SCRIPTURE LESSON.

THE FRUIT OF THE HOLY SPIRIT.

The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith. Meekness, temperance; against such there is no law. Gal. 5. 22-23.

Every branch in me that beareth not fruit he taketh away; and every branch that beareth fruit he purgeth it, that it may bring forth more fruit. I am the vine, ye are the branches; he that abideth in me and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit, for without me ye can do nothing. St. John 15. 2-5.

My well beloved hath a vineyard in a very fruitful hill. Isaiah 5, 1.

I beg you to notice carefully that the scriptural term is fruit, not fruits. We say fruits, but God says fruit and the difference is worldwide. “Every tree is known by its own fruit.” “A good tree bringeth forth good fruit,” not some good fruit and some bad fruit. “And a corrupt tree bringeth forth corrupt fruit.” “Every branch in me that beareth fruit he purgeth it that it may bring forth more fruit.” The fruit of the Spirit as described in the text has at least nine clusters, or nine qualities, but the fruit is one. There are other qualities that are not mentioned here, but the fruit is one. Any one of these clusters is just as truly a part of the fruit of the Spirit as any of the others. No one part of this fruit should be cultivated to the neglect of the other. The desire to see in our hearts but one of these clusters is a deception of the devil.

No one of these clusters is sufficient to meet all the demands of any human life and every quality needs the other qualities to give it tone and flavor. Love must be supported by faithfulness, meekness and self-control before it is seen to be perfect love that casteth out fear. If there is no meekness, nor faithfulness, nor self-control with love, then it is only childish love.

One serious mistake that Christians make is to expect the same cluster of the fruit of the Spirit under all circumstances; the same manifestations of the Spirit's indwelling under different trials and burdens of life. The virtues in plants are often diversified. In the winter the virtue is in the root. In the spring it is in the bud or the leaf, while in the summer it is in the flower or the fruit. So the fruit of the Spirit does not appear in the same way all the time, but sometimes in love or joy, at other times in faithfulness, long suffering or self control. There are many times when self control is the great evidence of the indwelling Spirit. When you are being imposed on, then self-control is needed. When you are tempted to gratify any of the desires or appetites at the sacrifice of rightness or duty, then self control is evidence that the Spirit is dwelling in you. Then there are times when long suffering is the only fruit of the Spirit that will meet the case. When things are turbulent, or belligerent, gentleness is the evidence of the Spirit’s indwelling. Gentleness will recommend a Christian in such times better than joy, though most people are careless about gentleness and are clamorous for joy. Then at other times of backsliding, faithfulness is the fruit of the Spirit. If you are always trying to bear one cluster of the fruit, you will find yourself frequently in great spiritual barrenness. Here in this meeting you may have great joy, but if you take that to be the special fruit you are to bear, when joy is gone you will say that the Holy Spirit is gone. If you say here in this house, “I have peace,” and think that is the only fruit of the Spirit, you may soon be in a place where peace is not so evident, but where faithfulness or long-suffering is needed and you will think the Spirit is gone when He is giving you a blessed manifestation of faithfulness, or long-suffering. If a man claims perfect love here and going home is impatient with his neighbor, his profession of love is discounted, but if he has gentleness that will confirm his love. If a man claims peace here and then is irritable at home his profession of peace is of no value, for the Holy Spirit who gives peace here is to give self-control at home. A person has “joy unspeakable and full of glory” in the house of God but does not have longsuffering with his enemies and all his profession of joy in the Lord is discredited.

I wish you would notice that it is not the fruit of the new Spirit, but the fruit of the Holy Spirit of which we speak. The new Spirit alone cannot bear fruit any more than the branch can bear fruit without the vine. “The branch cannot bear fruit except it abide in the vine.” Jesus taught this truth to the disciples when he said to them, “Without me ye can do nothing.” All the fruit of the Spirit is the natural outflow of the Spirit abiding in us, just as it was in Jesus. “If a man abide in me and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit.”

If these things are not so, it is simply the proof that we are not living in the Spirit. All the complaints that are made by ourselves, or by those around us, of unruly tempers, of selfishness, or feebleness or deadness, is simply the evidence that it is not yet understood, that to be a Christian is to be filled with the Spirit of Christ so that Christ will be living in me and I shall be living by the faith of the Son of God who loved me and gave Himself for me. We then may be fountains of love, fountains of peace, fountains of goodness, fountains of life, springing up and flowing out in streams of holy power wherever we may go. Do you not know that Jesus said to the woman of Samaria, “Whosoever drinketh the water that I shall give him shall never thirst, but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life.” John 4-13.

Take love, the first cluster. The business of every Christian is to reveal love. Jesus Christ was love incarnate. He clothed himself in flesh that he might reveal love to the world, and he sent his disciples into the world to carry on that same love life. Christians are to be love incarnated. How can this be done? How can we be possessed and permeated with love? This is the way.

I. The love of God is implanted in the heart when we are regenerated, but in that state love is limited or feeble. It is not that deep, holy consuming love for sinners that Jesus had. Jesus sheds forth the Holy Spirit and that Spirit coming into us, sheds forth the love of God in our hearts. Then the love of God for the redemption of men will reach to the poorest, lowest and farthest heathen. It will be as unlimited in us as it was in Jesus Christ. Our capacities will be filled with love.

When the Spirit abides in us there will be compassion for unsaved people, inexpressible yearning for sinners just as there was in Jesus. When the leper met Him he said, “Lord, if thou wilt, thou canst make me clean/’ and Jesus, moved with compassion, put forth his hand and touched Him saying, “I will, be thou clean.” When he saw the great hungry multitude, he was moved with compassion and gave them all the food they needed and healed all that had need of healing. When he looked upon Jerusalem he was so moved with compassion that he wept aloud and cried out saying, “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, which killest the prophets and stonest them that are sent unto thee; how often would I have gathered thy children together, as a hen doth gather her brood under her wings, and ye would not!” Thus if the Spirit dwells in you, you will see sinful men, sick men, hungry men, drunken men, and long to save them and help them.

Did you ever hear the story of the Baptist Zulu Mission in Africa? Mr. Stanley speaks of it as the greatest mission in the world. The founder, Mr. Richards, was there seven years without a convert. One Sunday he told them that something was wrong, either he was not a missionary, or that he was not preaching the gospel, or else the gospel was not the power of God unto the salvation of the Zulus, and said he, “I will tell you next Sunday what is the matter.” He and his wife read the Bible, prayed and fasted and the next Sunday the house was full to hear his conclusion. After the service he said: “I am sent as a missionary. The gospel is the power of God unto salvation, but I have not been preaching the gospel, but the law and morality. I will now try to preach the gospel and am going to live it.” And so he began at Matthew to tell the good news about Jesus and when he came to the Sermon on the Mount he read this sentence, “Give to him that asketh of thee and from him that would borrow of thee, turn not thou away.” He gave it the usual definition, but they shook their heads for they were all beggars. “Come back next Sunday and I will tell you exactly what it means.” The next Sunday he said it meant what it said, and if they wanted anything he had and would ask him he would give it to them, and if they wanted to borrow he would lend them anything he had. After the benediction they went to his home and took everything that he had except one lounge. The next morning two Zulus met on the corner and one said, “Let us go to the home of the missionary and get something.” They went to his house and he gave them the lounge. When they were carrying out the lounge, one of them was so convicted by the Spirit that he began to cry. They knelt down and prayed and he was converted. In two years 7,000 more were led to Christ.

II. Joy is the second cluster of the fruit of the Spirit. This is kin to love. The joy of the Lord is your strength. Joy is love, hopping, skipping and jumping out on a green pasture. Joy is love, capering, leaping and praising God for his unmerited favors. God wants us to be joyful.

The disciples were so full of joy at Pentecost that they were accused of being on a drunken frolic. Jesus had told them to ask and receive that their joy might be full. They had been asking and receiving and their joy was unspeakable and full of glory.

Nothing hurts the church more than the wilfulness, sourness, and foolish murmuring that some people are passing off for Christianity. I always pity them. They have that peculiar look half way between resignation and martyrdom. They do not seem to see the difference between righteousness and biliousness. You cannot tell whether they have religion or dyspepsia, but you know they have something awful. Send one of these sad, cadaverous, pessimistic Christians out after young sinners, and you might as well send a hearse to the front gate and ask the young people to crawl in the hearse and have a buggy ride.

Since I have been in this evangelistic work an undertaker in the church I had served was going to the depot with a corpse and having an hour to spare stopped in front of my gate and came in to visit with the family. The children were scared and ran up stairs. The telephone rang and the neighbors said, “What’s the matter, is anybody dead?” Another knocked at the kitchen door and said, “Oh, has your husband been killed?” They didn’t ask him to come again and were glad when he drove the hearse away.

III. Peace is also a Fruit of the Spirit. This is not merely peace with God, but the peace of God that flows out from the abiding Spirit. The Holy Spirit can keep the soul in peace, no matter what may be the external circumstances. No matter what worries, what perplexities, what cares, what dangers, what griefs, what sorrows, what slanders, what persecutions. No change of providence, no revolution in social affairs, no family troubles, no financial crash, can destroy the peace of God in the soul. “Great peace have they which love thy law and nothing shall offend them.”

The early church had this peace to a remarkable extent. Take the case of Peter in the hands of Herod. There is no such name as Herod in the New Testament times. Herod, the grandfather, killed all the little children that he might kill Jesus. Herod, the father, had killed John the Baptist, and now Herod Agrippa had killed James, the brother of John, and when he saw that it pleased the Jews he arrested Peter, put him in chains and then in prison. The keepers are at the doors and sixteen soldiers are guarding him. His fate is sealed. He is doomed to die. He is to be murdered. Now, pull aside the curtain and look into Peter’s cell. Is he walking the room in agony? Is he lamenting his fate? Is he sending out petitions to implore Herod for mercy? No, no. When Herod would have brought him forth, that same night Peter was sleeping between two soldiers and bound with two chains. He was sleeping so soundly that the angel broke off his chains, lifted him up, and walked him out the gate, then tapped him on the head and said, “Wake up, Peter, wake up.” As the loving mother takes up the frightened child, smoothes his hair, kisses his cheeks and wipes away his tears, singing some lullaby of love till he sleeps in peace, “Hush my dear, lie still and slumber, Holy angels guard thy bed.” So God the Almighty took Peter in his arms saying, “Sleep, my son, sleep.“ These same great arms will clasp every trusting soul and give it the peace which passeth all understanding.

IV. Long Suffering is Also a Cluster of the Fruit of the Spirit. Long suffering is simply patience in exercise. Patience long drawn out. Patience repeating itself. Long suffering is ability to endure any provocation and affliction. Again and again Jesus taught the disciples that they must have long suffering. “How often/' said one of them, “can my brother sin against me and I forgive him? Seven times?“ “Nay,” said Jesus, “not seven times, but seventy times seven“ — that is, as long as he needs forgiveness. Paul had this spirit of long suffering. “Of the Jews five time received I forty stripes save one.“ Then hear him say “My heart's desire and prayer to God for Israel is that they may be saved.“ “I say the truth in Christ, I lie not, my conscience bearing me witness in the Holy Ghost that I have great heaviness and continual sorrow in my heart, for I could wish that myself were accursed from Christ for my brethren, my kinsmen, according to the flesh.“ That is I wish Christ would let me be crucified for the Jews.

V. Gentleness Is Another Cluster of the Fruit of the Spirit. Paul says, “The servants of the Lord must be gentle unto all men apt to teach.” This grace has special reference to teachers. In commending Silas and himself, Paul said: “We were gentle among you even as a nursing mother nourisheth her children.” James says, “The wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, easy to be entreated, full of mercy and good fruits.” Those who have wisdom (to impart, must be gentle. Self-willed masters, teachers or parents are never able to impart wisdom to those over whom they are placed. I beseech you by the gentleness of Christ, see to it that you bear this fruit. Preachers and evangelists need great gentleness. What gentleness Jesus manifested toward his disciples. He did not scold them when he had to repeat lessons of faith over and over to them. He was not offended and sulky because he was not preferred to Barrabas. He did not say harsh, rough things because his enemies preferred false charges against him. He did not complain when they put an old robe and crown of thorns on his head. He did not murmur nor rebel when the cruel nails went crushing through his hands and feet, but he said, “Father forgive them for they know not what they do.” Oh, gentle Jesus meek and mild. Give me thy mind as an abiding presence and thy gentleness shall make me great.

VI. Goodness is another cluster of the Fruit of the Spirit. Goodness is not something to look at or to display in a front window, or on a sign board, or in a newspaper, but it is always in connection with usefulness. When a man has real goodness he is not always flapping his wings in the face of the public. If you look at it, it will spoil. We all have seen some Christians who have been praised too much and looking at themselves they have soured. Goodness is Christianity on foot loaded with blessings. Goodness must bless somebody. Its hands must be full of blessings. Good cheer for the troubled, courage for the weak, bread for the hungry, clothes for the naked, comfort for the feeble minded, pardon for the sinful and life for the dying. Suppose people were dying of thirst and an artesian well of pure water was opened in the city. Where would the people go? To the well, of course, but if they should go to the well fifty times and find no water, would you blame them if they stayed away?

The world is dying for the water of life and they have heard that we have it in our churches, and they have come to receive it, if possible, but alas, so many of us are thirsty, feverish, anxious, murmuring, fretting and worrying, that they go away saying, not there my soul, not there. It is time we were asking God not to bless us, but to make us blessings to others.

VII. Faithfulness is another cluster of the Fruit of the Spirit. This is not the grace of faith by which all men may be saved, nor the gift of faith by which great things may be accomplished, but faithfulness which is not a gift, but fruit.

When the City of Pompeii was buried, many people perished in different places, but when the city was exhumed they were found again. Some were found on their feet in the streets as if running for safety; some in deep vaults where they had hid for security; Others were in the highest chambers where they climbed to escape suffocation from the ashes and lava. But where were the Roman sentinels found? They found them at the city gates with their hands holding the spear and their faces toward the mountain. There they stood while the heavens threatened them, while the earth shook beneath them, while the lava rolled over them and, submerged 'the city, and there after a thousand years had rolled away they were found as an evidence of their faithfulness in time of peril. When the Holy Spirit dwells in a man, he will be faithful, faithful as a neighbor or a friend, faithful to his promises and pledges as a Christian. In the life of Jesus faithfulness glows from his very youth. “Wist ye not that I must be about my Father’s business. I must work the works of Him that sent me while it is day.” Tired and weary at the well of Jacob, he rose above all prejudice and caste saying: “My

meat is to do the will of Him that sent me.” Then coming to the end of his life he said, “I have glorified Thee on the earth. I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do.” Faithful to the last breath of life, to the last syllable of his history, to the last moment of his time, to the last drop of his blood.

God wants us to be faithful to the church, oh Christian men. There is no vow you ever made, that is so sacred and holy as the one you made at God’s altar to the church, the Body of Jesus. Take all your private vows and vows at the marriage altar and all your lodge vows, twist and bind them all together, but they are not as holy and sacred as this vow that you have made at God’s altar, and the Spirit is sent from heaven to keep you faithful to that vow.

VIII. Meekness is another cluster of the fruit of the Spirit. We hear much today of our rights — as Christians. I wish we could hear more about meekness in the Christians. Jesus says, “I am meek and lowly in heart.” “Blessed are the meek.” The Holy Spirit is symbolized by the healing oil, by the peaceful dove and by the gentle dew. A man full of the Holy Spirit may be led as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb so he will not open his mouth. This was true of the apostles. They 'were mocked and scourged, stoned and imprisoned and yet in it all they rejoiced that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for his name. There was no anger or bitterness, no wrath or retaliation. Many of the epistles were written in dungeons and prisons, yet there is no word of revenge nor vindictiveness. No diamond cut diamond. This may be true of Christians to-day. The Spirit of Nemesis must be driven out of them. All bitterness and strife, all malice and guile, all hypocricies and envies and all evil speaking must be forever gone. Where this is lacking it is simply proof that the Holy Spirit is not received as the Lord has given him.

IX. Temperance is the last cluster of the fruit of the Spirit. Temperance in the scriptures does not mean what we mean by temperance today. We have narrowed the meaning of the word into abstinence. Then we have specialized it into prohibition; then we have localized it into party prohibition. But in the scripture the word means self-control. Not abstinence from intoxication, but self control in body, soul and spirit.

Every ship on the seas of earth has a certain flag that is kept for use. It is not the flag of the country to which the boat belongs. It is not a flag of rank to signify what officer controls the boat. It is not a flag to signify a man-of-war, or merchantman. No, it is the same kind of a flag on every ship, so that when the machinery is broken and the boat is drifting that flag is lifted to the breeze, signifying “Not under control/’ How many flags of that kind are floating over the little vessels of human life. When the young man goes into saloons and wastes his money he floats the flag, “Not under control/’ When this other young man spends his money for cigars or cigarettes he puts up that flag, “Not under control.” I asked a book merchant in one of my charges, how much his store was worth. “$5,000.” How much have you wasted in smoking cigars? “More than $5,000” How much cleaner are you? Not so clean. How much stronger? Not so strong. For thirty years he had floated this flag “Not under control.” I see a man — sulky and cold, thinking himself to be something when he is nothing, and I see the flag “Not under control.” Patience would be there. I hear a man using short, snappy words and putting in some electric flashes. I see the flag waving “Not under control,” and in all these kind of cases if that keeps on disaster will come at the end.

This grace is given last not because it is the least, but because it belongs to all and is all important. This is the salt of all the other graces. It is the preserver of love; the safeguard of joy; the nourisher of peace; the support of long-suffering; the mother of gentleness and meekness. If the body, soul and spirit are without self control, not a single grace can grow. Instead of love there will be enmity; instead of joy there will be sorrow; instead of peace there will be contention and strife; instead of long suffering there will be irritation; instead of gentleness there will be harshness. Goodness will be supplanted by selfishness; faithfulness by disobedience and meekness by rebellion against God.

Our physical well being, our mental worth, our moral development, our emotional happiness, our spiritual tranquility all depend on the self-control of body, soul and spirit.

The Spirit has been given us that every Christian might abstain from every form of self-indulgence, so that whether in word or deed, whether in eating or drinking or whatsoever he doeth, he might do all to the glory of God.

These are the nine clusters of the fruit of the Spirit. What beautiful clusters they are that the Spirit intends to bring forth in every one of our lives! Perfect love to God and man! Joy inexpressible and full of glory! Peace that passeth all understanding! Long suffering with joyfulness! Gentleness without softness! Goodness without insipidity! Faithfulness without stubbornness! Meekness without murmurings! Self control in abstaining from every form of evil, never lifted up with increase, or cast down with loss — what beautiful clusters! Let us endeavor to bear them all by receiving and abiding in the Holy Spirit.