Fruits of the Spirit

Reading the Facebook posting of a friend this morning threw my thought process in gear.  He spoke of the fruits of the spirit namely, love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.  “Wow”, I thought, “I wonder how many of those I exhibit?” 

I LOVE my family and friends but I have a little problem loving the murderers or thieves. I’m full of JOY as long as things are going my way and God is answering my prayers the way I like.  My joy ceases if things are not going as I planned. PEACE is easy for me as long as I’m in peaceful sleep.  PATIENCE I have unless I am standing in line at WalMart. I find KINDNESS is easy most of the time until I have been wronged by some uncaring person. What about GOODNESS? Goodness knows, I am willing to help those in need out of the goodness of my heart unless it interferes with something I needed to do that day. FAITHFULNESS is an easy one. I have been faithful to my husband for over 55 years. I am faithful to my family, etc.  But, am I faithful to my church and its ministry? I have always been a gentle person. I treat babies and animals with gentleness. But, GENTLENESS means more than that. Gentleness means humility.  It means that I should not be above doing humble tasks. If the toilets at church need scrubbing or a stranger has thrown up in the foyer there, would I be willing to clean up the messes or is that the job of the janitor? Would I open my home to a homeless person and provide comfort to them even if I am uncomfortable?  Ah, and that last one……….SELF-CONTROL.  Most of the time, I have very good self-control unless it comes to eating that extra piece of pie.

How about you?  How do you line up with the Fruits of the Spirit?

I like what The Message says in Galatians 5:22-24.

“But what happens when we live God’s way? He brings gifts into our lives, much the same way that fruit appears in an orchard—things like affection for others, exuberance about life, serenity. We develop a willingness to stick with things, a sense of compassion in the heart, and a conviction that a basic holiness permeates things and people. We find ourselves involved in loyal commitments, not needing to force our way in life, able to marshal and direct our energies wisely. Legalism is helpless in bringing this about; it only gets in the way. Among those who belong to Christ, everything connected with getting our own way and mindlessly responding to what everyone else calls necessities is killed off for good—crucified.”