Gentleness
When Jesus Christ explained to the disciples how they’d be able to produce God’s fruit, in the Gospel of John, chapter 15, he used an analogy of a vineyard. He told the disciples that they were like branches, and he is the vine. In John 15:5(NLT), he said, “Yes, I am the vine; you are the branches. Those who remain in me, and I in them, will produce much fruit. For apart from me you can do nothing.” God is the Gardener, and He prunes us. He cuts off the parts of us that isn’t producing fruit, so that when growing season occurs, we will produce even more.
Our Lord and Master has made it clear that producing fruit distinguishes us as his true disciples. He is the perfect vine, and he wants us to produce the Spirit’s fruit, because the Spirit’s fruit is a perfect portrait of God’s love and nature. To fulfill the call of our Lord and Master, we must stay connected to Christ, and as God teaches us and helps us grow, we must take on more and more of His nature.
Our God is gentle, and not in the sense of being a pushover or weak. He’s never that. His gentleness is shown to us most prominently because He did not withhold His most precious treasure from us but offered Jesus Christ up as a sacrifice for our sin. He is meek in His treatment of our sin, because Romans 6:23 tells us that the wages of sin is death, but God had tremendous mercy on us. Rather than allowing us to pay the penalty for our sin, He sent His Son to do it for us.
Gentleness is not a characteristic of weakness, but of strength. We see this very beautifully demonstrated in Heavenly Father’s nature. The source of gentleness is our faith in God that we are never at a disadvantage when we clothe ourselves in the Spirit’s fruit. Just as the Father’s gentleness draws us closer to Him, gentleness has a profound impact on our relationships and interactions with others. It draws them closer to us and us to them.
One of our greatest mistakes as believers is to underestimate the impact of gentleness and to underestimate God’s allegiance to seeing us manifest from this fruit. There are many single believers longing for marital partnership, but they haven’t sought to anchor gentleness in their character. God tells us in Colossians 3:12(NLT), “Since God chose you to be the holy people he loves, you must clothe yourselves with tenderhearted mercy, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience.” To clothe ourselves in these yummies means they must become a part of us. We would be wise to pray to increase in gentleness and learn more about the example of Jesus Christ so that gentleness is truly anchored in our hearts.
Self-Control
1Thessalonians 5:5-6(NLT) says, “For you are all children of the light and of the day; we don’t belong to darkness and night. 6 So be on your guard, not asleep like the others. Stay alert and be clearheaded.” As God’s sons and daughters, we have the light of Jesus Christ within us. We are children of the light, and never before has there been creations like us. We are three-part beings, spirit, soul, and body. We are a total representation of our Father, because He made us in His very own image.
Our bodies are masterfully designed. The psalmist beautifully expressed in Psalm 139:14(NLT), “Thank you for making me so wonderfully complex! Your workmanship is marvelous—how well I know it.” God brilliantly prepackaged our beings with appetites, desires, and senses, and these all add so much flavor to life, but if we are not careful, they can at times be overwhelming. The discipline that we exercise to keep ourselves in check and in alignment with the example of Christ is self-control.
Galatians 5:16-17(NLT) teaches us, “16 So I say, let the Holy Spirit guide your lives. Then you won’t be doing what your sinful nature craves. 17 The sinful nature wants to do evil, which is just the opposite of what the Spirit wants. And the Spirit gives us desires that are the opposite of what the sinful nature desires. These two forces are constantly fighting each other, so you are not free to carry out your good intentions.” God has made it crystal clear to us that an internal battle persists. It is between doing what His indwelling Holy Spirit wants us to do and doing what our flesh wants to do. This choice is ever before us.
Since sin entered the body through the disobedience of Adam, God’s first man, the flesh has rebelled against the Will of God. The flesh wants to please all its yearnings for quick and temporary pleasure, but God has redeemed us from living by the flesh. Because of what Jesus Christ accomplished for us through his sacrifice and resurrection, we can obey God’s commandment to live through His Holy Spirit and refuse to be governed by our flesh. 1Corinthians 15:57(NLT) declares, “But thank God! He gives us victory over sin and death through our Lord Jesus Christ.” We have victory over sin through Christ, but again, it is our choice to walk in this victory.
A person that isn’t interested in producing the Spirit’s fruit in their lives may not ever witness the evidence of the Spirit’s power working in them. Arrogance blinds them from seeing who God wants them to be, and it blinds them from the faith of knowing in their hearts that they can do all things through Christ. God wants us to discern the difference between light and darkness so we will recognize the light of the Spirit working in us. Producing his fruit is our confidence that we belong to God.
Self-control requires us to yield to the Spirit, so that our thoughts, words, and deeds are pleasing to God. We should never want to grieve the Holy Spirit by walking in a manner that is unworthy of our calling in Christ. Instead, we must surrender our whole lives to God through Jesus Christ. Heavenly Father is very transparent and told us in His Word that in this life, we may face many obstacles and adversities. As we learn to overcome through Christ, we may also be tempted to give in to anger, selfishness, blaming others, putting ourselves down, or turning to fear instead of clinging to our faith in God. In these times, we must pray to God and turn to the self-control that comes from His Holy Spirit. He will always work within us when we demonstrate a willingness to surrender our will for the Will of God and to exercise the self-control that the Spirit gives us. ■
Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.
“The Spirit’s Fruit- Part 4”, SMS Member Services.com Copyright© 2023.