The Spirit's Fruits - Final Review - Galatians 5

- tonight we're going to be reviewing our study of the fruit
of the Spirit
- I realize that you may be here tonight and you start
attending somewhere in the middle of this series
- I tried to design this review in such a way that it would
helpful and challenging to you as well as those who have
been here each night
- I've also tried to put this together in such a way as to
not embarrass anyone
- this is not an exercise to see how much you or I don't know
- the purpose is to see how much we have learned and
especially how effective we've been at applying these
truths

I. Quiz

- I'd like you to begin by completing the review quiz
- the quiz has two parts, matching and fill in the blank
(explain and go over one from each section)

- Go over quiz

- OK, we've reviewed the meanings of some of these aspects of
the fruit of the Spirit and we've thought about some
specific situations in which they might apply
- now let me ask you, have you taken definite steps of growth
in these areas we've studied?

- In other words, are you a more fruitful person spiritually?
- Have you grown in love, joy, peace, longsuffering.
kindness, goodness, faithfulness, meekness, and self-
control?

II. Testimonies

- I mentioned last week that I wanted to take some time
tonight to hear from you regarding some specific situations
or a specific example where either the Lord challenged you
and helped you apply these truths to a specific situation
- or a situation or example where you didn't apply these
truths but were convicted and afterward made it right

- now, this is open to men and women of any age, and let me
just say that I have two definite goals in mind here

- we're not trying to toot our own horns, obviously

- ours goals are:

1) to thank and praise the Lord for the direction He
gives us through His Word

2) to help us become more skilled at applying this
material by hearing real life situations where
others applied it

- I hope that helped us accomplish our goals of

#1 - thanking and praising the Lord for His direction
through His Word.

#2 - helping us become more skilled at applying this
material because we've heard about how others have
applied it to specific situations.

- now I'd like to another exercise that will help us
especially with that second goal

III. Identifying The Weeds And The Artificial Fruit

- one of the things I'd like us to leave this study with
is one or two components that we know we still need to
work on and still need to emphasize when we think about
growth

- Now we've been trying to identify those by asking a
series of "self-examining" kinds of questions each
evening
- I've also encouraged you to ask your spouse, co-
workers, and friends, which of these areas you need to
work on the most

- However, I think we need to factor in here that
God says our hearts are deceptive and desperately
wicked

- INPUT - what is the implication of that truth to our
ability to identify which of these areas need to be
changed? (we may think we're doing OK on a given
component when in fact its just an artificial
substitute)

- Because that’s true, I'd like us to take a few moments
now to brainstorm weeds and artificial fruit that
correspond to each fruit we've studied

- INPUT - when we talk about weeds, what are we talking
about? (characteristics that are exactly opposite)

- INPUT - when we talk about artificial fruit - what are
we talking about? (characteristics that appear to be
similar to the real fruit on the outside, but is in
fact on closer examination a worldly substitute - wax
fruit)

- Now here's the point - we're looking for things that
need to change - and we're asking ourselves two
questions:

1) Are there any obvious weeds that need to be rooted
out?

2) Is there any artificial fruit that needs to be
replaced?

Fruit Weeds Artificial Fruit

1. Love Hate, apathy conditional love,
friendly, but only with
friends

2. Joy despair, sorrow temporal joy, happiness
for the wrong reasons

3. Peace fear, anxiety, strife numbness, carelessness,
absence of conflict

4. Patience impatience, short-fused laziness,
worry insensitivity

5. Kindness malice nice, polite,
manipulative

6. Goodness wickedness, evil-doing hypocrisy,
misrepresentation

7. Faithfulness infidelity, untrustworthy intellectual
undependable agreement, half-
hearted, tacid
acceptance
8. Meekness arrogance, proud, bashful, false modesty
self-seeking, high- given easy to tears,
minded timidity

9. Self-control irresponsible monastic, self-
deprivation

- Now I'd like each of us to take a look at that list of 18
characteristics and say - which of those do I need to work
on the most?

- If I asked my spouse, what would he/she say?
- If I asked a friend....co-worker....my child?

- With that thought in mind, let's talk specifically about
what to do to maximize the potential to change in that
area.

IV. Applying The Put-Off Put-On Principle

- If I asked the question, what is the primary principle
for growth and change in the NT, I think most here
would be able to answer "the put off/put on principle.
- that principle is found in some of the most important
passages in the Bible about how a believer changes and
grows like Eph. 4:22-24, Col. 3, etc.
- we also know this concept as the principle of
replacement

- let me get your mind warmed up to this by asking "When
is a liar no longer a liar?"
- when is a thief no longer a thief?

- What I'd like to do now is run a couple of these
components through the put-off / put-on principle to
see how it will specifically help us change
- Let's start with the spirit's fruit of patience.
- now, for each of these, we could talk about habits of
thinking that need to be put of or put on, we could
talk about habits of behavior

- to try to keep that somewhat separate - let's start
with
- what are some possible habits of thinking that a
person struggling with patience would need to put
off?

- (my time is more important than someone
else's, I must get all these tasks done
today, why can't this child eat without
making a mess-after all, she is 15 months
old)

- what would these habits of thinking need to be
replaced with?

- what practical advice could you give to help
someone trying to conquer these habits of thinking?

- now let's try on of the artificial fruits - let's
try timidity

- habits of thinking that need to be put off?

- habits of thinking that need to be put on?

- habits of behaving that need to be put off?

- habits of behaving that need to be put on?

- the goal is to have each of us take the time necessary to
apply these principles to the area we need to change in
the most so we're doing all we can to grow in this
important area.

V. Our Hope of Change

- v. 24-25 - We don't have to!