Paul’s Letter to the Gauls (Galatians) – Chapter 5

Now, that’s what the flesh wants you to do. It’s a living thing. If you do them and practice them, you’re not going to inherit the kingdom of God. But the fruit of the Spirit is love…Verse 22…joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such things there is no law. So let us do these things. Right? Let us do these things. Right? It’s a trick question. Let us do these things. Free to do them…you’ll never pull it off. You see, and those of you who heard me say this before, you’ll have to excuse me. Most of the saints here don’t know this. One is deeds, the other is fruit, and there is a big difference, my friend. You cannot: love, joy, peace, long suffering, gentleness, kindness, meekness, mercy. I’m going to say it again. You cannot do goodness, kindness, meekness, gentleness, mercy, or love. You can’t do those things, and there’s no need to put yourself under bondage to do them, but there is growth in Christ. That is fruit.

Now, if we had the horticulturalist here, he could help me. What is fruit? Fruit is that which is the result of a tree drowning in an overabundance of life. It is springtime, and life begins to flow into the tree. The tree has been dead all winter, yet life keeps coming into it through metamorphosis. It comes…my grandson reminded me of that…metamorphosis comes on up the tree, filling up the trunk completely. Comes out through the limbs, big limbs…fills that up. Sap everywhere. Life, an abundance of life springing up in the spring. Gets out and fills up the little branches. Got too many? Starts making more branches. More branches. Branches shooting out everywhere. The sap keeps rising. Goes all the way to the top of the tree. More branches filled, more branches created. The entire tree is full of sap, and it is drowning in life, and the tree says, “I am drowning in life. I’ve got to get rid of some of this stuff. I got too much life. I’ve got too much. I got more than I need.”

And so, it begins to build big pods, and lets the life, this living sap, pour out into the pods and store it there until those pods, whatever they may be, so full, so heavy, break from the tree and fall from the ground. That’s what fruit is, and that’s the only kind of work a Christian ought ever to do. Did you follow me? Did you follow me? There’s no law there, saint. Did you understand that there is no law there? That’s self-protection. That is creating a way to get rid of excess life. That is the life of the Lord in you until there is a spontaneous overflow or a continual overflow. There’s just more and more of Him, and it just keeps coming out, and the fruit keeps dropping. If winter comes, don’t put yourself under the law. The best thing for you to do is to withdraw and wait. Wait before Him until life starts flowing again, and there is natural fruit. I want to tell you something; I refuse to serve you when there is no life. I am not going to get caught up in obligation to you, brother. I think one of the greatest tragedies of the ministry is that preachers have to serve the Lord all the time. I don’t do that, man. Listen, you’re looking at a quitter. There are times when I kick it in and retreat, but you see, I don’t get paid for preaching. It’s not my livelihood. I work for a living, but a preacher has to continually preach…dry, dead, no matter what, because that’s how he gets his income. I kicked it in. I quit. I get tired sometimes. Paul of Tarsus stopped. The Lord Jesus stopped. You’ve got to stop sometimes. I would encourage you to quit when there is no flow, but I would say that as you mature in the Lord, there is, generally speaking, speaking very generally, a constant coming up of life. There will come times of exceptions to that, and the fruit flows out, and it is the fruit that is God Himself in abundance in you.

The Spirit…with God in your spirit…living, pulsating, breathing out of simple fellowship, and whatever it is, and there come out of it some wonderful things. Joy is not manufactured. Joy is when you can’t stand it; He is so good! Hallelujah. He’s wonderful. That’s the fruit of God in you. Excess life has got to come out. I do not find it difficult to love my brothers; I am not under an obligation to love you or serve you. The dear children of God have loved me, and there’s nothing quite so beautiful or so encouraging as to see someone who’s just got a little bit more life than he needs just pouring a little of it out on me, caring and loving. That is so wonderful. But brother, don’t ever do that for me or anyone else out of law and obligation. You are not obligated to love me. You are not obligated to have joy. There are some things that you can do to encourage the joy that is in your spirit, and there are things you can do to encourage the love that is in your spirit, and all of it has to do with you personally walking in your spirit and fellowshipping with your God who lives within you – all of it. Don’t…I have got to produce fruit. You’re back under the law. Don’t do that, saint. Attend to your inward parts, and the joy will flow. By the way, as you grow, it’s going to hurt at times. Christians start getting to be Christians at about 45. There’s hope when it stops being this and becomes something more like this, and the fruit is just there, and you become an evergreen. Do you understand what I mean by evergreen?

Now, the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. Against these things, nobody has ever passed a law. And there is no law that can ever be effectively passed to give you them. Again, these are internal things; they have to do with things that are living. Joy is a living thing. What in the world is love? It is God. What is joy? Christ is joy. What is peace? Christ is peace. There are no rules here. These are living creatures we are dealing with. And praise the Lord, there are no laws against any of them. And now he says it again. He comes back to that which is reality in the eyes of God. This is God speaking reality. Now those who are of Christ have crucified the flesh. It has been crucified. I want you to know that the flesh was crucified upon the cross. But Gene, I still feel the flesh. Then take a flying leap for your spirit saint, go where there is no space or time, and get into the reality of God. And don’t ask me to say any more about that because I cannot. I’m not going to try to play a sleight of hand here to tell you that you have been crucified. In the sight of God, your flesh has been crucified, and in your spirit, that is a reality.

Alright then, let us live by the Spirit. If we live by the Spirit, let us walk…let us walk by the Spirit. Let us follow Him, and then, of course, we will not challenge, envy, or boast against one another. And so, chapter five ends. It’s the shoe that finally drops, and the shoe that finally drops is: don’t use your liberty and freedom from all rules to give an opportunity to this living thing. These are not rules here. These are living things. But rather, so walk and so fellowship in Christ that the fruit will pour out automatically.

Now, if you’re really a young Christian, you may not even have any desire for the fruit of the Spirit, but you just get saved and walk long enough, and I’ll tell you, friend, the world’s going to drive you to the Lord, you’re going to get dry out there. And thank God that your soul is sitting there in the middle wanting to do good and can’t, screaming, “I don’t want to do the things I’m doing. So, I’m going to pass more laws on things I will and will not do. I’ll draw up a resolution. I’ll not do these things.” And it screams again, “I did every one of them.” until finally you take your place in your spirit, and you give up the law which is driving you to sin. You’re free. Now, walk in your spirit. Simple? Yes, brother. Audience: What do you see the seeds in fruit as a picture of?

The seeds in the fruit, well, I never thought about it, I don’t guess. Reproduction is in fruit; it’s not anywhere else. That’s right. Thank you, John. Excellent. Thank you, brother. Life begets life, and death does not produce death, and law does not produce grace, and law does not produce the spirit.

Now, we’re going to leave, but before we do, let me tell you what to do. Tomorrow morning… by the way, tonight we’re going to talk about chapter 6, which is church life. It’s one of the few cracks we get into what church life was like in the first century. This is the first piece of Christian literature ever written; it’s the first chance we ever get to see how churches did some of the things they did. Tomorrow morning, take that mimeograph copy you have, that Xerox copy you have, and get up and be alone with the Lord and read it out loud and let Jesus Christ speak to you. And with your voice, speak back to Him. One of the problems we have in prayer is not knowing what to say. Well, there are seven pages of what to say. He’s talking. Let Him talk. Read slowly. Don’t think; I mean, don’t study. Oh, just really, I want to understand that better. Just let Him talk.

You have got a spirit, brother. You can find out how to let the Lord speak through what’s written there on that Xerox copy, take it really slowly, say a sentence, and wait. Take another sentence and wait, and then tell Him, “Amen. Thank you, Lord. Praise Your name, Lord. That’s wonderful.” And then maybe you’ll find another sentence wanting to come out too and tell Him whatever bubbles up. Whatever just kind of springs up, tell Him. Spend a few moments doing that tomorrow morning, would you? If you can’t get up early in the mornings, then do it in the afternoon. Do it in the evening, but find a few minutes to be with the Lord to fellowship with Him in His own words to you, alone with Him, and then keep doing that inside a body of believers for about 20 years, and that’s all you’ll ever need to hear from me for the rest of your life. You got it? That’s all you ever need to know. You got it? Then you got it all. Just do that for about 20 years.

Someday there will be a short meeting. See you tonight. Was there anything else I wanted to talk with you about? I have just finished going through Romans. By the way, I rarely ever do this. I don’t go through books of the Bible. I’ve just gone through Romans 1-8 in Portland, and I brought the master tapes, a set of master tapes. If you would like to have them, the brothers and sisters here have a tape duplicator. Just let them know. How many tapes are there? 12 tapes. And Galatians and Romans are brothers. Romans is bigger; it’s the bigger brother. If you’d like to have it, you could write to Message Ministry, but you can get it cheaper here because these people don’t know what they’re doing. These people are running not only a non-profit organization but also an “in the whole” organization here. Take advantage of it. I realize that, that’s why I was trying to defend you a few minutes ago, and don’t forget what I said earlier. Okay. Is there a quick question? Yes, Brenda. No, no after meeting, anything. Yes, sister.

Audience: There’s a question that I have, though it’s about when Romans and other pastors talk about putting on certain things, putting on the Lord Jesus, putting on these things, and I was, you know, I know I can’t deal with it.