got fruit? got goodness?
August 14, 2021
The fruit of the Spirit is found in Galatians 5:22-23:
“22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.”
The original Greek word for “fruit” in Galatians 5 is karpos, and one definition means a result of something. When the fruit of the Spirit is displayed in our lives, it is a sign, or result, that we are being led by the Spirit of God. It is evidence that we are connected to Christ, just as the branches of the grapevine must be connected to the vine in order to produce grapes.
One of the most beautiful aspects of Galatians 5: 22-23 is found in the last part of verse 23—against such things there is no law. We are not limited or restricted in exhibiting these fruit. We can never show too much love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control!
The sixth fruit of the Spirit is goodness, but what exactly is goodness? We use this word frequently throughout our days and its meaning can get lost through overuse. For example, how many times a day do we say, “good morning”, “good job”, and “this food is good”? The Bible describes good differently than our normal use of it. The Bible tells us that the word good actually means holy, pure and righteous. Literally goodness is godliness.
Therefore, when we speak of goodness as a fruit of the Spirit we are not talking about good actions, but rather a personal character and integrity. We also need to realize that good in and of itself is a relative term. When we say something is good, what we really mean is that it is only good in reference to some pre-established standard. For example, I may be a pretty good swimmer, but when I compare myself to the standard of Olympian, Katie Ledecky, I am not so good. Therefore, our goodness as Christians has to be relative to some standard, and we see that standard expressed in Luke 18:19–
“And Jesus said to him, “Why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone.”
The standard for Christian goodness is the character of God. That can be a bit intimidating! How can we ever have the character and integrity that is on par with the all-knowing, powerful, good Creator of the universe? If God is the standard, how can we ever get close to being good?
The encouraging news is that the original Greek word for goodness is “agathosyne”, and this word is not speaking of someone who has achieved some high moral standard of living. Instead, it speaks of an intrinsic, created goodness.
We read in Genesis 1 that God created the entire universe. After each time God finishes creating something, we see a repeated phrase: “And God saw that it was good.” God created day and night, land and seas, sun and moon, fruit and plants, birds and fish, and then He pronounced, “And God saw that it was good.” Then in Genesis 1:31, after God creates man in His own image, He declares mankind is good—actually very good! This means that our goodness as humans, does not come from what we do or don’t do; it comes from the fact that we were created by God. I Tim 4: 4a—
“For everything created by God is good,”
Even though we are God’s good creation, we will still do bad things, miss the mark, sin and are broken people in desperate need of a Savior. However, we need to remember, our goodness is not the result of anything we have done or haven’t done. We are good because the Almighty God created us as good. Our goodness is not based on physical acts. Our goodness is a fundamental part of our identity in God. By His Spirit, God desires to awaken that goodness in us. When we begin to live out of that part of our identity, then and only then, will our actions begin to match the character of God.
Not only are we God’s good creation, we were created to do good works. Ephesians 2: 10 reads:
“For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.”
However, while God has prepared good works for us to do, we are not saved by those works:
“ 8For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, 9 not a result of works, so that no one may boast.”-Ephesians 2: 8-9
We also need to remember that goodness, just as all nine of the fruit of the Spirit, is something that the Holy Spirit produces in us. We cannot produce this fruit by our own efforts. We need to ask the Holy Spirit to mold our hearts to help others, to do the right things even when difficult, to be honest, moral, virtuous, and full of integrity.
So how are you doing? got fruit? got goodness?