I love the story of The Lorax, by Dr. Seuss, and one of the most impactful lines comes in an exchange between the Lorax and the Once-ler:

The Lorax: Which way does a tree fall?
The Once-ler: Uh, down?
The Lorax: A tree falls the way it leans. Be careful which way you lean.

I don’t know if Dr. Seuss read the book of Galatians before writing that line, but I wouldn’t be surprised.

We sometimes wind up in a lifestyle we never intended to be in, habitually committing the same sin and scrambling to figure out how we wound up in the destructive cycle. For some of us, it’s anger. For others, it’s lust, pornography, or an illicit relationship. It could be gossip, overeating, occult involvement, or many other things. And Paul, in Galatians, helps us to answer the question, how’d I get to this point?

It’s because we leaned toward sin.

He writes:

When you follow the desires of your sinful nature, the results are very clear: sexual immorality, impurity, lustful pleasures, idolatry, sorcery, hostility, quarreling, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambition, dissension, division, drunkenness, wild parties, and other sins like these. Let me tell you again, as I have before, that anyone living that sort of life will not inherit the Kingdom of God.

– Galatians 5:19-21 NLT

It’s all about our trajectory. Andy Stanley called it The Principle of the Path. Dr. Seuss might say, we got to where we are because we leaned in this direction.

Let me slow us down a bit and follow Paul’s logic. When you follow – that is, when you make a conscious choice to stick with the thought that popped into your head… And why did that thought pop into your head to begin with? Because of your sinful nature. Even when we are saved and delivered forever from the penalty of sin, we still walk around in a human body in a fallen world and we have this tendency to be selfish and sinful. When we follow our sinful tendencies, the results are clear…

A life controlled by sin is the inevitable result of choosing to follow and giving in to what our sinful flesh wants.

We just keep falling in whatever direction we lean. If you want to break the pattern and end the repetitive cycle of sin, the pathway has to be short-circuited. But Paul doesn’t say it’s simply a matter of having more willpower or resisting temptation in the strength of the same flesh that got us here to begin with. Instead, he points to the One who can and will help every time we humble ourselves and lean into him.

But the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.

– Galatians 5:22-23 NLT

If you lean toward sinful thoughts, the inevitable result will be sinful actions, which will produce a sinful lifestyle. If you lean into the Holy Spirit, the inevitable result will be a life filled with the good, fresh fruit that only the Spirit can produce.

So, which way are you leaning? What path are you following? In what direction are you headed? Your very next choice matters. A lot.

 

by Brandon Cox: I remember a professor in college once asking our class, does a peach tree bear peaches because it’s a peach tree? Or is it a peach tree because it bears peaches?

And who cares? Far more importantly…

When led by selfishness, you’ll bear the fruit of the flesh. When led by the Spirit, you’ll bear the fruit of the Spirit.

And just as importantly, you can’t have it both ways.

For the flesh desires what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the flesh. They are in conflict with each other, so that you are not to do whatever you want.

~ Galatians 5:17 NIV

The Apostle Paul gives us a lengthy list of examples of the kind of fruit we bear when we’re driven by selfish desire rather than the Spirit’s influence, “being sexually unfaithful, not being pure, taking part in sexual sins, [20] worshiping gods, doing witchcraft, hating, making trouble, being jealous, being angry, being selfish, making people angry with each other, causing divisions among people, [21] feeling envy, being drunk, having wild and wasteful parties, and doing other things like these.” (Galatians 5:19-21 NCV)

And then he gives us another list, the well-known and much beloved fruit of the Spirit, “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control…” (Galatians 5:22-23 NIV)

I like to think of these two ways of living in terms of our nature. When I’m living a naturally natural life, things go badly. But when I’m living a supernaturally natural life, I bear sweet fruit. I say “supernaturally natural” because when you’re filled with the Spirit (a supernatural influence operating within you), you will naturally bear the Spirit’s fruit.

In other words, when you’re filled with the Spirit, bearing the Holy Spirit’s fruit is like second nature. It just comes from you because it’s who you are on the inside.

That’s why it’s important to note that these are not the “fruits” of the Spirit (plural), as though there is a list of nine specific possible outcomes, some of which you may or may not bear on a given day, but rather these nine traits, taken together, are the “fruit” (singular) of the Spirit. When you’re Spirit-filled, you become spiritually fruitful in a multitude of ways.

The fruit of the Spirit is definitely not a list of activities to try to do in your own power. Rather the fruit of the Spirit is simply the natural product of living in tune with, filled with, and in submission to the influence of the Spirit of God, moment by moment.

by Brandon Cox: A. W. Tozer once said, “It is doubtful whether God can bless a man greatly until he has hurt him deeply.” Tozer wrote those words in a previous generation of Christianity. He did not intend to imply that God wishes to cause pain in the lives of his children, rather, that God has determined to use the pain that will inevitably find us for our good.

And here’s the truth… Most people who have been used greatly by God have also been greatly wounded. They’ve walked through pain. They bear some scars and they’ve carried crosses.

God shapes us through pain. He cleanses us through it, as well. He sharpens our spiritual senses, detaches us from all that is temporary and fleeting, and gives us glimpses into the majesty of King Jesus when we hurt.

Paul said of his own experience,

Quite frankly, I don’t want to be bothered anymore by these disputes. I have far more important things to do—the serious living of this faith. I bear in my body scars from my service to Jesus.

Galatians 6:17 MSG

Pain puts life in perspective. Want to rise above pettiness? Walk through pain. Want to barely flinch in the face of little problems? Go through some big ones.

The truth is, you’ll never become all that God has in mind for you to become unless you walk through fire.

The big question is, do you want God’s very best blessings poured out into your life badly enough to walk through the fire?