Fruit of the Spirit

By contrast, the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, ²³gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against such things. Galatians 5:22-23

There is no law against these things.  For some reason I find this phrase in scripture quite humorous and revealing.  Why would there be a law against any of those things?  I know that when Paul talks about the law he is talking about the Old Testament laws that guided the faith and community life of the Jewish people, but can you imagine if there were laws that forbid such things?  It is unlawful to love others. It is unlawful to have peace and patience.  It is unlawful to be generous or faithful, to be gentle or exhibit self-control. Hard to imagine that these ultra positive, relationship building and sustaining virtues would ever be considered against the law. Yet, Paul adds this tidbit.

They key to understanding this passage is these virtues are the fruit of the spirit.  The holy spirit produces these qualities in us.  On our own we function like love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control are against the law because we rarely do them on our own.  Left to our own devices and agendas we will rarely love others, we are anxious and need to control, we will lack patience with others, we will hold back and do not give, we will not have the courage and strength to be faithful, we will treat people harshly, and we will lack self-control with our appetites and urges.  Without the intervening of the spirit, we cannot produce the fruit of the spirit.  We need God's presence in our life to live out the best of ourselves.  We need the spirit in our life to lead us to a life worth living.  Without God and the work of the spirit in our life we function like virtues are illegal.  So let us submit ourselves to the spirit's work and allow God to lead us.