How Well are You Caring for the Fruits?

Galatians 5:22-23: "But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.  Against such things there is no law."

I make no claims to be a great agricultural mind, however, in my limited experience and rudimentary research I have learned a few basic things about the process.  There is, it turns out, a very basic rule about growing anything desirable and it is this: there are only enough nutrients and space for one thing.  For instance, an oak and a daisy cannot be planted in the same spot.  Inevitably one of them will win out the fight for food and sunlight and the other will die.

You cannot have a healthy plant and a diseased plant in the same space.  You can, however, have diseased portions of healthy plants, in which case the diseased part must be cut off so that the host plant may be able to heal and become healthy again.  Additionally, in my experience (admittedly limited) the best soil is quite adept at growing the most voracious weeds; meaning that well-tilled,-well-watered soil is just as likely to grow weeds as it is to grow desirable flowers.

It takes an active hand on the part of the farmer or the gardener to prevent the weeds from sapping the nutrients from the healthy plant. It takes an intentional effort to ensure the health and prosperity of the fruit so that it may grow into its full, ripe state.  It cannot occur passively.  Think of how miraculous it seems to walk through an overgrown forest and find a desirable flower or raspberry bush; we would immediately discern that either a great biological oddity has taken place or an active agent has, in fact, planted and tilled that flower, protecting it from the overgrowth of the more resilient and capable plants.

This is what fruits of the Spirit are all about.  In Christ, the soil of our souls has been tilled, renewed by the restoration of Calvary; what was a lifeless soil has now been made alive and fertile in Christ.  But this soil is just as capable for growing great fruits of the Spirit as it is to grow despicable fruits of flesh and death.  The point is that we play an active role to encourage the growth of fruit in our lives as well as to preserve those fruits from the wickedness of the world.

To be sure, all of this is done by the empowering presence of the Holy Spirit but it is a joint partnership.  He works within us that we might work with Him in obedience to His will  in our own lives and, by extension, to affect the whole world.  Let us then take serious the call to farm the fruit of our souls with all the fervor and care of the most decorated blue-ribbon farmers!