The fruit of the Spirit is what we are harvesting in our lives. What am I harvesting in my own life?

If I love Jesus, why do I still battle the very familiar evidence of life in the flesh (sinful nature) at times?

It is a matter of what we are feeding. What I think we battle sometimes is the “list.” We focus on the wrong things.

First, we may focus on what not to do. That’s like telling someone NOT to think of the pink elephant. We think about what not to think about… so we think about it. It’s a vicious cycle.

But a second problem still plagues us. We try and think about the list. We think about the fruit of the Spirit… or the harvest of what results from life in the Spirit. So, we want to check off the list.

“Today, I had love. CHECK.”

“Today, I had patience. CHECK.”

And on down the list. Hopefully we checked off more than we left blank.

It misses the point. It’s not about self-producing fruit. It’s like being an orange tree and trying to command yourself to start putting out apples.

What needs to be fed in our lives… where our FOCUS needs to be… is life in the Spirit. 

Living in the Spirit is keeping in step with the Spirit.

When my life and my field of view are filled up with the things of the Kingdom, and the pursuit of the King, the junk of this world fades. So, I still struggle with the battle. I still find myself dealing with the junk of the sinful nature. The key, however, is not to focus on what NOT to do… or go to my check off list of what “to do.” The key is to ask forgiveness, turn my gaze back to the King, and keep following.

When I am filling my being with the Word, with worship, with a desire to keep on learning the principles of the Kingdom, I have less and less space to be consumed with thinking about the stuff of this sinful nature. I feed what needs to be fed, and I starve what needs to be starved.

Feast at the Kingdom table spread for you.