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We've been studying what it means to be created in the image of God, and this week we see a well-quoted passage taken from Paul's letter to the Galatians. Unfortunately I have found that the title 'fruit of the Spirit' has been so often quoted that its basic meaning has been lost to me through repetition; hopefully this phrase will be revitalised by the Spirit this week and we will learn more about his fruit. Let's begin by this week looking at the introduction to the well-known passage:

'But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do. But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law.' (Galatians 5:16-18)

But I say

The first three words set up this passage. It is unfortunate but every so often the useful titles which break up our translations of the Bible break them up in the wrong way, and here is one such case. Paul's 'But I say' is directly linked to, and is part of, the previous idea in Galatians 5:13-15, which talks about how we should not use the new freedom we have been given in Christ 'as an opportunity for the flesh'. Because we have the freedom to now choose how to live we should honour Christ's suffering in our place and...and what? Paul answers the question in verse 16: 'walk by the Spirit'.

The particular way that Paul words this command are interesting. He uses the imperative 'walk' to tell the Galatians that this is something they must do and as a result underlines the fact that we all have human responsibility. He wants us to know that we cannot live a life of sin and put it down to what I call 'Victim Syndrome'; 'I drink because I've just lost my job.' 'I sleep around because my husband just left me.' 'I beat up my children because my Dad did the same to me.' 'I intimidate my wife because it's the only way I can lead her.' We have a tendency to justify our sin by calling ourselves the victim, but Paul wants none of this - he would command 'walk by the Spirit.' However the truth behind this is really one of God's sovereign grace. Walking by the Spirit is not 'walk in your own strength,' and is certainly not 'follow the rules' - more on that later; Paul's objective in this first sentence is to beat some humility into us; if we are to use our freedom to the full we should not trust our foolish selves with it - we desperately need the Spirit to lead us, help us, and empower us. It is as if we cannot walk by ourselves, we need to walk by the Spirit to do what Jesus said in John 10:10 and 'have life and have it abundantly'.

The Spirit and the flesh

After laying this foundation of human responsibility plus sovereign grace Paul moves immediately to comparing the Spirit and the flesh, and pointing out their differences. In fact, it appears that they are more than just different but are polar opposites, and Paul explains why: 'to keep you from doing the things you want to do.' This reminds us of Romans 7, in which Paul talks of the struggle every Christian faces. In this chapter he does not use the word 'flesh' but rather 'the sin that dwells within me' (Romans 7:20). What Paul is talking about is our fallen nature; some have called this a sin nature and although my mind is open for correction on this I am not keen on that phrase, because it implies that our bodies are like those described in the time of Noah when 'the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually' (Romans 6:5) - this is surely total depravity, and while this world is far, far from perfect there are glimpses of good, mercy, love, justice and peace; this fallen world is more than simply sinful, and therefore I feel it unfair to give our fallen bodies the title 'sinful' when actually they are capable of doing good by God's common grace.

That being said Paul puts the flesh and the Spirit in stark contrast here, and it is to drive home a point. If we do not rely on the Holy Spirit to help and lead us in the way we live our lives it will not be long before we start acting in a way that we actually do not desire. Let's look at a hypothetical, yet highly believable, example; a man is left alone for the evening as his wife is going out to meet some friends. He decides to watch some television and an advertisement contains an attractive young lady in a bikini. The man finds the young lady appealing and so searches on the internet for information about her and before too long has discovered that she has posed topless for a magazine and the images are freely available. These topless images awaken temptation in his heart and before he has had a chance to think about it he is committing adultery on his wife by viewing pornography on the internet. Is this example ridiculous? Or is it too close to home? Would I be a fool if I thought that something like this story has not happened to someone reading this article?

It comes down to this: if that man had obeyed the Spirit's promptings and used his time alone to cultivate his walk with God rather than watching the television he would not have been tempted. If he had invited some friends round and enjoyed fellowship the whole thing would never have happened. Now please hear me: I am not saying that we must never relax and watch some television, but I do believe that there is a calling on us to be wise in how we spend our time. Please let's be those who follow the Spirit's prompting and don't succumb to the temptations of the flesh.

The Spirit and the law

Now Paul does not leave it there, he adds something else which is the opposite of walking by the Spirit: the law. The truth is that there are two groups of people in the church who live in a manner which is against the will of God. The first we have just dealt with; liberals (not necessarily in the political sense) allow the flesh to control their desires, and freely justify their sin in whatever way they can find. The man in the example above could no doubt find an interpretation of an obscure Bible verse which would allow him to enjoy ladies' bodies, and many who take the title Christian are so happy to do so in all manner of ways. But the other group of people is no better and are dealt with in this mention Paul makes.

Some who bear the name Christian are obsessed with religion, and do not realise that their religion is a sin too. This group love to memorise Scripture, include prayer time on their daily agenda, are always on time for the Sunday church service, give exactly ten per cent of their income and most likely have diarised times at which they have sex (if they are married - they would never get physical outside of marriage). There are two possible outcomes to having this attitude, and both are horrible. Firstly, if they fail to meet up to their own strict rules they can easily become very discouraged, depressed, and the result is an unhealthy lack of faith. The other result is if they manage to keep their rules, in which they become proud, and judge others for not meeting their high standards. Apart from the fact that pride and judgmentalism are sins in themselves these religious types are taking judgement on themselves, as they are the ones who condemned Christ to death in the first place because he did not follow some laws in the same way that they had done, for example when he healed on the Sabbath.

The problem with these religious folk is that they do not walk by the Spirit, they walk under the law. Please let's not be like that.

So the fruit of the Spirit?

We have managed to go through this entire article entitled 'fruit of the Spirit' without actually talking about them - and that is for next week. It is important that we acknowledge the foundation Paul is coming from when he begins to talk about the fruit of a life lived by the Spirit. If we walk in the flesh we will produce certain fruit. If we walk under the law we will produce certain fruit. And if we walk by the Spirit, taking full human responsibility yet acknowledging God's sovereign grace in all, we will produce a fruit which is better, more rewarding, and more worthy of our calling than any other.

"Word from Scotland" from Sandy Shaw

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