The complexity of defining goodness – Fruit of the Spirit: Goodness, Part 4

This week we are studying the quality of goodness, which is listed in the Fruit of the Spirit. What we’re going to find is that defining goodness is not as simple as it might seem.

We learned in the previous post that numerous Psalms declare that God is good. In today’s post we jump over to the New Testament, where Jesus’ disciple Peter, who later became the leader of the Christians, writes in 1 Peter 2:1-3, “Therefore, rid yourselves of all malice and all deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and slander of every kind. Like newborn babies, crave pure spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow up in your salvation, now that you have tasted that the Lord is good.”

When studying the word “goodness” what we find is that our English bible translations use our English word “goodness” for multiple original language words.  For example, that in 1 Peter 2:1-3, the New International Version translates Peter as writing, “the Lord is good,” but the word Peter uses is actually the word we studied last week, “kindness.”  

So what is the precise goodness Paul is talking about in Galatians 5:22-23?  As we have seen in the Psalms, goodness is found in God.  God is good.  As we have learned from Jesus, God wants his goodness to be so rooted in our lives, that his goodness flows out of us just as naturally as goodness flowed out of Jesus. So what is this goodness?

The people who study language tell us that the word Paul used when he wrote this list of qualities called the Fruit of the Spirit, the word which in many English Bibles is translated “goodness” is defined as “the ACT of generous giving, with the implication of its relationship to goodness—‘to be generous, generosity’.”[1]

Generosity?  Or really, as the definition indicates, “generosity that is related to goodness.”  In other words, we are talking about a life that is generous in the way that a person uses their time, their money, their abilities.  They are a giving person.  For the good of the world and others around them.

In fact, some of your Bibles translate the word here as “generous.” Consider the expression “she is so good to us.”  When someone says that, what do they mean?  They mean that the person is generous.  Generous with their time, their money, their gifts and abilities.  They use their lives sacrificially to benefit others.  They have a heart for the good of others.  Every quality in the list of the Fruit of the Spirit is best understood as applicable in relationship to others.  So when it comes to goodness, we practice generous giving to benefit others.

Why, then, do many English Bibles translate this word as “goodness”?  Is Paul saying we should grow generosity in our lives or is he saying we should show goodness?  Which one is it, Paul? To answer that, remember that many words have multiple meanings, often meanings that are related. The scholars who study language tell us that the word Paul uses in Galatians 5:22-23 can also mean “positive moral qualities of the most general nature.”

That’s what we normally think of when we think of goodness: positive moral qualities. Goodness, or positive moral qualities, is who God is, and what God wants to grow in our lives, so that his goodness flows out of us. Goodness is not just an idea.  It is action, and we show our active goodness in how we treat others.  When goodness flows from our lives, we are actively good to other people, we are generous to them. 

Goodness encompasses much of what we already learned about in the fruit of the Spirit, and the qualities we will talk about in the rest of the list.  Goodness includes love, patience, kindness, gentleness.  We must have self-control to demonstrate goodness.  How are you doing showing goodness to the people in your life?

[1] Ibid, 569.

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The first and most important step to growing goodness in our lives – Fruit of the Spirit: Goodness, Part 3

During my first few years as senior pastor, I remember a thought I had nearly every Sunday when I was studying for and writing the sermon each week.  I thought, “the people don’t need to hear this…they already know it…look at them…look how good they are.  What could this sermon possibly say that they need to hear?”  Twelve years later I don’t think that anymore.  Why?  Because I now know how bad my congregation is?  No.  First of all, I know I need to hear the sermon each week.  I’m not perfect.  And second of all, none of us are perfect.  I have learned that our lives are more complicated than what we often convey. Just about everyone in my congregation has a family struggle or a personal struggle. Just about everyone has a broken relationship, a difficulty at work, a crisis. We never outgrow needing to hear the Word of God.

When it comes to growing the Fruit of the Spirit of goodness in our lives, we not only prune or cut away the bad actions (as we learned in the previous posts here and here), but we also strive to increase good actions.  What are good acts?  Or maybe that is the wrong question.  People can look good on the outside, even doing good things, but it is possible that they are not good? Yes, it is possible to put on a good face, a good front, but for that outer goodness not to be flowing from a much more important inner goodness.  Have you ever known anyone like that?  A person who appears good, but it turns out there is another side to their life?  Are you like that?

All of us probably have at least a touch of this reality in our lives, such that we are not inwardly as good as we want to be.  We believe we could do better.  We suspect God wants us to do better.  That’s normal.  We are not perfect. Our heart motives and actions rarely, if ever, fully align with God’s heart. But some people are highly deceptive, claiming to be good, doing some good things, but inwardly not so good.

Jesus once taught about this.  Matthew 12:33-35,

“Make a tree good and its fruit will be good, or make a tree bad and its fruit will be bad, for a tree is recognized by its fruit. You brood of vipers, how can you who are evil say anything good? For out of the overflow of the heart the mouth speaks. The good man brings good things out of the good stored up in him, and the evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in him.”

How do we become good?  Jesus says to become truly good, we must change from within.  What is truly inside us will come out.  We can fake it, but not forever.  The real us will come out.  Therefore, Jesus says, we want inner goodness to be the real us.  So how do we get that goodness inside us?

Jesus’ powerful analogy of the Vine and Branches in John 15:1-10 helps us understand how we grow the life of God, including goodness, deep within our lives:

“I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful. You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. Remain in me, and I will remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me. I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. … This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples. As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. If you obey my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have obeyed my Father’s commands and remain in his love.”

We cannot become good on our own.  We need to abide in Jesus, depending on the the empowerment of the Holy Spirit who lives in us.  The Spirit can transform our inner being so that God’s goodness flows out of us.

“God is good.  All the time.  All the time, God is good.”  It’s a call and response phrase some Christians use.  What I tend to hear more often is Christians saying, “God is good,” when they are going through a difficult time.  God is truly good, no matter how difficult our situation may be.  The situations of this life cannot change God. He is and always will be good.  Goodness is his character.  It is who he is.

Scripture declares unequivocally that God is good. For example, consider these psalms:

Psalm 31:19, “How great is your goodness, which you have stored up for those who fear you, which you bestow in the sight of men on those who take refuge in you.”

Psalm 34:8, “Taste and see that the Lord is good; blessed is the man who takes refuge in him.”

Psalm 86:5, “You are forgiving and good, O Lord, abounding in love to all who call to you.”

Psalm 100:5, “For the Lord is good and his love endures forever; his faithfulness continues through all generations.”

God is so good! Spend some time now rereading these verses from the Psalms, basking in the truth of God’s goodness. Abide in his goodness.

But how does a person abide in the goodness of God? How do we do what Jesus teaches us to do in the Vine and the Branches. In the final two posts this week I’ll give some practical actions you can apply to your life, helping you abide in Jesus, and thus grow his fruit in your life.

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What to do when Christians disagree about what is good and what is bad – Fruit of the Spirit: Goodness, Part 2

What is good…and what is bad?

In Christian circles there are plenty of disagreements about what are good actions and bad actions.  Many times on the blog I’ve talked about many of these disagreements.  What clothing styles can people wear to worship services?  What beverages can people drink?  What films, music, TV, books, magazines, can people experience?  What political party and its ideas should we support?  

The most recent examples of Christian disagreement in American culture are abortion and guns.  During the Covid-19 pandemic many people expressed sharp disagreement about mitigation procedures, such as wearing masks, in church. There are so many disagreements in our age, and Christians can boldly declare that, “My view and choice is good and any other way is bad,” as if their perspective is not an opinion, but a fact.  In any local church family like mine or yours there are differences of opinion.

Would it surprise you to learn that Christians have had differences of opinion about what is good and what is bad, including all the way back to Paul’s day 2000 years ago?  Paul wrote about it, and I’ve written about it previous (such as here and here). For now, let me summarize.  In places like 1 Corinthians 8 & 10 and in Romans 14 & 15, Paul provides what I believe is his clearest teaching about what to do when the people in a church disagree about what is good and what is bad.  Why did Paul bring up disagreements in the church? Because there seems to have been a thorny issue in his culture, and Christians could not agree about how to handle this issue.

In the culture of the Greco-Roman Empire of the first century, excess meat from sacrifices in pagan worship services was sold in markets in many cities and towns. Some Christians said it was sinful to purchase and eat it because it had been involved in idol worship.  Some said it was okay, that it was just meat.  In the same church family, Paul reveals, there were people who disagreed about eating meat sacrificed to idols. How did Paul help the people solve their disagreement?

Simply put, he said, “Love one another.”  When Christians disagree, let your love for one another guide you.  If you feel free to eat the meat, be willing to express your love by abstaining from eating if your eating will harm your brother and sister.  If you do not feel free to eat, be willing to express your love by not being judgmental of your brothers and sister who do eat the meat.  In other words, being good means being loving when you disagree.

We can apply this principle to many situations in the church.  Goodness means loving first.  It means loving God first.  There is a famous quote from an ancient Christian theologian who said, “Love God and do what you want.”  If you are filled with love of God, you will live in such a way that you are pleasing to him.  As his life more and more becomes your life, your life will be good because you are living out your love for him.  The outflow of your heart will be seen in your actions and your decisions, particularly as you love those with whom you disagree.

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You good? – Fruit of the Spirit: Goodness, Part 1

“You good?” Have you ever said that to someone?

Maybe a person appears to be coughing or choking, and as they struggle to maintain composure, we say, “You good?”  After they regain composure, they respond, “It’s all good.” 

Or maybe a person has a particularly emotional reaction to a situation, a reaction that we think is inappropriate or overboard, and we say to them, with a bit of sarcasm, “You good?”  What we really mean when we say that is, “You just had a big reaction to that situation, and we’re not sure you’re totally okay.”  We can use the phrase, “You good?” almost in a mocking way. Those phrases are a contemporary slangy way of talking about being okay. 

“Good” is a word we use in many situations, and it has a variety of definitions.  If we are loaning someone money, might ask them if they are truly capable of paying back the loan, and they will say with urgency and emotion, “Seriously, I promise you, I am good for it.”  Good?  What they mean is that they intend to keep their promise.  They are making a commitment that they will pay the money back.  We should trust them.  Maybe they have the money in another account, or maybe they will work to pay off the loan.  Either way, they are good for it.

Often we use the word “good” when we say that a person is good at something.  They are a good soccer player.  They are a good piano player, a good artist, a good cook, a good book, a good businessman.  Or we eat a meal that is delicious and satisfying, and we say, “That was soooooo good!”  We use the adjective “good” in this way for so many things.  What we mean is that the thing we are referring to is of a high quality.  It is good. 

This week we are talking about goodness. But we are not talking about any of the aspects of the word that I have described so far.  What is goodness?

In Galatians 5:22-23 we read the list of qualities called the Fruit of the Spirit.  We have been studying each quality in this list, one quality per week.  Last week we studied kindness, and I mentioned that kindness, goodness and gentleness are very similar.  Next week we’ll study gentleness, and for those of you who are reading the list in your Bible, you might be wondering, “What about faithfulness?  Are we skipping that?”  No, we are not skipping faithfulness.  We’ll get to it in a few weeks.  Because kindness, goodness and gentleness are so similar, we’re studying them one right after the other.  So this week, we turn our attention to goodness.  What is unique about goodness? 

Goodness refers to behavior.  The opposite of good is bad.  So if we want to learn what good behavior looks like, we can first take a look at what it is not.  Good behavior is not bad behavior.  Paul in Galatians 5:19-21 describes bad behavior.  He calls bad behavior, “the acts of the sinful nature.”  Scan through his list of bad behaviors, and familiarize yourself with it.  People who are growing goodness in their lives will stop doing the actions Paul lists. 

Paul did not intend to write a comprehensive list of sinful actions.  He was just illustrating what is actually a rather short list when you think about how many bad things he could have included.  So why did he pick those specific acts? Maybe Paul heard about some wrong actions that were happening in the Christian communities there in the region of Galatia.  I suspect he also included actions in his list that were prevalent in the Greco-Roman Empire, actions that were not in line with God’s heart. The principle is clear: if you are growing goodness, you will prune badness out of your life.  Pruning is an action of removing something.  We use the word pruning mostly in the realm of caring fruit trees.  We want those trees to produce good fruit.  The analogy, as we will see carries over to disciples of Jesus.

What wrong actions do you need to cut out of your life?  Do you have someone in your life who can speak honestly to you about this pruning?  Ask them. 

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Oh my goodness! – Fruit of the Spirit: Goodness, Preview

“Oh my goodness!!!” 

How many of you say that phrase?  Usually we say “oh my goodness” when we feel surprised, disappointed or disgusted.  Why, then, do we not just say “I am surprised,” or “I am disgusted”?  Certainly there are times when we do say, “I am surprise” or “I am disgusted,” but my guess is that there are many more instances when we say, “Oh my goodness!”  We’ve trained ourselves, by habit, so that the words come flying out of our mouths pretty much without thinking about them.  Let’s slow down and think about those words.

I wonder how that combination of words came together.  There are, of course, other versions of the phrase “oh my goodness.”  We sometimes say, “Oh my gosh,” or “Oh geez,” or others.  Perhaps “oh my goodness” was created as a way to avoid what some people consider to be taking the Lord’s name in vain, “Oh my God.”  It could be that the first time “Oh my God” was used, it was done by a person who was praying.  Maybe they were so shocked by a situation, they didn’t know what to do except pray, “Oh my God…help!  I need you!”  If so, theirs was a very faithful response to a situation, was it not?  But as is so often the case with religion, some people likely felt offended, accusing “Oh my God”-speakers as taking the name of the Lord in vain, which is one of the 10 Commandments.  Historically, to keep that commandment, Jews were extremely cautious about the use of God’s name.  Even in contemporary Judaism, some will not print the English word, “God”.  They will instead print, “G-d,” as a way of conveying respect to God.

We Christians have not gone that far, but we have squabbled about what it means to take the name of the Lord in vain, which is a concern about not using God’s name flippantly or as a curse or oath. Instead some Christians claim that to honor God, to honor the real relationship we have with him, we shouldn’t use his name or any form of his name in a way that would denigrate that relationship.  At the same time, we also don’t meander into legalism.  We don’t create rules that God didn’t create.  So many just say, “Oh my goodness!”

What does goodness have to do with a phrase expressing surprise?  My guess is that “goodness” was selected as a sanitary replacement word for “God.”  In other words, the people were trying to avoid saying God’s name in vain. They were likely not trying to create a phrase that would help us grow goodness in our lives.  Of course, avoiding saying God’s name in vain is a good thing.  But goodness goes well beyond just following rules, especially man-made rules.  We can follow rules and have very little goodness in our hearts.  The much more important question is this: How can we grow goodness in our lives?

In our continuing series on the Fruit of the Spirit, we are learning to walk in step with the Spirit, which means growing the Fruit of the Spirit in our lives.  We’ve learned about growing love, joy, peace, patience, kindness and now this week we’ll study what it means to grow goodness. We get started in the next post.

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How to be kind even when you don’t want to be – Fruit of the Spirit: Kindness, Part 5

Kindness can get a bad rap.  Some people who are extraordinarily kind can come across as fake.  We tend to think that there is no way people can be that kind.  We want people to be real.  “I’m just keepin’ it real,” we say, as if it is always good to express ourselves however we want, including with unkindness.  In fact, authenticity in our culture is often assumed to mean that we will so fully express ourselves that we have permission to be negative or hurtful.  When you hurt or feel threatened, our cultural norm says you are authentic when you let it out however you feel.  Shout, curse, manipulate, intimidate.  Do what feels right.  If it is inside us, just let it out, our culture says. 

The problem is that what feels right in those moments is often contrary to kindness.  Kindness sometimes doesn’t feel natural.  How can you be kind when you don’t want to be kind?  How can you wrestle your very negative emotions and thoughts into submission so that what comes out of your mouth and your actions is consistent with kindness? 

For some of us, we have allowed ourselves to get stuck in a rut of expressing ourselves negatively, and we have done so for years.  For some of us, therefore, kindness can seem like an impossibility.  Sometimes the negativity comes out almost, or perhaps totally, without us thinking about it.  It can feel like we have no choice in the matter.  We wonder, doubting, “Can I be kind and still express honestly the pain I am feeling?” 

When it comes to kindness, as with every quality in the Fruit of the Spirit, notice how they are related to that final quality in the list, self-control.  We’re going to talk about self-control more when we get to the end of the list in a few weeks.  For now, know this: we are not robots.  God has created humanity with free will, so that we can have more or less control over our lives.  We can live in such a way that we are controlled by our habits, emotions, and the world around us. But walking in step with the Spirit means that we will practice, we will exercise, we will train our bodies, our minds, our emotions, so that we have more control, so that more kindness flows from our lives. 

When kindness flows from our lives, it brings healing.  Consider the wisdom of the Proverbs: in Proverbs: 12:25, “an anxious heart weighs a person down, but a kind word cheers him up;” 14:21, “The one who despises his neighbor sins, blessed is the one who is kind to the needy;” 14:31, “The one who oppresses the poor shows contempt for their Maker, but whoever is kind to the needy, hears God.”  Kindness really can transform us and the world around us.  We Christians, then, are people who grow kindness. 

Growing kindness means cultivating a relationship with the Spirit. We are not alone in the work of becoming kind.  We have the Spirit living inside us, and we can grow our relationship with the Spirit so that he helps us express ourselves with kindness. The Spirit can help us choose kindness specially in those moments when we don’t feel kind, when we don’t want to be kind, including those seemingly automatic reactions that we think we’ll never get under control. 

I have appreciated the work of The Kindness 101 Team on CBS News.  Check it out, as they feature stories of people that are practicing kindness.  Talk with people who demonstrate kindness.  Ask them about it. Are there ways they think, talk and act that you can learn from? 

Kindness can heal, kindness can disarm an intense conversation, kindness can bring warring factions together.  Kindness is like a superpower, some people have observed.  It does not mean you aren’t honest about your pain.  But, it is a way to express pain and struggle that then enables it to be heard, understood and healed. 

In what ways do you need to work on kindness? 

First of all, do you need to confess to God and to people that you have been unkind?  Do you need to work toward healing a relationship that you have broken because of your unkindness? If so, do so.

Second, do you need to work toward growing kindness in your life?  Do you need to set an alarm on your phone to go off regularly and pause and pray for help to get rid of anger, hatred, rage and to replace it with kindness?  Do you need to ask someone to check in on how you are doing with this on a regular basis?  Who in your life do you see as someone who is kind?  Spend time with them!  Learn from them.  What are there patterns and habits?  Read through the gospels and watch The Chosen.  Observe how Jesus interacted with people who were frustrating or different from him. 

Then be kind like he was kind.

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What to do when kindness doesn’t work – Fruit of the Spirit: Kindness, Part 4

This week we are studying kindness, so let’s go back to our definition of kindness. Kindness is “to provide something beneficial for someone as an act of kindness.”[1]

My college, Lancaster Bible College, has an annual mission conference.  During the years Michelle and I were students, the mid 1990s, one feature of the mission conference was a session where students would drive all over Lancaster county and city practicing Random Acts of Kindness.  “Random” is perhaps a bad word choice, as it carries the idea of thoughtlessness.  Instead, students were trying to be thoughtful and intentional, hoping that an act of kindness would lead to honoring Jesus and demonstrating his love in the community.  We put coins in parking meters.  Cleaned restaurant bathrooms.  Swept sidewalks.  We’d then give out cards explaining that the acts of kindness were being done because of Jesus’ love and to demonstrate his love.

Notice the flow of thought in that, a flow of thought that is rooted in biblical teaching.  Our kindness reflects God’s kindness.  In Isaiah 54:8 God says to Israel, “with everlasting kindness I will have compassion on you.”  Similarly in Isaiah 63:7, the prophet says, “I will tell of the kindnesses of the Lord, the deeds for which he is to be praised, according to all the Lord has done for us—yes, the many good things he has done for the house of Israel, according to his compassion and many kindnesses.”  The prophet wasn’t simply declaring that God is kind.  The prophet was remembering how God demonstrated kindness to Israel over and over and over through the centuries.  He rescued them, kept his promises to them, forgave them, and provided for them.  When Israel was a jerk to God, God was kind to Israel.

God shows us what kindness looks like.  Then he says, “Go and do likewise.”  We are kind because he first was kind.  And, we are benefiting from knowing and living in the kindness he gives. Furthermore, God is love, and we read in 1 Corinthians 13:4-8 that “Love is kind.”  We’ve seen in previous weeks in our study of the Fruit of the Spirit how there is a correlation between some of the qualities in the Fruit of the Spirit.  Love is patient, love is kind.  The Fruit of the Spirit is best understood, I believe, as flowing from God’s nature to us, and therefore flowing from us to other people.  We are kind to others because God was kind to us. 

In our interactions with people, then, we Christians should be known for our kindness.  Do those who know you best know you as kind?  Or is your appearance of kindness just a veneer you put on for the outside world?  Is it just politeness? Kindness includes polite, for sure, but it also goes beyond politeness.  We can be polite to the outside world, but not show kindness to the people closest to us.  Consider, for example, the following questions and scenarios. Are we showing kindness to those who are difficult for us?  Kindness when we are confronted.  Kindness when we are upset.  Kindness when we are hurt.  Kindness when we disagree.  Kindness when all we feel like is being unkind.  Controlled by kindness rather than controlled by meanness. Kindness in our tone.  Kindness in our word choice. 

If you are reading all those descriptions of kindness, you might wonder if being kind the way God wants us to be kind is impossible.  On our own it is.  That is why these things are fruit of the Spirit.  We need his help.  We need to be connected to the Spirit, praying, reading the stories in the Bible of who he is and the way he interacted with others. 

When we dig into Scripture, we see that Christians are people who do everything with kindness, even when we are concerned that kindness will be ineffective. 

In 2 Corinthians 6, Paul writes about his perspective on ministry, and he talks about how important it is to pursue kindness, even when it hurts.  In 2 Corinthians 6:3-10, he writes, “We put no stumbling block in anyone’s path, so that our ministry will not be discredited. Rather, as servants of God we commend ourselves in every way: in great endurance; in troubles, hardships and distresses; in beatings, imprisonments and riots; in hard work, sleepless nights and hunger; in purity, understanding, patience and kindness; in the Holy Spirit and in sincere love; in truthful speech and in the power of God; with weapons of righteousness in the right hand and in the left;through glory and dishonor, bad report and good report; genuine, yet regarded as impostors; known, yet regarded as unknown; dying, and yet we live on; beaten, and yet not killed; sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; poor, yet making many rich; having nothing, and yet possessing everything.”

Do you see what Paul is saying?  The way of Jesus is the way of kindness at all times, and that means your practice of kindness might not lead to worldly success.  If you study the stories of Paul’s ministry in the historical account in the book of Acts, or if you read his letters, you’ll observe that Paul tried to practice kindness in all circumstances.  I can’t say for sure how well he did with that. There are at least a few stories where he seems to have failed in being kind. But Paul clearly attempted to demonstrate kindness, and it cost him.  Kindness can be costly. Kindness might hurt the one being kind. But it is still the best way of life, by far.

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[1] Ibid, 749.

What do kindness and heaven have to do with one another? – Fruit of the Spirit: Kindness, Part 3

In the previous post, we read Paul’s words in Galatians 5 where he writes that if you are regularly demonstrating hatred, discord, and fits of rage, you will not inherit the Kingdom of God. Is Paul saying that if we are not kind, we cannot go to heaven?

“Paul,” you might say, “I thought you wrote in Ephesians 2:8-9, that it is by grace you have been saved, through faith, not by works, it is the gift of God.  I thought you wrote in Romans 10:9-10 that if we confess with our mount, ‘Jesus is Lord,’ and believe in our hearts that God raised him from the dead, we will be saved.  Now you’re saying in Galatians that we will not inherit the Kingdom of God if we are struggling with sin?” 

It can seem like Paul is contradicting himself.  How are we saved?  By believing or by being good?  

Paul is not contradicting himself. Christians are people who believe in Jesus.  A relationship with Jesus starts by believing in him, believing that God raised Jesus from the dead.  But a relationship with Jesus is not just believing an idea in our minds.  A relationship with Jesus is verified as authentic when we allow our beliefs to affect our actions.  This is why Paul also wrote, “Confess Jesus as Lord.”  When we confess him as Lord, we Christians respond to the grace of God in Christ by making different choices, living a different way.  We work to get rid of the acts of the sinful nature.  We do the work to walk in step with the Spirit.  We do these actions of getting rid of the sinful nature and walking in step with the Spirit as acts of gratefulness to God.

Paul’s implication in Galatians 5:19-21 is clear.  If we do not get rid of the acts of the sinful nature from our lives; if we allow hatred, discord and fits of rage to have a hold on our lives, then we should not believe that we will inherit the Kingdom. When he writes about the inheriting the Kingdom, that is language describing experiencing abundant life now and eternal life in heaven.  So evaluate yourself. Are hatred, fits of rage or discord a regular part of your life?  Then you are not experiencing the abundant life Jesus wants for you, and you should not have confidence that you will inherit the Kingdom of God.

If so, what will you do to work to get those things out of your life?  Don’t just simply say, “Well, I’m forgiven.  God loves me.  I believe in him. I’m good. I don’t need to worry,” and then live as though your acts of the sinful nature don’t matter, maybe just continuing to be unkind.  Remember the heart of God in saying these things; he wants what is good for us.  A heart that has rage, hatred and discord as a part of it is not going to be joyful, content, is not in good relational standing with others, which is what God desires for us, to be in good relationships with others. 

Instead, make a point to walk in step with the Spirit and grow kindness in your life.  In the next two weeks we’ll talk about goodness and gentleness.  For the remainder of this week, let’s return to the definition of kindness. And we’ll do that in the next post.

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The antidote to unkindness – Fruit of the Spirit: Kindness, Part 2

In the previous post, I mentioned that unkindness has power. We humans can wield unkindness as a weapon to benefit us. And we often do. Yet, in the process of being unkind, we leave a trail a bodies. What is the antidote to unkindness? As we continue our study through the Fruit of the Spirit, this week we are studying kindness. I’m sure it wouldn’t surprise you to read that I believe kindness is the antidote to unkindness. But there’s more. In fact there are three qualities in the list of the Fruit of the Spirit in Galatians 5:22-23 that are very similar. Take a look.

Kindness is “to provide something beneficial for someone as an act of kindness.”[1]

Goodness is “the act of generous giving, with the implication of its relationship to goodness—‘to be generous, generosity’.”[2]

Gentleness is “gentleness of attitude and behavior, in contrast with harshness in one’s dealings with others—‘meekness, mildness’.”[3]

Do you notice how similar the concepts of kindness, goodness and gentleness are? In fact it might seem like these three words are talking about the same thing.  I wondered if I should combine all three into one week.  But I decided against it because, while they are certainly related, they are different enough to warrant a special focus. 

I also think that we should have one sermon on each of these topics because we live in angry, unsettled times.  Think about the political advertisements we just endured for the last month or more.  Candidates willing to trash talk their opponents, including opponents in the same party.  Candidates willing to curse in their commercials. (I don’t believe all curse words are automatically sinful, but I do believe it is in the best interest of society for politicians to maintain a level of decorum that does not include curse words.)

It seems as though the goals civil discourse and civil society are being eroded.  What people believe in increasing measure, as verified by their actions, is that anger, sarcasm, cursing, gossip, confrontation, tearing down, and belittling are the best means we use to get what we want.  Unkindness works.  Unkindness is all around us.

Words like Kindness, Goodness, and Gentleness seem like antiques.  Those words seem to be weak and impotent.  Kindness, Goodness, and Gentleness seem to be the pathway of those who are losers.  Christians, have we bought into the idea that though the Fruit of the Spirit is  the way of Jesus, because it is not the way of the world, we can dispense with the Fruit of the Spirit in the areas of politics, business, and commerce?  I have seen unkindness even in the church, when a person believes that their viewpoint is correct.  Do the ends justify the means, so that we can be unkind if we think it will lead to a good result?

No!  We followers of Jesus grow all the Fruit of the Spirit, the entire package, and we allow that Fruit to flow from the Spirit into every area of our lives.  Remember, Paul said that growing the Fruit of the Spirit involves two things: first, crucifying the acts of the sinful nature, and walking in step with the Spirit.

It’s been a few weeks since we read the verses Paul wrote just before the Fruit of the Spirit, and it is important to remind ourselves of them.  In Galatians 5:19-21, Paul writes,

“The acts of the sinful nature are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery; idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God.”

We eliminate those acts of the sinful nature from our lives.  Notice verse 20 includes a few sinful acts that are the opposite of kindness, goodness, and gentleness.  Hatred, discord, fits of rage. 

Because our struggle with these sins is so prevalent, I think we need one week about kindness, one for goodness, and one for gentleness.  We Christians are called to live differently.  We are called to express ourselves differently.  Paul’s warning in verse 21 should cause us to pay attention: if you live like this you will not inherit the kingdom of God.  If you are regularly demonstrating hatred, discord, and fits of rage, Paul says, you will not inherit the Kingdom of God.  Yikes!

What does Paul mean? In the next post we’ll find out.

Photo by Dim Hou on Unsplash

[1] Johannes P. Louw and Eugene Albert Nida, Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament: Based on Semantic Domains (New York: United Bible Societies, 1996), 749.

[2] Ibid, 569.

[3] Ibid, 748.

The surprising efficacy of unkindness – Fruit of the Spirit: Kindness, Part 1

My wife recently shared a prayer request in a group text, and one person texted back, “No praying!”  Then a few seconds later the person wrote, “This phone has been killing me lately with autocorrect…that was supposed to be ‘NOW praying’.” 

How many of you have had text messages auto-correct to something crazy? Something unsavory? Something that was maybe the opposite of what you intended? Something unkind?

Our friend didn’t have to text us the explanation. We are so used to typos in text messages, we knew.

Those were unintentional unkind words.  Like our friend did, when you and I send an errant text, we feel embarrassed and quickly send off an apologetic text saying, “Ugh, Auto-correct strikes again…sorry…what I meant was …” 

The reality is that often we intentionally do, say or think unkind things.  And we mean them to be unkind.  Maybe we don’t 100% mean to be unkind. I suspect it is rare that we do sinful things with 100% motivation.  Instead, when we are unkind, we are usually in the middle of an emotional or difficult situation, and our fear, our anger, or our sense of justice is heightened. If we have not cultivated our inner strength enough or are not walking in step with the Spirit enough, we can choose to be unkind.  We can also have patterns of unkindness.  Habits of unkindness.  Almost to the point where it can seem that it comes out of us without thinking. 

But there is another side to unkindness.  Some of us have watched unkindness benefit us. There are people who cower and fall in line in the face of unkindness.  If we use a certain tone, if our posture is aggressive, domineering, or authoritative, certain people are intimidated by us and will do what we say.  If the words we use are harsh or accusatory, there are plenty of people who will bow before us.  Have you learned the dark power of unkindness?

In other words, we can use unkindness to get what we want.  In relationships, in business, on the sports field, and in the church, unkindness can be a method for personal advancement.  We can even spiritualize our unkindness, believing that God has blessed us with a special coercive power, and that he is working through us. When we think like that, we don’t believe that unkindness is wrong.  We usually call it boldness or persuasiveness or committedness or leadership.  And the people who lay broken and hurting in the dust behind us, we declare them to be weak, that they couldn’t handle life or the truth, and thus their pain is not our fault.  We say they just misunderstood us and took things too personal.

We can be deeply unkind.  Followers of Jesus, however, are willing to pursue kindness, even if it slows down our progress, even if it puts us at a disadvantage, even if kindness doesn’t seem to be working. 

We have been studying the Fruit of the Spirit, which we read about in Galatians 5:22-23.  In previous weeks, we’ve talked about how the Spirit grows his fruit in our lives so that we can be in healthy relationships with God and others.  Our God is a relational God, and how we treat one another is incredibly important to Him.  Look at the lengths He went to to be in relationship with us.  We’ve already studied love, joy, peace and patience in relationships.  This week we will study kindness. 

Before we focus on kindness, I want to point out that some of the qualities in the Fruit of the Spirit are very similar.  In the past two weeks we talked about peace and patience.  They are not identical, but they are related.  This week and the following two weeks we are going to learn about kindness, goodness, and gentleness.  These three are also related. 

In the next post, we’ll take a look at their definitions, and I think you’ll see what I mean.

Photo by Alexandra Mirgheș on Unsplash