Where the Fruit Comes From

Where the Fruit Comes From--June 1, 2018

"By contrast, the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against such things. And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live by the Spirit, let us also be guided by the Spirit. Let us not become conceited, competing against one another, envying one another." [Gal. 5:22-26]

Trees don't audition.

This obviously but vitally important fact is brought to you today by the Apostle Paul, who talks about our lives in the Spirit like trees that produce fruit.  And just to make it clear, trees don't audition... or apply... or try to impress.  They bear fruit because of what they are.

In these familiar verses from Galatians, Paul talks about our life in Christ as one marked by the "fruit" of the Spirit, and that imagery is important.  If you've got an apple tree, let's say, and it starts producing apples, you can really only say that this is what you expect it to do--it is an apple tree, after all.  And it is an apple tree--that is its identity, its definition, even--even before the first golden delicious hangs from a bough.  You might say it produces apples because it is an apple tree, not that by producing enough apples first, it might gain the elite status of being an apple tree.

That's the picture Paul offers of our lives as people given new identity by the Spirit--we are Spirit-people, the people in the community of Jesus in which the Spirit of God dwells, and what comes forth from us--what comes to hang from our boughs, so to speak--is the fruit of this Spirit.  But notice that the imagery presumes that we are such a people first, and then that the practice of love, joy, peace, etc. comes to fruition in us consequentially.  

Sometimes we are tempted to reverse that logic and turn this laundry list of virtues into conditions for belonging--as in, We'll know if you're really worthy enough to be a believer when we see you do something from each category on this list--something loving, joyful, peaceable, etc.  But for Paul, it's the other way around--God has made us to be Spirit-people (like an apple-tree, but for the Spirit), and because God has called us to be such people, that is what we are.  And flowing from that is the work of the Spirit in us that brings forth all of this fruit--all of this new way of ordering and aligning our lives.  And as this new life comes to realign us, to remake us from the inside out, the old life is shed like a snakeskin--at least that is the possibility handed to us.  Sometimes it seems we are determined to keep covering ourselves with that dead old snakeskin of the old life, the life of self-interested materialism and manipulation of others, the life of "the flesh".  But Paul says that regardless of what coverings we put on ourselves and how foolish we look when we do it, we have been identified by God as his children, as people in whom the Spirit lives, as people who share in the life of Jesus.  And so we are.  The invitation to us once again today is to become what we are.

This picture of a life of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control can become a throwaway, too, if we treat these as just abstract words or greeting-card sentiments.  

Please don't.

Please don't let those words be empty religious talk.  

Please don't let them be pious-sounding jargon that we use to mask the old bitterness, avarice, self-centeredness, rudeness, and rottenness that we are used to.  

No, not today, not when we are given then chance to embody these things--to practice faithfulness by showing up for someone who needs us, to enflesh peace by bringing reconciliation between people estranged today, to embody love by taking the time for compassionate listening today when you would prefer to be on your way.  These are all opportunities standing in front of us today--take one.  

It is who you already are--no auditions or try-outs necessary--by the Spirit's presence.

It is who the Spirit is transforming us to become.

O God the Gardener of our Very Lives, give us all that we need today to bear fruit today, to bring to fruition the life you have handed to us and create in us by your Spirit.