Galatians 5:13-26

Galatians 5:13-26 … This passage contains one of the great memory verses of Scripture: Galatians 5:22-23 … “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.” The passage points out a spiritual truth that is important to know. We have a sinful nature. We were born with it. It’s a fact of life. But the believer has been born again and has a spiritual nature. The old sinful nature is still there … Paul calls it “the flesh” (Galatians 5:16-17) … that’s your sinful nature. But you have a new nature … a spiritual nature in Christ Jesus. Either could manifest itself in your (or my) behavior, but (here’s the struggle), we can overcome the sinful nature and live by the Spirit. Paul referred to this as a “war” between these two inherent natures in Romans 7:23 and Peter does as well in 1 Peter 2:11.

The text gives us the attributes of our sin nature (5:19-21) and the encouragement of the passage is to live and walk by the indwelling Spirit of God, our new nature in Christ … and those are the fruits of the Spirit of Galatians 5:22-23. That’s the new nature in Christ … that’s what we want to evidence in our lives and in our walk. That’s why it’s a great memory verse and those attributes are things we can meditate on and emulate in our interactions with every one we meet. Love … joy … peace … patience … kindness … goodness … faithfulness … gentleness … self control.