Pastor Raymond Osborne

The Fruit of the Spirit Series Message #1
�Walking in Step With the Spirit�
Galatians 5:16-26

This morning I am doing something that I don�t often do; I am straying from the assigned lection passages for the next several weeks to begin a series of messages on �The Fruit of the Spirit.�

For this series we are going to adopt a mantra that comes from the text that Lacy read to us this morning. It is Galatians 5:25,

Many of us can remember the day that the Holy Spirit of God convinced us of our need to have a relationship with God through the Son, Jesus Christ.

Unfortunately, over the years the �church� has done a poor job of discipleship. We have rightly discerned that our primary task is to get people to Jesus, but we have often failed to teach people what it is that we are suppose to do AFTER we establish that relationship.

The Scriptures unequivocally point to the Christian life as a life that is to be bearing fruit.

In John�s gospel Jesus says, �4Remain in me, and I will remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me.

5"I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. 6If anyone does not remain in me, he is like a branch that is thrown away and withers; such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned.

15I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master's business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you. 16You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit--fruit that will last.� (John 15:4-6, 15-16a NIV)

Jesus is very explicit isn�t he? As Christian people we are to what? Bear fruit! But what kind of fruit are we to be producing? Apples? Oranges? Olives? Bananas? Tomatoes?

While all of those are delighting to the palate, these are not what Jesus had in mind. The kinds of fruit we are to be producing are found in Galatians 5:22-23, �the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.� (NIV)

Last Sunday evening we had a glorious time in this sanctuary! Many walked up to me and commented that this place was filled with the Holy Spirit! For me, it was like a one night revival! When I left here I was ready to march on hell with a water pistol!

A dear friend of mine, Dr. Paul Brunner tells of an experience that he had on a cruise. Now this wasn�t a Templeton Gospel singing cruise; this was just a regular old cruise. He told me that the ship had twenty-some bars on it and they were all open and filled to capacity.

It was his night to sit at the �Captain�s Table.� As he sat there a young woman came stumbling up to the table who had apparently visited at least half of those bars. In a very confidential manner the captain leaned over to Dr. Brunner�s ear and said, �I know you are a minister. Would you mind seeing that this young lady gets back to her cabin safely?� Dr. Brunner said, �Well, I don�t know. She�s a very beautiful woman I best ask my wife!� Mrs. Brunner of course trusted her husband and off he went to get this woman back to her cabin.

As they went up the stairs the woman looks at Dr. Brunner and says, �Honey you�re passionate!� To which Dr. Brunner says, �Maam, I�m a Southern Baptist pastor and I�m just trying to get you back to you cabin!�

They get to the top of the steps and the woman again whispers into Dr. Brunner�s ear, �Sweetheart you are passionate!� To which Dr. Brunner says very firmly, �Madam I have told you that I am a Southern Baptist pastor, and what�s more I am a VERY HAPPILY married man!�

A little further down the hall the young woman says, �Darling you�re PASSIONATE!� Well, Dr. Brunner had about all of this he could take! He spoke even more firmly to her with a bit of frustration and anger in his voice, �Madam! I�ve had about all of this I can stand! I tell you again, I�m a Southern Baptist pastor, I�m very happily married! I am simply doing a favor for the captain and trying to get you to your cabin!�

To which the young woman says, �Well that�s what I�ve been trying to tell you! You�re passin' it!�

Beloved the Scripture plainly says, �18Do not get drunk on wine, but be filled with the Spirit.� (Ephesians 5:18 NIV)

As Christians, you and I are to not only be filled with the Spirit, but we are to be walking with the Spirit, and producing in our lives the fruit of the Spirit!

Now let me warn you before we begin getting into these messages in the weeks that follow, there is absolutely no way we can produce the fruit of the Spirit in our lives, on our own, with little or no effort. Producing fruit is not an easy task! In fact growing anything, except my waistline is not an easy task for me! But we have a couple promises we must keep at the forefront of our minds as we take this journey together.

First, Jesus tells us that �with God all things are possible.� (Matthew 19:26 NIV)

We can�t do this alone! We must be looking to God daily to make this happen!

Secondly, remember the words of Jesus I shared earlier, Jesus wants us to know HE is the VINE and apart from the VINE we cannot produce the good fruit he desires to see in our lives!

I will never forget the time Stephanie had a basket of wooden cookies lying in a basket in our home. They looked just like the real thing! My Mother and Father came to visit us in our home and my Dad eyeballed those wooden cookies! Bless his heart, he had no idea that they were fakes! They looked like real cookies! He reached into that basket, picked one up and the next thing we heard was, �OUCH!� He bit right down on that wooden cookie! I kept that cookie, teeth marks and all for a long time! I have no idea whatever became of them, but they are no longer there.

That�s a pretty good illustration of what happens when we try to bear fruit apart from Jesus. All we have is a pretty good, yet imperfect imitation of the real thing! There is nothing that can ever take the place of a relationship with Jesus Christ as Savior of our lives, and there is absolutely no way we will ever produce the fruit of the Spirit apart from him. It just can�t be done.

As we travel together through this series we will stumble across some riches in the Word of God that are going to help us along the way. Nothing grows without proper treatment and our lives will not grow without proper nurturing and care. With all creation there must be a beginning point, and the beginning point for us here today is Jesus!

Paul and Timothy�s words to the Church of Corinth were,
�17Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come! 18All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: 19that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting men's sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. 20We are therefore Christ's ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ's behalf: Be reconciled to God.� (2 Corinthians 5:17-20 NIV)

This is the beginning message in our series and this is the beginning point of growth in the Christian faith, growth in the Spirit, and producing the fruit of the Spirit!

Let us pray:
Lord Jesus, we come to you for there is nowhere else we can go! We cannot even begin to produce the fruit of the Spirit in our lives until we have come to you! We come to you Lord Jesus seeking all that you have to give us. Help us even now to begin producing the fruit of the Spirit in our lives. Help us to keep in step with you Holy Spirit. It�s in your name we humbly pray and come seeking. Amen.

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