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The fruit of the spirit in Galatians 5:22-23 (NIV) is love, joy, peace, patience (or forbearance) kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.
These nine fruits, or godly characteristics, grow in a Christian’s life thanks to the work of the Holy Spirit. In Galatians, Paul explains that when we walk in step with the Spirit, good fruit will grow as the result. This means being in unity with the will of God, seeking to live in obedience to his ways out of love for him and trust in his wisdom and goodness.
We don’t gain the fruits of the Spirit by our own efforts; they’re a natural outworking of us putting our faith in Jesus and letting the Holy Spirit change our hearts. The more closely we depend upon God, the more we grow in his characteristics.
And why are the fruit of the Spirit important? Because as we grow in godliness, patience, kindness etc, our character becomes more Christlike. We show servant-hearted love to others, we’re able to be joyful in sorrowful circumstances and we can display gentleness and self-control under pressure.
Is it fruit or fruits?
In Galatians, Paul writes the fruit of the Spirit is… and then he goes on to list nine qualities. So, these are all characteristics of the fruit that flourishes in a Christian’s life when they live in obedience and faith, not trying to follow a list of rules, but trying to know and love God more deeply.
Just as in John 15, Jesus says that when believers ‘remain’ or ‘abide’ in him that is how they will ‘bear much fruit.’ The fruit that comes from faith is a natural outworking of an ever-deepening dependence on Christ and God’s work of grace in the believer’s life.
What is the fruit of the Holy Spirit & how do we get it?
There are nine characteristics that make up the fruit of the Spirit. The Christian believer can’t be satisfied with thinking ‘I’m good at joy, not so good at patience’! All these characteristics will grow over time, by God’s grace, the more we allow God to be first in our hearts.
- Love
- Joy
- Peace
- Forbearance (Patience)
- Kindness
- Goodness
- Faithfulness
- Gentleness
- Self-control
How can we bear fruit of the Spirit?
We’re not fruitful by following the law, turning ‘good living’ into a burden of rule-keeping. Instead, our growth in godly qualities – the fruit of the Spirit – all comes about by living fully in the grace of God’s love and kindness for each of his children.
We need to first put our trust in Jesus. This means acknowledging that we’ve done wrong – we’ve disobeyed and ignored God, and we’ve hurt people around us. We need to admit that the only way we can seek God’s forgiveness is by allowing Jesus to take our rightful punishment in our place, which he did willingly by dying on the cross. Jesus took our punishment so that all who trust in him can be fully forgiven.
Once we’ve been forgiven, and given new life as children of God, we need to ask for the Holy Spirit’s help to continue to grow as God intends.
All of this is a work of grace – God’s undeserved blessing that flows from his love for us. He helps us, by His Spirit, to grow into the people he always intended us to be – people who reflect his own characteristics of love and kindness, patience and faithfulness.
We can cultivate the fruit of the Spirit by:
Spending time in God’s Word. We can prioritise our relationship with God by praying, worshipping and reading the Bible. In Romans 12, Paul writes ‘be transformed by the renewing of your minds.’
Asking the Holy Spirit to help us become more like Jesus. We can actively ask the Spirit to change us and grow our hearts in love, joy, peace, patience and kindness.
Practising living out the fruit of the Spirit. We can put our faith into action, following in Jesus’ footsteps by caring for the poor and loving our neighbour.
What’s the historical and cultural context of Galatians?
The original context to the fruit of the Spirit passage of scripture is that Paul was speaking to the church in Galatia, a region in north central Asia Minor (modern day Turkey). His letter was likely written to the churches he had established during his first missionary journey (Acts 13:1-14:28). The original scripture wasn’t written in English; the apostle Paul wrote in Greek.
This group of new Christians from a Gentile background had responded to the gospel, abandoning their worship of idols. However, in Galatians we find them already in crisis. The Galatians are being preyed upon by a group called the Judaizers who were teaching that you must obey the law of Moses in addition to trusting in Jesus. The apostle Paul’s letter, written in approximately A.D. 48, seeks to correct this false doctrine, explaining God’s truth to the churches in Galatia that it is by grace alone that we’re saved.
What is the meaning of each characteristic of the fruit of the Spirit?
Love
In his fruit of the Spirit commentary, John Piper explains that “love is mentioned first because it is comprehensive of the other fruits of the spirit”.[1] The eight fruits that Paul lists after love are descriptions of what a love-filled life looks like.
The Greeks had different words for different types of love and here Paul deliberately uses agape which means an unconditional, unselfish love for others.
Agape isn’t the fluttering of emotions our culture often describes as love; it’s a choice. Agape love is the Christ-like character the Holy Spirit grows in us as we walk in step with Jesus.
Looking at examples of the fruit of the Spirit throughout the Bible, 1 John 4:16 tells us that this kind of love reflects God’s own nature.
“And so we know and rely on the love God has for us. God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them.”
How to develop love as a fruit of the Spirit
To cultivate love as the fruit of the Spirit, we need to ask for God’s help in loving Him and loving our neighbour. As Jesus clearly calls us to do in Matthew 22: 37-38, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind,” and “love your neighbour as yourself.”
We need the Spirit’s help! It’s a joy of the Christian life that we can ask for the Holy Spirit’s enabling power so we can put daily sacrificial agape love into practice. We need to ask God to help us honour others above ourselves, following Christ’s explanation when he said, “Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.” (John 15:13)
One way we can put agape love into practice is by caring for our neighbour and coming alongside a child in poverty through Compassion child sponsorship. When you sponsor a child with Compassion, you demonstrate the fruit of the Spirit to a child living in extreme vulnerability.
Follow God’s example, therefore, as dearly loved children and walk in the way of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.
Joy
The joy Paul is writing about in the fruit of the Spirit passage isn’t a personality type or the absence of sorrow. We know this because Jesus himself mourned and expressed deep sorrow after the death of his friend Lazarus (John 11:35).
“Do not grieve, for the joy of the Lord is your strength.”
Instead, the joy Paul writes of as a fruit of the Spirit is an inner contentment that isn’t dependent on our outward circumstances. As Paul explains in 2 Corinthians 6, despite “troubles, hardships and distresses,” we can be “sorrowful but always rejoicing.”
How to practice Joy?
To unpack how we can practise both joy and peace as fruit of the Spirit, John Piper points us to Romans 15:13.
Here Paul writes, “May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.” When we are saved, we receive the Holy Spirit, who begins to produce the fruit of the Spirit in our lives. The development and outworking of this fruit depends on our obedience and faith. As we joyfully follow Jesus, the Holy Spirit works within us, transforming us and making the characteristics of this fruit—such as love, joy, and peace—evident in our lives.
Peace
Although the Greek word for peace is eirene, named after the Greek goddess, Paul is much more connected to the Hebrew word, shalom.
Shalom can be defined as wholeness, completeness, victory, and harmony in one’s inner being. It’s the absence of war/conflict and the presence of wholeness and right relationships. We know this “shalom” peace when we first trust in Christ and are reconciled to God. It then grows in our lives as a fruit of the spirit as the Holy Spirit gradually shapes our character. We learn that the peace we receive from God protects us and transcends our circumstances. As Philippians 4:7 explains:
“And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.”
Being in prison and under constant watch, Paul certainly knew what it was like to be guarded! Perhaps this is why he uses the phrase to explain how peace as a fruit of the spirit can protect our hearts and our minds.
Developing Peace
Being Spirit-filled can give us peace, even in the most turbulent of times. We can practise trusting in Christ, consciously making a decision to keep following him and choosing to worship despite the challenges we face. The gospel accounts of Jesus calming the storm remind us that Christ is always with us and can bring calm to the fiercest wind and waves.
We can also develop peace as a fruit of the Spirit by cultivating peace in our relationships. Just as Christ has restored our relationship to our Father God, we can pray for the Holy Spirit to bring unity and right-relationship amongst those in our families, churches, workplaces and communities.
“What causes fights and quarrels among you? Don’t they come from your desires that battle within you.”
Forbearance (Patience/longsuffering)
This fruit of the Spirit can be translated as patience, endurance, constancy, steadfastness, perseverance, longsuffering and slowness in avenging others. Contrary to our world that seeks speed and instant results, the Holy Spirit empowers followers of Jesus to withstand challenging situations with perseverance and endurance.
God our Heavenly Father is endlessly patient with us, demonstrating to us time and again that “love is patient” (1 Corinthians 13). We’re therefore called to show the same patience to others, “bearing with one another in love” (Ephesians 4:2) and turning the other cheek (Matthew 5:39) when we face conflict and disagreements.
Practising Patience
In Colossians 3, Paul describes how patience doesn’t come naturally – we need to proactively put it on as if it were a garment:
“Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience.”
We need to ask the Holy Spirit to clothe us in patience, a character trait we’re called to cultivate as “God’s chosen people”. It’s a characteristic from our Father God who is himself “compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in love” (Psalm 103:8).
Kindness
When we consider kindness in the wider context of the Bible, we see it isn’t just a character trait God requires of us, it’s something he offers us in Christ. When Jesus invites the weary to come to him because his “yoke is easy” and his “burden is light” (Matt. 11:28–30), the word translated as “easy” is the same word translated elsewhere in the New Testament as “kind.”
God showed us the ultimate kindness by freeing us from sin and giving us the gift of eternal life, but we’re also reminded that Jesus is able to sympathise with us in our weakness. We’re therefore called to imitate the kindness of Christ in how we treat others in both our words and actions, showing empathy and grace.
Being kind
Jesus told the parable of the Good Samaritan to teach us about how we live out this call to be kind and compassionate to others. The Good Samaritan demonstrates how we’re to show sacrificial kindness that isn’t limited by the differences that so often divide us.
“But a Samaritan, as he travelled, came where the man was; and when he saw him, he took pity on him. He went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he put the man on his own donkey, brought him to an inn and took care of him.”
One way we can cultivate the fruit of kindness is by living out sacrificial generosity and sponsoring a child who is coping with the many complex barriers of poverty.
Watch Richmond’s story to be moved by how God used the kindness of a young sponsor to bring powerful hope and lasting change to Richmond, his family and his community.
Goodness
Since Adam and Eve fell away from God (Genesis 3), all of humanity has turned away from good and inclined towards evil. As Mark 10 v 17-22 describes, “Nobody is good except God alone.”
In the face of this stark truth, we can be so thankful that through Jesus, goodness is given to us as a free gift. Once we trust in Jesus Christ as our Lord and Saviour, God no longer punishes us for our sins. Instead, because Jesus has paid this price, His righteousness is ‘credited’ to us. He is our perfect substitute.
When God created the world, he declared it was “very good”. When you became a Christian, you became part of God’s new creation so therefore God declares you “very good” as well.
I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.
Developing Goodness
We receive the goodness of Jesus’ sacrifice once and for all when we put our trust in Christ and accept that he died on the cross for us. But the outworking of that goodness is a lifelong process. The sanctification of us becoming fully like Christ, holy and good, will only be completed when we see Jesus. As Paul writes in Philippians 2: 12-13, “continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose.”
“Jesus sat down opposite the place where the offerings were put and watched the crowd putting their money into the temple treasury. Many rich people threw in large amounts. But a poor widow came and put in two very small copper coins, worth only a few cents. Calling his disciples to him, Jesus said, ‘Truly I tell you, this poor widow has put more into the treasury than all the others. They all gave out of their wealth; but she, out of her poverty, put in everything—all she had to live on.'”
Faithfulness
Faithfulness is the very essence of God’s character. Psalm 89 rejoices that “I will sing of the Lord’s great love forever. With my mouth, I will make your faithfulness known”.
In the Bible we see God’s consistent and unwavering faithfulness, and man and woman’s persistent unfaithfulness.
We can be so thankful that through the Holy Spirit, God will change our unfaithfulness. The Spirit moves our hearts to be more loyal, steadfast and dependable, both in our relationship with Him and how we treat those around us.
Practising Faithfulness
When we make mistakes and struggle to be faithful to God and others, we can rejoice that God remains steadfast. As 2 Timothy 2:13 explains, “if we are faithless, he remains faithful, for he cannot disown himself.” As we look to cultivate the fruit of faithfulness, we can pray for the Holy Spirit to change our hearts so we can reflect more of this character trait of God.
Gentleness (Meekness / Humility)
Gentleness is often thought of as a weakness, but being gentle didn’t stop Jesus from completing every part of his mission.
Psalm 62:11-12 explains, “power belongs to you, God, and with you Lord is unfailing love.” This verse points us to a biblical definition of gentleness. God is loving and gentle, but at the same time all power belongs to him.
In Isaiah 40:11, God is described as a loving shepherd (in images that echo Psalm 23):
“He tends his flock like a shepherd:
He gathers the lambs in his arms
and carries them close to his heart;
he gently leads those that have young.”
Jesus models the same gentleness, commending the character trait in the Beatitudes (Matthew 5:3-12). Christ has all power and yet this power is controlled by love. For example, in Matthew 21:5 he is described as gentle when he “arrives on a donkey rather than a warhorse”.[8]
“Say to Daughter Zion,
‘See, your king comes to you,
gentle and riding on a donkey,
and on a colt, the foal of a donkey.’
Yet Jesus’ gentleness doesn’t stop him from standing against injustice. Shortly after his entrance into Jerusalem, he turns over the temple furniture, driving out those using his Father’s house as a marketplace (Matthew 21:12).
Being Gentle
We can develop gentleness by following Jesus’ example of controlling the power we have with love.
Scripture encourages us to, “speak evil of no one, avoid quarrelling and to be gentle and to show perfect courtesy towards all people.” (Titus 3:2). This can be incredibly challenging as our natural inclination is so often to be quick to anger. We need God’s Holy Spirit to help us in cultivating the gentleness, learning to be ‘slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love’ (Exodus 34:6) just like our Father God.
Self-control/Temperance
Paul lists self-control or temperance as the final characteristic of the fruit of the Spirit. As John Piper writes, “the very concept of ’self-control’ implies a battle between a divided self.” It implies that our “self” produces unhelpful desires (what Paul terms the “desires of the flesh” earlier in Galatians 5).
We need the Holy Spirit to help us control the desires of the flesh and submit our own agendas and priorities to God. Jesus modelled this powerfully, pursuing obedience to God above all else. Faced with an excruciating death in the garden of Gethsemane, Jesus demonstrated the ultimate self-control, praying “Father, if you are willing, take this cup from me; yet not my will, but yours be done” (Luke 22:42).
Challengingly, Jesus calls us to do likewise when he explains in Matthew 16:24, “if anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.”
Practising Temperance
We need God’s help in controlling the “desires of the flesh” and submitting all our ways to him. Thankfully God has given us his grace. As Paul writes in Titus, it is this grace that enables us to live self-controlled lives.
“For the grace of God has appeared that offers salvation to all people. It teaches us to say ’No’ to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age.” Titus 2:11-12, NIV
Fruit of the spirit FAQs
Why is the Fruit of the Spirit Also Called Fruits of the Spirit?
Some people refer to the nine character traits in Galatians 5 in plural form calling them “fruits” of the Spirit. Although each character trait is distinct, the Bible refers to them as a united, singular “fruit” of the spirit. Together these nine different fruits give us a complete picture of Jesus’ character.
What are the fruit of the Spirit for?
God cultivates the fruit of the Spirit in our lives so that our characters become more Christlike over time. The benefits of the fruit of the spirit enable us to leave the “desires of the flesh” behind. As the nine fruits of the spirit grow, we become closer to who God created us to be, a work that will only be completed when we meet Jesus face to face.
Where is the fruit of the Spirit in the Bible?
Paul writes about the fruit of the spirit in Galatians 5 in the New Testament of the Bible.
How many fruit of the Spirit are there?
Paul writes of nine characteristics that make up the fruit of the Spirit in the Bible (some mistakenly think there are seven fruits of the spirit). Catholic traditions list 12 fruit of the spirit.
What are the nine fruit of the Spirit?
The nine fruit of the Spirit are love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.
What is the most important fruit of the Spirit?
Love is the first fruit of the Spirit listed because love encompasses the rest of the character traits Paul goes on to describe. The eight fruits that Paul lists after love are descriptions of what a love-filled life looks like.
KJV: The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance: against such there is no law.
ESV: But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.
The Message: 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.
How is the fruit of the Spirit linked to Isaiah?
“The fruit of the Spirit” in Galatians 5 is considered to be a reference to Isaiah’s promise that the spirit would bring abundant fertility in the coming new age.
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