The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness and self-control. Without the Spirit none of these can be present. With the Spirit none of these are really mine. I do not bear the fruit. I only tend the ground where it is grown. I can only be the one who presents the fruit. I can only reveal love. I can only demonstrate the joy that the Spirit gives. I am peaceful when I am revealing God’s Spirit within me. I am patient as the Spirit waits and hopes. When I understand that I stand back and “let God”, I am full of the Spirit’s kindness. I can be good at a spiritual level because it is the Spirit in me that is good. The Spirit reveals His gentleness through my actions. True faith only comes from the Spirit—true trust in God’s Riches, God’s Righteousness on my behalf, God’s mercy and grace. And self-control. When the Spirit is in control, I appear to have self-control because my “self” is controlled, not manipulated, not coerced, not driven, but loved and honored and revealed.
Sometimes my ground is weedy or dry because I haven’t tended it. Sometimes I try too hard and it is overwatered, overworked, watched too closely. It reminds me of when I used to plant carrots and radishes with my daddy. I was so impatient. I would dig the poor little plants up every day or so just to see how they had grown; and once, I even took a bite out of the root to see how it was going to taste! The plants couldn’t grow for my overzealousness. I don’t want to be that woman: the one who is “the sort of woman who lives for others—you can always tell the others by their hunted expression”. (C. S. Lewis) I want to be that woman who reveals joy, love, goodness, kindness. I want to be the kind of woman who is inviting and spiritual, who exudes peace and patience like a nursing mother. The one who is good because God is Good. The one who is faithful because God is Faithful. I want to be controlled by the Spirit who is God revealed.
