Paul's admonition to people who follow Jesus was to recognize that life is lived in spirit and our spirits are empowered by the Holy Spirit of God. So then, joy and peace and love and all good things like these are the product, the fruit, of God's Spirit at work in us and in conjunction with our spirits.
The struggle of life then becomes the spiritual battle of surrender: the willingness to surrender our spirit to the Spirit of God and be transformed into the completeness of who we were created to be, spiritually.
In Ephesians, Paul says we are in a spiritual battle against powers of darkness. In Galatians, he describes the struggle as being between the Spirit and our own self-serving nature. With both of these images in mind, we are able to more fully feel and understand the internal tug-of-war that works on each one of us.
Paul encourages the Christ followers to live by the Spirit and also then to walk by the Spirit. Do not give way to our own self-serving nature or to similar tempting forces that come from around us. Rather, give way completely to the Holy Spirit of the One True God who is nudging, whispering, or otherwise calling us all to know and to love God and then to offer that same love to the world and the people around us.
Do you have any such internal tug-of-war? God may just be at work in your life.
Is there any self-serving, or possibly detrimental, characteristic about you that really doesn't belong? You have an invitation to live and walk by the Holy Spirit of God and see the fruit of your life improve.
Galatians 5:16-25 (The Message Paraphrase)
My counsel is this: Live freely, animated and motivated by God's Spirit. Then you won't feed the compulsions of selfishness. For there is a root of sinful self-interest in us that is at odds with a free spirit, just as the free spirit is incompatible with selfishness. These two ways of life are antithetical, so that you cannot live at times one way and at times another way according to how you feel on any given day. Why don't you choose to be led by the Spirit and so escape the erratic compulsions of a law-dominated existence.
It is obvious what kind of life develops out of trying to get your own way all the time: repetitive, loveless, cheap sex; a stinking accumulation of mental and emotional garbage; frenzied and joyless grabs for happiness; trinket gods; magic-show religion; paranoid loneliness; cutthroat competition; all-consuming-yet-never-satisfied wants; a brutal temper; an impotence to love or be loved; divided homes and divided lives; small-minded and lopsided pursuits; the vicious habit of depersonalizing everyone into a rival; uncontrolled and uncontrollable addictions; ugly parodies of community. I could go on.
This isn't the first time I have warned you, you know. If you use your freedom this way, you will not inherit God's kingdom.
But what happens when we live God's way? He brings gifts into our lives, much the same way that fruit appears in an orchard—things like affection for others, exuberance about life, serenity. We develop a willingness to stick with things, a sense of compassion in the heart, and a conviction that a basic holiness permeates things and people. We find ourselves involved in loyal commitments, not needing to force our way in life, able to marshal and direct our energies wisely.
Legalism is helpless in bringing this about; it only gets in the way. Among those who belong to Christ, everything connected with getting our own way and mindlessly responding to what everyone else calls necessities is killed off for good—crucified.
Since this is the kind of life we have chosen, the life of the Spirit, let us make sure that we do not just hold it as an idea in our heads or a sentiment in our hearts, but work out its implications in every detail of our lives.
