Peace.....Resting in God.
Typically we think of peace as the absence of irritation. A quiet afternoon composed of naptime for the children and a cup of Joe with a good book for us. No phone calls, No early awakenings, and No to-do-list.
Well, the fruit listed in Galations 5 conveys something different than our definition of Peace. It's less about real life lining up according to our desires and more about our desires lining up to real life.
Peace is the result of resting in a relationship with God.
Peace can come in all the busy circumstances of our lives, because peace comes in a relationship with a God who is with us in the Stormiest of times. Peace peeled away is no longer the expectation that we will find it in the absence of irritation and instead embraces the calm that comes from resting in the midst of it.
Strive to be a Christ Follower.
Sunday, July 18, 2010
Thursday, July 1, 2010
Joy
The Second Fruit is Joy. The Old Testament describes joy as a quality of life as well as an emotion. The spontaneous songs of worship contained in Psalms illustrate this kind of joy. Joy is something deep that celebrates God's character despite the circumstances.
In the New Testament, joy is often expressed as ecstasy, a feeling of amazement, an uninhibited response to God's grace and presence in our days. The fruit of joy is confidence in God. Joy is confidence in God's grace, despite circumstances, despite what happens. Joy is the ability to hold up because we know we are being held up. Joy is the conviction that God is in control of every detail of our lives even when those details appear to be out of control.
We've watched God working in so many moments of life; good, bad, confusing, sorrowful, challenging, unfathomable; when we are joyful, we are wrapped up by our observations and held in place, knowing clearly that just as God came through before, he will come through again. Joy has a way of buoying us up in the midst of the unpredictable. We're somehow hopeful. Strong. Clear. Confident. We still wonder, worry, and cry. We are fearful, but beneath all these feelings is the comforting thought that we are held in God's hands.
Joy unpeeled reveals to us and to others, what we believe about God. We know He has us, He has our backs!
Strive to be a Christ Follower.
In the New Testament, joy is often expressed as ecstasy, a feeling of amazement, an uninhibited response to God's grace and presence in our days. The fruit of joy is confidence in God. Joy is confidence in God's grace, despite circumstances, despite what happens. Joy is the ability to hold up because we know we are being held up. Joy is the conviction that God is in control of every detail of our lives even when those details appear to be out of control.
We've watched God working in so many moments of life; good, bad, confusing, sorrowful, challenging, unfathomable; when we are joyful, we are wrapped up by our observations and held in place, knowing clearly that just as God came through before, he will come through again. Joy has a way of buoying us up in the midst of the unpredictable. We're somehow hopeful. Strong. Clear. Confident. We still wonder, worry, and cry. We are fearful, but beneath all these feelings is the comforting thought that we are held in God's hands.
Joy unpeeled reveals to us and to others, what we believe about God. We know He has us, He has our backs!
Strive to be a Christ Follower.
Friday, June 18, 2010
The First Fruit of the Spirit is Love
Among all the qualities of God's character produced in us by His Spirit, love seems the most natural, second nature, and easiest to both offer and receive. Love. Indeed, seemingly the easiest of all qualities to model in so very many moments. Love is there in all things, except when love is hard. And it can be hard, can't it?
Let's get real (unpeeled) about love. It can be hard to love people. Love means handing over the remote control when we'd rather keep it, getting up just when we're all settled and in a comfy spot, speaking in a balanced tone of voice when we'd rather be screaming, opening our heart to listen to another when we'd rather allow our own feelings to tumble out. Yes, it's hard to love people.
How can we grow this fruit of love in our lives and in the lives of others, in everything?
Love is not about being nice for the sake of niceness it's about being like Jesus. Love is a committed choice to be there in, Everything. When it's hard to love hard-to-love people, the fruit of love helps us in the EVERYTHING moments of life. As God is the source of all the spiritual fruits, He is the source of love. Because He loves us in the "everything" of life, WE can love others. He shows us the way.
In the "everything" moments, love is a choice. God CHOSE to love us, He did not have to. He wanted to love us, so He chose to love us. We choose to love others.
Love is a committment in, Everything. God is committed to loving us, no matter what. Love stays when it wants to go. It accepts when it wants to reject. It does what it doesn't want to do when it doesn't want to do it. It gets above the "Can't stand this person" moments and, squinting, forces itself to look at that someone the way God looks at them, seeing them flawed, but filled with potential. Love is a committment to keep choosing to love, even when you don't feel like it.
Love others as God Loves us.
Strive to be a Christ Follower.
Let's get real (unpeeled) about love. It can be hard to love people. Love means handing over the remote control when we'd rather keep it, getting up just when we're all settled and in a comfy spot, speaking in a balanced tone of voice when we'd rather be screaming, opening our heart to listen to another when we'd rather allow our own feelings to tumble out. Yes, it's hard to love people.
How can we grow this fruit of love in our lives and in the lives of others, in everything?
Love is not about being nice for the sake of niceness it's about being like Jesus. Love is a committed choice to be there in, Everything. When it's hard to love hard-to-love people, the fruit of love helps us in the EVERYTHING moments of life. As God is the source of all the spiritual fruits, He is the source of love. Because He loves us in the "everything" of life, WE can love others. He shows us the way.
In the "everything" moments, love is a choice. God CHOSE to love us, He did not have to. He wanted to love us, so He chose to love us. We choose to love others.
Love is a committment in, Everything. God is committed to loving us, no matter what. Love stays when it wants to go. It accepts when it wants to reject. It does what it doesn't want to do when it doesn't want to do it. It gets above the "Can't stand this person" moments and, squinting, forces itself to look at that someone the way God looks at them, seeing them flawed, but filled with potential. Love is a committment to keep choosing to love, even when you don't feel like it.
Love others as God Loves us.
Strive to be a Christ Follower.
Tuesday, June 8, 2010
Our Spiritual Growth is up to God.
When we receive the seed of Hope into the soil of our lives and begin a connected relationship with God, He lives inside of us. We get His spiritual DNA. Like a twenty four hour a day gardener, God tills the soil of our lives until we begin to frow qualities that resemble his nature. By His interest and effort in us, grow into holy orchards.
By our own efforts, based on our own natures, we'll grow fruit of the flesh. It might be nice, but it won't look like Jesus. It won't be peeled fruit. Our best efforts won't grow godliness, because the fruit of the Spirit comes forth only from godly seeds. We can't make ourselves look like God. Only God can do that. Only God can reproduce his nature in us.
We do have a role, however in our growth. Just as we cannot grow spiritual fruit without God, God cannot grow spiritual fruit in us without us. Our job in spiritual growth is to cooperate with the Gardener. Here is what cooperation with the Master Gardener looks like in our lives. First, we are receptive. A seed can't get into hard, clay packed soil. Our job includes staying soft so that we can receive the seeds God wants to plant in our lives. Being receptive can be a challenge at times. When times of resistance arise, we can pray, call a friend, or simply remind ourselves that God is not out to get us with His fruit.
Second, we endure pruning. Part of the growing process involves cutting off what is diseased or no longer necessary or even what is taking nutrients that are needed elsewhere. The third way we cooperate is we stay connected. We can't grow spiritually if we detach from the source of our growth. When we stop hanging out with others who care about growing, we'll probably stop growing too. A leaf doesn't continue growing once it is pulled from a branch. When we let week after week slip by without attending church service, or a study group, or even spending some time opening ourselves to God in prayer, we will shrink rathter than grow.
Ready to get growing? It is up to God to grow His fruit in our lives, but it's up to us to cooperate with Him.
Be a Christ Follower
By our own efforts, based on our own natures, we'll grow fruit of the flesh. It might be nice, but it won't look like Jesus. It won't be peeled fruit. Our best efforts won't grow godliness, because the fruit of the Spirit comes forth only from godly seeds. We can't make ourselves look like God. Only God can do that. Only God can reproduce his nature in us.
We do have a role, however in our growth. Just as we cannot grow spiritual fruit without God, God cannot grow spiritual fruit in us without us. Our job in spiritual growth is to cooperate with the Gardener. Here is what cooperation with the Master Gardener looks like in our lives. First, we are receptive. A seed can't get into hard, clay packed soil. Our job includes staying soft so that we can receive the seeds God wants to plant in our lives. Being receptive can be a challenge at times. When times of resistance arise, we can pray, call a friend, or simply remind ourselves that God is not out to get us with His fruit.
Second, we endure pruning. Part of the growing process involves cutting off what is diseased or no longer necessary or even what is taking nutrients that are needed elsewhere. The third way we cooperate is we stay connected. We can't grow spiritually if we detach from the source of our growth. When we stop hanging out with others who care about growing, we'll probably stop growing too. A leaf doesn't continue growing once it is pulled from a branch. When we let week after week slip by without attending church service, or a study group, or even spending some time opening ourselves to God in prayer, we will shrink rathter than grow.
Ready to get growing? It is up to God to grow His fruit in our lives, but it's up to us to cooperate with Him.
Be a Christ Follower
Monday, May 31, 2010
Marketing the Produce (Fruit)
Our Heavenly Father is the Master Marketer. He "packages" Himself in a wrapper of fruit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self control. Fruit Markets, in other words fruit sells God to a world hungry for truth, for hope, and for life. Fruit is something we know. We are familiar with these amazing words. God is so much bigger, but He meets us in the language, words, and qualities of our longing so that we might know Him.
Fruit is the external result of an internal relationship. Fruit is the dressing that beckons others to know the God we represent. As a result of our growing relationship with God, we can introduce others to Him.
Fruit looks good! When we get to know fruit-filled people, we discover that fruit tastes so good. Like bright oranges standing out against the green leaves of a tree, the fruit of the Spirit announces to a starving world, "Here is food, Here is Life". Come and find a way out of exhaustion and discouragement. Come and Meet God!
Strive to be a Christ Follower.
Fruit is the external result of an internal relationship. Fruit is the dressing that beckons others to know the God we represent. As a result of our growing relationship with God, we can introduce others to Him.
Fruit looks good! When we get to know fruit-filled people, we discover that fruit tastes so good. Like bright oranges standing out against the green leaves of a tree, the fruit of the Spirit announces to a starving world, "Here is food, Here is Life". Come and find a way out of exhaustion and discouragement. Come and Meet God!
Strive to be a Christ Follower.
Saturday, May 29, 2010
Spiritual Fruit
Fruit is the result of growth. It's the evidence that a plant or a vine or a tree has been rooted and established, fed and nurtured, watered and staked, and pruned to the point of reproducing. Spiritual fruit is what results in our lives when we root ourselves in a relationship with God. When we live a life connected like this with God, He grows His nature in who we are, and fruit results: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self control.
A life lived in connection with God is a life lived in a healthy direction, a life that makes a difference for tomorrow.
The fruits of the Spirit are those God-like qualities that make us look like Him. They are His nature exhibited in our personalities. When we plant ourselves in a relationship with Jesus, day in and day out, the result of that relationship is the fruit of His charateristics in us.
God's character grows in you as you plant yourself in Him. Make the decision to plant yourself in God.
Strive to be a Christ Follower.
A life lived in connection with God is a life lived in a healthy direction, a life that makes a difference for tomorrow.
The fruits of the Spirit are those God-like qualities that make us look like Him. They are His nature exhibited in our personalities. When we plant ourselves in a relationship with Jesus, day in and day out, the result of that relationship is the fruit of His charateristics in us.
God's character grows in you as you plant yourself in Him. Make the decision to plant yourself in God.
Strive to be a Christ Follower.
Friday, May 28, 2010
Removing the Peeling
The Fruits of The Spirit: Love, Joy, Peace, Patience, Kindness, Goodness, Faithfulness, Gentleness. Self Control. Galatians 5:22-23
Growing a fruit-filled life of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self control seems beyond our grasp. Why? Because we think that growing such fruit is about being nice, and we think it is all up to us to produce these fruits. Neither is true.
It's not about being nice. The truth is that the fruit of the Spirit is about being like Jesus. Jesus was always demonstrated the qualities of the Fruits. But these qualities did not always wear the peeling of "nice" in His interactions with people. His Love was acted out in telling a prostitute to stop sinning, and in ordering religious leaders to quit making faith harder than God intended it to be. His kindness led Him to touch an outcast leper during a time when such an action was strictly prohibited. His peace put him to sleep in a boat with his disciples in the middle of a storm out at sea. Such moments do not define "niceness", but they are definitely fruit-filled.
The Fruit of the Spirit grows when WE let God do His job. When WE let Him live these qualities in us and through us, as we are growing in OUR relationship with Him.
Removing the peeling from the fruit is to be honest. Naked fruit is about getting past the peeling of "nice" Christianity and getting down to the honest, simple truth. What is the honest simple truth? Being like Jesus.
God makes it simple. We make it hard. We want to grow a life that matters, and God wants to grow such a life in us. That is fruit minus the peeling. Naked Fruit. Taste it is good.
Strive to be a Christ Follower.
Growing a fruit-filled life of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self control seems beyond our grasp. Why? Because we think that growing such fruit is about being nice, and we think it is all up to us to produce these fruits. Neither is true.
It's not about being nice. The truth is that the fruit of the Spirit is about being like Jesus. Jesus was always demonstrated the qualities of the Fruits. But these qualities did not always wear the peeling of "nice" in His interactions with people. His Love was acted out in telling a prostitute to stop sinning, and in ordering religious leaders to quit making faith harder than God intended it to be. His kindness led Him to touch an outcast leper during a time when such an action was strictly prohibited. His peace put him to sleep in a boat with his disciples in the middle of a storm out at sea. Such moments do not define "niceness", but they are definitely fruit-filled.
The Fruit of the Spirit grows when WE let God do His job. When WE let Him live these qualities in us and through us, as we are growing in OUR relationship with Him.
Removing the peeling from the fruit is to be honest. Naked fruit is about getting past the peeling of "nice" Christianity and getting down to the honest, simple truth. What is the honest simple truth? Being like Jesus.
God makes it simple. We make it hard. We want to grow a life that matters, and God wants to grow such a life in us. That is fruit minus the peeling. Naked Fruit. Taste it is good.
Strive to be a Christ Follower.
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