The Definition LESSON 9. BE FRUITFUL In The Spirit, Part II. What does it mean to be fruitful in the Spirit? SECTION 1:

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Edmund Clarke
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1 BE FRUITFUL In The Spirit, Part II SECTION 1: A Story of Being Fruitful Read Acts 20:17-38 LESSON 9 It was time for the Apostle Paul to bid farewell to the elders of the church in Ephesus. He had invested three years in the people of this church, developing them as mature disciples and effective leaders. Now he was moving on to new areas of opportunity to proclaim the gospel. It was a bittersweet moment for Paul as well as these leaders. The elders knew they had to release Paul to continue to carry out his mission, but the love they had for this man who had done so much for them made it difficult. As Paul began to exhort these shepherd-leaders to care for the flock of God, he recounted his history among them. He spoke of the tears and the trials of serving them faithfully difficulties that required Paul to walk in tremendous patience and long-suffering. He spoke of all the truth he had poured into them, withholding nothing that was helpful, and in so doing, displayed a generous outpouring of kindness and goodness toward them. He reminded them that he had only done good for them and had never served them for what he could gain personally. And that they should display the same kind of spiritual fruit in their lives as they patiently and kindly served God s people. When Paul finished his words of exhortation, he knelt down and prayed for them. After praying there was a poignant display of love and affection for Paul. They hugged and they wept as they said farewell to their beloved shepherd. It was now time for them to shepherd the church of God as Paul had filled with the Holy Spirit, leading others in the love and the power of Christ. What Paul preached and wrote about concerning walking in the Spirit and bearing the fruit of the Spirit, he practiced in his own life. He knew that the only way to sustain a ministry of sacrifice and service, was to remain abiding in Christ, surrendered to the life of the Spirit within. This is true of us as well. If we desire to express the fruit of the Spirit, we must remain yielded to the life of the Spirit. When we do, lives are impacted with the love and the life of Jesus. The Definition What does it mean to be fruitful in the Spirit? Read Galatians 5:22-25 and 1 Corinthians 13:4-8 In this lesson you will be discussing and deepening your understanding of the next three fruit of the Spirit: long-suffering (patience), kindness and goodness. The first three fruit discussed in the last lesson love, joy and peace were those that the Spirit bears in you because of what Christ has done. The fruit of long-suffering, kindness and goodness focus more on your maturing in Christ by the Spirit, the way you relate to other believers and the lost. Long-suffering: In the New Testament, God s attitude towards mankind is that He is very patient with us. The Greek word is makrothumia [macro-thoo-mia], which means patience, endurance, constancy, steadfastness, perseverance, forbearance, long-suffering. When you are wronged if you are walking in the fruit of long-suffering you will not be compelled to avenge the wrong done, but instead will be slow to anger and wrath. This fruit causes you to bear with troubles and ills in people and situations. To be long-suffering is to be forbearing, loving and forgiving. Kindness: The Greek word for kindness is krestostes [kray-sto-tays] it means moral goodness, integrity, kindness. It has the connotation of being useful, and it goes hand-in-hand with the Greek for philanthropy, which is goodwill to fellow members of the human race. However, kindness is the disposition. It is what motivates us. The word denotes a goodness which does not irritate, does not make others uncomfortable and is a gentleness. Goodness: The Greek translation for goodness is agathosuney [a-gath-osu-nay] uprightness in heart and life, goodness, kindness. This is God s heart towards mankind as well. He wants to do good to you. His goodness towards you is manifest in His good actions and deeds born out of His great love for you. This goodness flows to you by His Holy Spirit. It is the ability, out of His heart of love, for us to do good to others as well. The fruit of Spirit in us grows as we abide in Christ and are continually filled with and led by His Spirit. Why do I need to be fruitful in the Spirit? Read Ephesians 4:29-32, 2 Corinthians 6:4-6, Ephesians 2:4-10 Imagine if there were no real differences between a person who has experienced the salvation of Christ and His mighty filling with His Holy Spirit, and an unsaved person who is lost in their sin. What good would

2 your faith be? What real impact would it have? Would those around you come to faith, or reject it as just another religion? All of the fruit of the Spirit, including long-suffering, kindness and goodness are marks of a believer who has come in contact with and has been made into a new creation by the living God. The living God radically changes you. He has poured out kindness and goodness on you and calls you to do the same, by living in the power of the Holy Spirit. Long-suffering is the ability to wait until God s will and good purpose are revealed. God s plans are always ultimately good and fruitful. The Holy Spirit gives the strength to patiently endure until the end. 1 If you exemplify the fruit of long-suffering, kindness and goodness, you will be a person with God s perspective and Christ s character. People will know that you have the living God in your life, that you know the true God. He has done a wonderful act of long-suffering, kindness and goodness by sending His Son and saving you. He sees the beginning from the end. If you exemplify the fruit of long-suffering, kindness and goodness, you are showing the love and grace of God to those around you. How can I be fruitful in the Spirit? SECTION 2: The Study Take 10 minutes to examine the fruit of long-suffering, kindness and goodness in your life. Have you noticed a growth of these fruit? Is there a difference between the way you are now and the way you were before you came into salvation in regards to these three fruit? Using the journal pages provided, write down areas where you ve seen growth in long-suffering, kindness and goodness as you ve walked by the Holy Spirit. Describe how God s pruning process has affected your growth. If you can t think of any examples, ask a close friend or family member to help you. As you go about your week, ask for a fresh filling of the Holy Spirit daily. Also, ask God to show you any areas where you need to put off any old ways of thinking or living. Declare your commitment to submitting to the Spirit in your everyday life. Read John 15:1-5 and Colossians 3:9-17 The Word of God clearly communicates the simplicity and beauty of how the fruit of the Spirit is borne in your life; you do not walk (live) by the flesh (our natural ways of thinking and living), but you crucify the flesh and are led by the Spirit in the context of community! How are you to really see the fruit borne in your life? By living in the Spirit with one another, allowing the Spirit to work in your life as a good farmer would work in his field, pruning away the bad and therefore allowing the good the character of Christ to grow in your life. How are you to do this daily? As you already read in Galatians, you choose to daily be filled and live in the Spirit. He will continually work and bear the character of Christ in you. If you are not bearing the fruit of the Spirit, you are not filled with and living in the Spirit, plain and simple. By the Holy Spirit and the first fruit of the Spirit, love, you will be able to walk in the fruit of long-suffering, kindness and goodness. Your part is to daily choose to put off put away like old, ill-fitting clothing the old flesh ways of thinking and living. By the power of the Spirit, you can put on Christ and, therefore, His character through the filling and leading of the Spirit. 1 Life Book Volume 2, Shibley/Evrist, Global Advance Resources, p.36 This inductive Bible study will help you respond in obedience to the truth of God s word. Use the Inductive Bible Study Guidelines for Examine, Express and Exercise at the beginning of your handbook and the worksheets provided on the next pages to help you. As you look at each passage of scripture below, examine what it says, express what it means, and consider how you will exercise it in your life. Read Colossians 3:12-15, write it down using the journal pages provided, and specifically follow the instructions at the beginning of your handbook entitled Inductive Bible Study Guidelines: EXAMINE. Now read these scriptures aloud and declare your commitment to their truth in your life. Use the worksheets provided to rewrite these scriptures in your own words. Write down 2-3 action steps that you will take based on the truth of Colossians 3:12-15 using the journal pages provided.

3 Inductive Bible Study Worksheet Inductive Bible Study Worksheet

Inductive Bible Study Worksheet SECTION 3: The Memorizing of Scripture Follow these guidelines as you commit to memory the following verses: Colossians 1:10,11; Ephesians 2:7; and Ephesians 5:5 1.

4 Inductive Bible Study Worksheet SECTION 3: The Memorizing of Scripture Follow these guidelines as you commit to memory the following verses: Colossians 1:10,11; Ephesians 2:7; and Ephesians 5:5 1. Set aside the time you need each day to memorize scripture. 2. Pray and ask the Lord to help you commit scripture to memory. 3. In addition to the help you ll receive from the Holy Spirit, the key to memorization is repetition, repetition, repetition! 4. After locating the scripture in your Bible, read out loud through the chapter and, if helpful, the book where the scripture is found so that you understand the context of the scripture. 5. Speak the scripture aloud several times, saying the scripture reference before and after. 6. You may find it helpful to break up the scripture into smaller portions, repeating those portions by themselves, and then putting them together. Or you might utilize the help of 3x5 note cards or sticky notes to write out the scriptures so that you can keep them before you each day. 7. Once you have memorized a scripture, dedicate yourself to living what the scripture says, as well as sharing the scripture with those in your sphere of influence. SECTION 4: The Discussion Use the journal pages provided to write your response to each of these questions in preparation for a group discussion. Describe a time this week where you found yourself challenged in being long-suffering, kind and/or good. Share specifically with your group. Your ability to walk in the fruit of the Spirit is a result of being made a new creation in Christ and being filled with the Spirit. Express areas where you need to walk as the new creation that you are in the fruit of longsuffering, kindess and goodness. Write down three action steps you will take this week to put away the old and put on the new. Pray with your group for the leading of the Spirit as you walk in the fruit of long-suffering, kindness and goodness.

5 SECTION 5: The Marks of Maturing These are the Marks of Maturing as someone who is fruitful in the Spirit. How well do they describe you? Use the journal pages provided to write your response. A disciple is someone who bears the fruit of long-suffering, kindness and goodness, maturing in Christ by the Spirit, the way they relate to one another and the lost. A disciple is someone who is marked as a believer by the fruit of long-suffering, kindness, and goodness because they have come into contact with and have been made into a new creation by the living God. A disciple is someone who lives in the Spirit with others, allowing the Spirit to work in their life as a good farmer would work in his field, pruning away the bad and therefore allowing the good the character of Christ to grow in their life. SECTION 6: Go Further Here are some additional readings for you as you are fruitful in the Spirit: Patience: [< Latin patiens, < Latin pati (to endure, suffer)] the quality or capacity of being patient; to endure something with calmness; the ability to willingly accept or tolerate delay or hardship. (The same root word led to the word passion, which is still used in its original sense of suffer when describing the last week of Christ's life.) Its word-field includes long-suffering, forbearance, perseverance, to put up with. The Greek term in Galatians 5:22 is makrothumia [makro- (long, distant in time or space, large-view) + thumos (passion, rage, the emotions of suffering)], with a usual meaning of having an enduringly-calm temper. 2 The root of all goodness is the goodness of God. Sounds simple, right? But there is a problem with what we think of as good. We think, "If God is good, He'll do good things for us!" And what do we think of as good? Getting material wealth? Having things go our own way? Instant healing 2 of our ills? Removal of suffering, or getting someone you loathe out of your life? But goodness may be humility, may be suffering, may be loss, may be to serve, may even be boredom. And the things we think of as the gifts of a good God may well be the most important things for us not to have. God s goodness is defined by God s love. God s goodness is goodness, and in its light it is our expectations that must change. Goodness has a way of setting things straight. When we see other people being or doing good, it often reminds us of how not-good we are. Which brings out a suitcase full of excuses. The exposé can be quite a shock, puncturing one s self-image. Even when we do good, goodness may have nothing to do with it. While nothing entirely gets rid of this tendency in this life, God has given us a way to face up to it: confession. It not only opens us for God s response to our un-goodness, it also brings about a more truthful self-image. The only way to become more good is to know what ways we re bad so we can replace that with goodness. 3 Do acts of kindness for people. Give them little tastes of God s love. People actually like being treated kindly, as if they are valued. They can lay down at least some of their defenses, relax more, and feel comfortable. Most non-christians have an expectation of being treated a bit more kindly by Christians, and are disappointed and sometimes even angry when they re not treated that way. While it s wrong to live according to others expectations, it is a challenge we need to take to heart. Many practicing Orthodox Jews today do good deeds (mitzvot) as the opportunities present themselves in their daily lives, mainly because it is what God wants them to do. To them, doing good for others is more than a duty, it s also a prayer and a devotion. 4 One of the ways of our God is that He is a very patient and longsuffering God. His ways are not our ways. And one of the things you will find out very early on about His ways is that He works on a much slower time frame than we do. And unless you learn to adjust to His slower way of working things out, you will find yourself easily losing your patience with Him and how He wants to work things out in your life. God operates on a much longer and slower time frame than we are used to operating in the fast-paced world in which we live in. You will really have to work with the Holy Spirit on this particular quality to get it properly worked up into your personality. The reason for this is that your own impatience will start to act up and try to override the patience and long-suffering that the Holy Spirit will try and transmit to you. At times, it may become a battle of wills your will against His will

TASTY: THE FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT LESSON 4. Patience. You, too, be patient and stand firm, because the Lord s coming is near.

TASTY: THE FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT LESSON 4 Patience You, too, be patient and stand firm, because the Lord s coming is near. James 5:8 Opening Illustration: A Farmer We can learn much about patience by observing