with patience and hope, if we remember at all deeply and honestly, then I think we come to recognize beyond all doubt, that, however faintly we may hear Him, He is indeed speaking to us, and that, however little we may understand of it, His word to each of us is both recoverable and precious beyond telling." ~ Fredrick Buechner

Well that is about all there is of interest to tell you about me.

I hope our ministry here is a blessing to you and your family. I also hope that it is only a supplement to a local church where you are committed to other believers in a community of grace.

~God Bless!