Fruit of the Spirit--Kindness

"The fruit of the Spirit is...kindness..." (Galatians 5:22)

The King James Version has the word "gentleness" here but almost all modern versions read "kindness." "The fruit of the Spirit is...kindness..."

Kindness describes the gentle, gracious, generous disposition that results in the doing of favors, the showing of mercies, and the bestowing of benefits on others. The kind person is gracious, not harsh; sympathetic, not indifferent; and helpful, not uninvolved. He is considerate, compassionate and charitable.

There is a natural kindness which even the people of the world show to one another. But the kindness which is produced by the Spirit is supernatural. It goes above and beyond anything that man is capable of doing by himself. It enables a believer to lend, hoping for nothing in return. It enables him to show hospitality to those who cannot repay him. It enables him to reward every insult with a courtesy. A Christian university student displayed this supernatural kindness toward another student who was an alcoholic. The latter had become so disgusting that he had been rejected by his classmates and finally was evicted from his quarters. The Christian had an extra bed in his room and so invited the drunk to live with him. Many nights the believer had to clean up his roommate's vomit, take his clothes off, bathe him, and put him to bed. It was a magnificent display of Christian kindness.

And--to complete the story--it paid off. Once, during a sober period, the dissolute fellow asked with irritation, "Say, look here, why are you doing all this for me? What are you after?" The Christian replied, "I'm after your soul"--and he got it....

quoted from One Day at a Time, by William MacDonald

Too often I find myself being unkind and ungracious towards others. What a shame to my testimony for the Lord! It makes me wonder what sort of an impact we could have for the cause of Christ if all believers were characterized by a generous and gracious spirit? Would we begin to see revival in our neighborhoods if we were consistently displaying the kindness of the Lord, as only produced in us by the Spirit of the Lord?

I am praying that you and I might show this sort of kindness to those around us. To our neighbors, to our co-workers, to our brothers and sisters in Christ...and that each one of us might make a small difference by exhibiting the kindness of the Lord to those around us.

Mouth to Snout?!

So I was in a meeting at work this week and another nurse rushed in and proceeded to share a story from her morning. She had been making her lunch and her dog jumped up and got a chunk of her meatloaf. She let him have the one bite and took the rest away. A few minutes later, she turned around and saw her dog, lying unresponsive. She immediately rushed over and started doggie CPR! Yep, that's right! Mouth to Snout CPR!

I'm not a pet owner so this intrigued me. Now I'm quite curious...how many of you would do mouth to snout?! (I'm also a little curious about her meatloaf! :-)

Fruit of the Spirit--Longsuffering

It's so easy to be aggravated with the people around me. It might be the crazy driver who cut me off when I'm late to work. Or maybe a co-worker that forgot to follow through on a task I had delegated to them. There are so many things that can happen in a day that might fall into the "aggravation" category! I get frustrated. Sometimes I can hide my frustration and show outwardly an attitude that resembles patience. But, I must admit that too often I am still aggravated in my heart..I am merely trying to muster up a fake image of longsuffering. But, longsuffering does not come from me, (no matter how hard I try) because we see that longsuffering is a fruit of the Spirit, according to Galatians 5:22, and not a fruit of Kelly!!

"The fruit of the Spirit is...longsuffering..." (Galatians 5:22)

Longsuffering is the virtue that bears up patiently and even triumphantly under the aggravations of life. While it may refer to a patient response to adverse circumstances, it usually refers to a merciful endurance of the provocations of people.

God is longsuffering with man. Think for a moment of the gross sinfulness of the human race at the present time -- ... the laws permitting abortions, the breakdown of marriage and the home, the wholesale rejection of moral standards, and, of course, man's crowning sin -- the utter rejection of God's Son as only Lord and Savior. One could scarcely blame God if He were to wipe out mankind with a stroke. But, He doesn't do it. His goodness is designed to lead men to repentance. He is not willing that any should perish.

And His will is that this longsuffering should be reproduced in the lives of His people as they yield to the Holy Spirit. This means that we should not be quick-tempered. We should not fly off the handle easily. We should not try to get even with people when they have wronged us. Instead we should display what someone has called "a kind of conquering patience."

When Corrie and Betsie ten Boom were enduring indescribable sufferings in the concentration camp, Betsie would often say that they must help these people after they were released. They simply had to find a way to help them. Corrie thought, of course, that her sister was planning some program to rehabilitate the victims of the Nazis. It wasn't til later that Corrie realized that Betsie meant her persecutors. She wanted to find some way to teach them to love. Corrie commented, "And I wondered, not for the first time, what sort of a person she was, this ssiter of mine...what kind of road she followed while I trudged beside her on the all-too-solid earth" (The Hiding Place, p. 175).

The road Betsie followed was the road of longsuffering. And Corrie walked it too, in spite of her humble disclaimer.

quoted from One Day at a Time, by William MacDonald

Fruit of the Spirit--Peace

Peace has been on my mind a lot lately. We hear people talking about the peace of the world, of our country but do we really know what peace is all about? Do people really live in such a way that promotes peaceful living? What is it to really know peace in our lives?

Life happens all around us...the good, the bad and the ugly. And it is hard to have peaceful reactions to the scary and difficult things that present themselves to us. But, I'm learning, that when I try to conjure up peace myself, I always fail miserably. Peace is a fruit of the Spirit, NOT a fruit of myself! Peace can only come from the Lord. So, in continuing my posts on the fruit of the Spirit, peace is next on the list! William MacDonald writes:

"The fruit of the Spirit is...peace..." (Galatians 5:22)

As soon as we are justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. (Romans 5:1). That means that the hostility between ourselves and God has ceased since Christ has effectively dealt with the cause of that hostility--our sins.

We also have peace of conscience knowing that the work is finished, Christ has paid the penalty of our sins, and God has forgotten them.

But then the Holy Spirit also wants us to enjoy the peace of God in our hearts. This is the serenity and tranquility that comes from knowing that our times are in the hands of God and that nothing can happen to us apart from His permissive will.

So we can remain calm when we have a tire blowout on the busy freeway. We don't have to lose our composure when heavy traffic causes us to miss the plane. Peace means remaining cool in a car crash. Or when grease ignites on the kitchen range.

The fruit of the Spirit enables a Peter to sleep soundly in jail, a Stephen to pray for his murderous assailants, a Paul to comfort others in a shipwreck.

When a plane flies into clear air turbulence and is thrown around like a feather in the gale, when the wing tips flex thirteen feet, when most of the passengers are screaming as the plane lurches, falls, rises, and dips, peace enables a believer to bow his head, commit his soul to God and praise God for whatever may be the outcome.

Or to change the illustration, the Spirit of God can give peace to us when we sit in the doctor's office and hear him say, "I'm sorry to tell you but it's malignant." He can enable us to reply, "I'm ready to go, Doctor. I'm saved by the grace of God, and or me it will be 'absent from the body, at home with the Lord.'"

And so in the words of Bickersteth's lovely hymn, we can have "Peace, perfect peace, in this dark world of sin...by thronging duties pressed...with sorrows surging round...with loved ones far away...our future all unknown" because "Jesus we know, and He is on the throne."

*One Day at a Time, William MacDonald

I am so thankful to our Savior who humbled Himself to the point of death on the cross for MY sins, so that I might have peace with God, peace with the very One who created me and that I have the Holy Spirit dwelling in me, to equip me for walking this life in a way that will honor and glorify the life that He gave up for me! Won't you praise Him with me today?

Fruit of the Spirit--Joy

I haven't posted in a while. The Lord has been working on my heart in so many ways lately that its difficult to even put it into words on this blog post or to convey some of these "elementary" realizations without feeling like a moron for not learning these lessons earlier in life! But, that's how we humans can be...a little dense, a little slow...or sometimes just a little stubborn!

So over the next several posts, while I contemplate the lessons the Lord is teaching me, I'd like to share with you a few thoughts from William MacDonald's One Day at a Time devotional that have both encouraged and challenged my heart. There are several days where he addresses the fruit of the Spirit and so as this dreary winter is winding down and we look forward to the hope and sunshine of spring, and all the blossoms that it entails, I pray that we will reflect and also see the fruit of the Spirit blossoming in our lives this spring!

"The fruit of the spirit is...joy..." (Galatians 5:22)

Man never finds real joy till he finds the Lord. Then he enters in to what Peter calls "joy unspeakable and full of glory" (I Peter 1:8).

Anyone can rejoice when circumstances are favorable, but the joy which is the fruit of the Spirit is not the result of earthly circumstances. It springs from our relationship to the Lord and from the precious promises He has given to us. Christ would have to be dethroned before the Church could be finally robbed of its joy.

Christian joy can coexist with suffering. Paul weds the two when he speaks of "all patience and longsuffering with joyfulness" (Colossians 1:11). The Thessalonian saints had received the word "in much affliction, with joy of the Holy Ghost" (I Thessalonians 1:6). Suffering saints down through the centuries have testified how the Lord has given them songs in the night.

Joy can coexist with sorrow. The believer can stand by the grave of a loved one, shed tears of sorrow at the loss, yet rejoice at the knowledge that the loved one is in the presence of the Lord.

But joy can not coexist with sin. Whenever a Christian sins, he loses his song. Not until he confesses and forsakes that sin is the joy of his salvation restored.

The Lord Jesus told His disciples to rejoice when they were reviled, persecuted, and falsely accused (Matthew 5:11, 12). And they did! Not many years later we read of them leaving the courtroom, "rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for His name" (Acts 5:41).

Our joy increases as we grow in the knowledge of the Lord. At first, perhaps, we can rejoice in minor irritations, chronic ailments, and trivial inconveniences. But the Spirit of God wishes to bring us to the point where we can see God when circumstances are at their worst and rejoice in the knowledge that His way is perfect. We are spiritually mature when we can say with Habakkuk, "Although the fig tree shall not blossom, neither shall fruit be in the vines; the labour of the olive shall fail, and the fields shall yield no meat; the flock shall be cut off from the fold, and there shall be no herd in the stalls; yet I will rejoice in the Lord, I will joy in the God of my salvation" (Habakkuk 3: 17,18).

*One Day at a Time, William MacDonald, p 67

Spring cleaning??!

I'm not sure about any of you, but spring cleaning hit my house today! I'm sure it's just wishful thinking that spring is right around the corner but I was dying to get my clothes closets cleaned out! I've been so antsy about cleaning that I could wait no longer and had to do it! Every morning when I was working on getting dressed, I would struggle to identify the clothes that actually still fit me! So, I tried on all my clothes today (except the ones in the hamper that I've confirmed appropriate fitting) and I got rid of 2 large trash bags of clothes that no longer fit! Astounding! I have two trash bags of clothes headed to goodwill. They are in great shape...they just don't fit MY shape anymore! :-)

Some clothes I was so glad to see go...they weren't my favorites and it was good to have a legitimate reason to excuse them from service in my house. But there were others that I really liked. Isn't it odd that a person can become so attached to something like an article of clothing?! Sometimes I am attached because of memories associated with the item. But, sometimes it's just pure silliness!

Whatever the reason, I was reminded as I was cleaning that I am a sojourner in this land. This is not my permanent home. It is my home for now but one day I will be with my Lord and Savior, worshipping at His feet and praising His name! I am looking forward to that day when I will see him face to face. Are you looking forward to that day, too?

Face to Face
by C. Breck

Face to face with Christ my Savior
Face to face--what will it be--
When with rapture I behold Him,
Jesus Christ, Who died for me?

Only faintly now I see Him,
With the darkling veil between;
But a blessed day is coming,
When His glory shall be seen.

What rejoicing in His presence,
When are banished grief and pain;
When the crooked ways are straightened,
And the dark things shall be plain.

Face to face! O blissful moment!
Face to face--to see and know;
Face to face with my Redeemer,
Jesus Christ Who loves me so!

Chorus:
Face to face I shall behold Him,
Far beyond the starry sky;
Face to face in all His glory,
I shall see Him by and by.

My Song is Love Unknown

A few weeks ago, I was practicing the piano. When no one is listening, I love to find unfamiliar songs and play them. I came across this hymn, My Song is Love Unknown, (Hymns of Truth & Praise, 162) that has a lovely tune and, more than that, the words struck me. I haven't been able to get them out of my head. And, today, as I was forced to miss meeting because of feeling a bit under the weather, I came back to this song, thinking on the wondrous love of my Savior for me, that He showed love to me, the loveless, so that I might be lovely. He has set me free and I gives thanks to Him with a heart grateful for the love He has bestowed on me!

My Song is Love Unknown
by Samuel Crossman

My song is love unknown, My Savior's love to me,
Love to the loveless shown, That they might lovely be.
Oh who am I, that for my sake My Lord should take Frail flesh, and die?

He came from His blest throne, Salvation to bestow;
But men made strange, and none the longed-for Christ would know:
But O, my Friend, My Friend indeed, Who at my need His life did spend!

Sometimes they strew His way, And His sweet praises sing;
Resounding all the day Hosannas to their King:
Then "Crucify!" Is all their breath, And for His death they thirst and cry.

They rise, and needs will have My dear Lord made away;
A murderer they save, The Prince of Life they slay.
Yet cheerful He to suff'ring goes, that He His foes from thence might free.

Here might I stay and sing, No story so divine;
Never was love, dear King, Never was grief like Thine.
This is my Friend, In whose sweet praise I all my days could gladly spend.

**If you like, here is the tune on YouTube to the rendition found in Hymns of Truth & Praise