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LET THE SPIRIT BEAR FRUIT
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IN US
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By Carolyn Bautista
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One of our desires as Christians is for the Holy
Spirit to dwell in us, thereby allowing the fruits of the Holy
Spirit to be born in our lives. In Galatians 5:22-23 it says that
“The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace,
patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness and
self-control.” It is these fruits which can be used to conquer
the sinful desires that we human
beings are susceptible to.
We will know therefore that we are producing these
Fruits in our lives when we are loving, joyful, peaceful, patient,
kind, good, generous, gentle, faithful, modest, when we exercise
self-control and when we are chaste and pure. To recognize whether
we bear these Fruits in our lives, let’s try to examine
our relationships with our parents, our spouse, our children, our
friends in the Community and even those people we do not know whom
we come across everyday. How do we treat them?
If we examine our relationships, it looks like at
times we may have hindered the Fruits of the Spirit to flourish,
because these relationships, sad to say, were drawn to immorality,
impurity, idolatry, hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish
ambition, dissensions and envy (see Galatians 5:19-20).
Are we respectful of our parents, are we loving to
them, or are we blinded by our selfish ambitions to the point that
we tend to disregard them (especially in their old age)?
Are we understanding of our spouses, recognizing them
for their virtues and forgiving them for their failures, or do
we often allow jealousy and hatred to overpower our love for them?
Are we patient and joyful with our children, in a way
that every time we seem to run out of control, we call on the Holy
Spirit to make us more gentle and kind, instead of giving in to
anger and saying things we should not have uttered?
Are we kind and good to our friends in the Community,
greeting them with God’s love each time we see them, or is our
relationship with them full of envy or even perhaps hypocrisy?
And for those people who are just passing by, those
whom we do not know personally but are in our midst, are we generous
to them with our material possessions or with our time if they need
it, or do we close our eyes to them, and our hearts to the Holy
Spirit, thereby preventing it from bearing fruit?
Looking closely at the Fruits of the Spirit, these
are actually the characteristics of a person that God likes us to
be, if we only allow the indwelling of the Holy Spirit to bear
fruit. The Holy Spirit will help us, guide us, and lead us. All we
have to do is be open to receive the Holy Spirit… unconditionally.
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