I am continuing with the Fruit of the Spirit series In case you missed them, you can find them here...
Greetings from sunny and
warm Oregon! We are just beginning summer and the sun has been shining every
day. We are finally at the end of the list of the fruits of the Spirit….
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness,
goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.
Galations 5:22
What is self-control? It is the quality that allows
you to stop yourself from doing things you want to do, but might not be in your
best interest. For example…maybe there is a little bit of yummy food and you
are supposed to just eat a little and leave the rest for your brother (or
sister or family member). You want to eat it all, but self-control allows you
to just eat your portion.
Or maybe you want to tell another friend a story about
someone and the story might not be very nice. You really want to share this
story, but if you have self-control, you will keep it to yourself and protect
the virtue
of your friend.
Personally I love to read books. I would love to read
for several hours every day, but there are too many other responsibilities that
I have and I must see to them. I need to do housework, I need to cook for my
family and I need to spend time with my kids and husband. I exercise
self-control by only reading for 30 minutes each day, and then making sure I
have time to get my work done.
God wants us to have self-control He wants us to know
our limits and boundaries and to stay within those so that we can maintain our
integrity. It’s another great way to put others ahead of ourselves.
In what ways can you exercise self-control?
I have loved going through the fruits of the Spirit
with you. I have learned so much from writing these letters to you. I would
love to know which fruit of the Spirit gives you the most difficulty in
producing. I will be praying that God would give you opportunities to display
all these fruits in your life.
I think that when the fruits of the Spirit are
displayed in our lives, others who don’t know God can see that we are different
from the rest of the world. Hopefully our love, joy, peace, patience, kindness,
goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control will point others right to
God!
