Fruits of the Spirit

You may be familiar with the term Fruit of the Spirit. Typically, this is a phrase used in conjunction with religion. Christians hold onto the passage Galatians that lists mine beahviors as being fruits of the spirit. 

These behaviors are the fruit of a healthy spirit. Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, and self-control. Yet, you don’t have to be religious to recognize the value of these fruits. Nor do you need to religious to value and nurture your spiritual health.

First, where did this phrase even come from? The Greek word that is translated to fruit literally means edible fruit. However, it’s also translated as profit, deed, result, offspring or action. In our society, we see bearing fruits as a positive. When you plant something, and it bears fruits it’s obvious that you have done well. This fruit has bloomed, it has grown, and reached a point for you to harvest because you nurtured it.

We’re not all green thumbs, though, so to put it in a modern context, we use fruits now as a way to communicate that our efforts have reaped results. You might not be out cherry- picking, but look at this – paycheck, completed project, child, etc. These are all evidence of your work.

So, when we talk about fruits of the spirit, that’s what we’re talking about. You can see that there is no need to be religious to recognize the fruits of the spirit. Your spirit health matters.

For you to bear fruit, you need to eradicate those unhealthy habits and stressful events and situations that are fueling an unhealthy spirit. How can your spirit work in your life if you are stifling it? It just can’t.

Your old self, the one that lacks spirit health, has to be put aside in order to truly nurture your wellbeing and freedom. There are several ways to do this, which we will address later in this eCourse.