Fruit of the Spirit
“Live Freely by the Spirit” – Galatians 5:1,13-26
June 7, 2026
Today, we begin a summer worship series on Fruit of the Spirit.
Some of you may remember that we had a similar worship series in the summer of 2014,
twelve years ago.
That summer, we gave everyone a wrist band with the list of the fruit of the Spirit.
We wanted to encourage everyone to memorize and take to heart the fruit
which comes from abiding with the Spirit of Jesus.
The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity,
faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.
Each week of the summer, we will focus upon one of these virtues.
For today, we begin the series with Galatians 5:1,13-26. Hear the Word of God.
For freedom Christ has set us free. Stand firm, therefore, and do not submit again
to a yoke of slavery…For you were called to freedom, brothers and sisters,
only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for self-indulgence,
but through love become enslaved to one another.
For the whole law is summed up in a single commandment,
“You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” If, however, you bite and devour one another,
take care that you are not consumed by one another.
Live by the Spirit, I say, and do not gratify the desires of the flesh.
For what the flesh desires is opposed to the Spirit, and what the Spirit desires is opposed
to the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to prevent you from doing what you want.
But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not subject to the law.
Now the works of the flesh are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity, debauchery, idolatry,
sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, anger, quarrels, dissensions, factions, envy, drunkenness,
carousing, and things like these. I am warning you, as I warned you before:
those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.
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 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.
The Word of the Lord. Thanks be to God.
A few weeks ago, here in the sanctuary, on a Saturday afternoon,
one of the active participants in our youth group was honored with the Eagle Scout Award.
The special ceremony recognized the hard work and dedication of one Allison Bombardier.
Allison earned the right to become the first female Eagle Scout in our local Scouting district.
Congratulations Allison! And congratulations and kudos to her mom, Katherine Wright,
who serves as the Scoutmaster of her Scouting Troop. **(Allison photo here)**
Most of you probably know someone who is an Eagle Scout.
Can we get a show of hands of our local Eagle Scouts?
And many of you are likely to have heard what is known as the Scout Law:
“A Scout is trustworthy, loyal, friendly, helpful, courteous, kind,
obedient, cheerful, thrifty, brave, clean and reverent.”
Every single time a Scout troop gathers for a meeting, the Scout Oath and the Scout Law
are recited, and now, as I recently discovered, today an Outdoor Code is often recited as well.
Over time, the Oath and the Law and the Code become a part of who a young Scout is,
part of their very being. Consider that Eagle Scout person whom you know.
Certainly that person is not perfect, no less a sinner than the rest of us,
but I would venture to guess that that person still seeks to live, at least for the most part,
by those virtues listed in the Scout Law – trustworthy, loyal, friendly, helpful,
courteous, kind, obedient, cheerful, thrifty, brave, clean and reverent.
Such lists of virtues were common in the Greco-Roman world.
Greco-Roman philosophy encouraged such virtues as:
courage, justice, moderation, perseverance, mercy, truthfulness, discipline.
The Apostle Paul’s lists of virtues and vices in this letter to the church in Galatia
would have been very familiar to this first century congregation.
In their desire to know what it meant to follow Jesus and live as a member of Christ’s body,
the Church, Paul’s lists of virtues and vices would have guided their thoughts and actions,
and, over time, would have become part of their very being.
Today’s church would also do well to memorize and take to heart Paul’s list of virtues.
Look at the front of your bulletin and repeat these with me:
the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness,
generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.
In 2014, the last time we had a summer series on Fruit of the Spirit,
Charlie Cousar was still with us.
Charlie was one of my professors at Columbia Theological Seminary.
Charlie served as a beloved intern and youth minister here at DPC in the late 50’s,
then later taught New Testament at the seminary for some 40 years.
Throughout many of those years, Charlie and his wife Betty,
along with my theology professor George Stroup and his wife, Donna,
would sit in the balcony most Sundays here at the church,
and afterwards they would go to Cafe Alsace for lunch together.
I mention Charlie because he studied and wrote extensively on the church in Galatia.
Charlie would tell you that the Letter to the Galatians is the most harsh of all of Paul’s letters.
The Christians in Galatia were part of a small, unknown sect in the midst of a secular world.
They were learning very different moral standards within their little congregation
than was being taught in their broader culture.
Like Allison Bombardier and her fellow Scouts learning to be trustworthy and kind,
obedient and reverent, the virtues that Paul was teaching the Galatians
were not necessarily taken for granted in the broader culture.
Paul was particularly addressing two opposing populations in the congregation in Galatia –
legalistic Jews and libertarian Gnostics.
Legalistic Jews thought early Christians had to obey every detail of the Mosaic law.
In order to be a member of the Church, in order to follow Jesus,
they thought that everyone, including Gentiles, must be circumcised (well, at least the males)
and had to follow all the minute rituals of the Mosaic law.
Paul said “No” – we are no longer under the law.
Paul let the legalists, the strict rule followers, know, to the delight of the libertarians,
that they no longer had to be slaves to the law. The law is important, but the function
of the Law is to maintain our relationship with God and others, not earn it.
The second extreme group in Galatia was the libertarian Gnostics.
Gnostics thought the moral code was not all that important.
Many of the Gnostics thought that just so you had your belief system right,
had your mind right, then it didn’t really matter what you did with your flesh.
As long as you believe certain things, then you could even disregard love for neighbor
and not be overly concerned about restraining your fleshly passions.
Paul said “no” – what we do with our bodies and in our earthly relationships matters.
Our sexual morality and our concern for the needs of our neighbor
has not only temporal, but eternal significance.
Christian freedom does not mean moral laxity, but means that we are freed
from the bondage of sin so that we can live in righteousness.
Here lies the paradox in living a Christian life:
We are called to live freely by the Spirit – free to live, free to love, free to serve –
and yet we are called to be servants, to be slaves to one another.
For freedom Christ has set us free, Scripture claims.
But this freedom does not mean that we live with the freedom of self-indulgence.
We are not called to self-serving, licentious behavior.
We are not called to do whatever we want, whenever we want, with whomever we want.
We are called to live freely by the Spirit, which means that our desires will be transformed,
which means that we will want to love God and neighbor,
that we will want to freely choose what is good and right,
including offering ourselves in service.
This lifestyle, of course, is in the manner and likeness of Jesus,
who is the Gracious One who came not to be served, but to serve.
When we love others as Christ loves, we do not mind becoming servants to them.
We are no longer slaves to those things, works of the flesh, that would corrupt our souls,
but we freely choose to become servants one to another.
Paul urges: “Live by the Spirit, I say! and do not gratify the desires of the flesh.”
According to Charlie Cousar, the NRSV translation is misleading.
Charlie claimed that a better translation from the Greek would be something like :
“Live by the Spirit, I say, and then you will not be bound by the desires of the flesh.”
The way to avoid self-indulgence, the way to avoid fleshly temptations and sinful behavior
is to live freely, freely by the Spirit.
Pauls writes that flesh and Spirit are opposed to one another.
What Paul is not saying here is that material things and earthly desires are inherently evil.
Human feelings and desires, including sensual pleasures, are a gift from God,
not to be avoided or suppressed.
The problem comes when the concerns of this world absorb all of one’s focus,
when fleshly desires demand all of one’s full attention, so that one is no longer even open
to the presence of God and God’s redeeming work in the world.
We can live either “according to the flesh” or we can live “according to the Spirit”.
To focus on the flesh eventually leads to death; to focus on the Spirit leads to life and peace.
(Cousar, Charles. Interpretation: Galatians. John Knox Press, 1982.)
Did you notice that eight of the fifteen vices Paul listed in his letter to the Galatians
have to do with conflicts of some sort?
In his list of “works of the flesh”, Paul includes not only sexual immorality,
drunkenness and carousing, but also other works like envy and quarrels and dissensions,
vices which break down our relationships with God and with others.
Those who do such things, who follow the desires of the flesh,
who live with constant conflicts, dissension, and jealousies, will not inherit the kingdom of God.
The kingdom of God is all about life in community.
The kingdom of God is about God’s peaceable reign, here and now,
about God’s good intentions for human beings on earth.
God desires for us to live without hatred or fear, without constant tears or sadness,
without drawing lines in the sand between people, or the “cancelling” of others.
The works of the flesh will ultimately lead to such conflict and dissensions.
By contrast, let’s repeat again the list of Paul’s fruit of the Spirit….the fruit of the Spirit is:
“love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control.”
Paul says: “There is no law against such things!” Of course not!
When one lives by this fruit, one’s path leads to love and light and peace.
One last word: Only our intimate connection with Jesus
nurtures and allows the fruit of the Spirit in our lives.
Just as a branch must remain connected to a vine in order to bear fruit,
so we must remain intimately connected to the Source of all good.
Jesus said (Gospel of John, Chapter 15):
“I am the true vine, and my Father is the vine-grower.
Abide in me as I abide in you. Just as the branch cannot bear fruit by itself
unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in me.
I am the vine, you are the branches. Those who abide in me and I in them
bear much fruit, because apart from me you can do nothing…
I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you,
and that your joy may be complete.”
Friends, the key to living freely by the Spirit,
the key to bearing good fruit in our daily lives and interactions,
the key to this fruit becoming part of our very being,
is our intimate connection to the Gracious One who came not to be served, but to serve.
Amen.
Rev. Dr. Todd Speed
Decatur Presbyterian Church
Decatur, Georgia
