Love: A Fruit of the Holy Spirit

Hello, hello!!

This is my last article in a three-part mini-series on bearing the fruit of love. In the first post, we discussed the importance of obeying God’s command to love Him and love others. Then we went on in the second post to answer the question, “What does biblical love look like?”

If you missed any of them, I encourage you to click the links to read them before scrolling down.

What we are going to be talking about today is love as a fruit of the Holy Spirit.

Love is a Fruit of the Holy Spirit

“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.” Galatians 5:22-23 NIV

In my last post, we defined biblical love using 1 Corinthians 13:4-8. And we can all agree that we cannot generate this type of sacrificial love by willpower or effort. God is love (1 John 4:8). Love comes from God and is imparted into our hearts by the Holy Spirit. When get become born again, we become new spiritual beings because of what Jesus accomplished on the cross for us (2 Corinthians 5:17). God removes our stony hearts and gives us hearts that can respond to His love and love others (Jeremiah 31:33; Ezekiel 11:19).

The Holy Spirit moves in to dwell permanently in us (1 Corinthians 6:19). He is the One who saturates our hearts with God’s love and empowers us to love others.

“And hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us.” Romans 5:5

For the Spirit God gave us does not make us timid, but gives us power, love and self-discipline. 2 Timothy 1:7

Without Him, we would revert to selfishness, and our love walk would be futile. Therefore, walking in love is a fruit or product of the Holy Spirit. It is not behavioral modification or becoming our best selves. The Holy Spirit produces fruit in the lives of those born again and yielded to Him.

“Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God.” 1 John 4:7 NIV

“Now that you have purified yourselves by obeying the truth so that you have sincere love for each other, love one another deeply, from the heart. For you have been born again, not of perishable seed, but of imperishable, through the living and enduring word of God.” 1 Peter 1:22-23 NIV

Did you notice that both Scriptures state that the only reason we can love is because we are born again? God gave us the Holy Spirit and poured His love into our hearts to enable us to do the impossible, such as loving Him and others. If you identify as a born-again believer but are not manifesting the love of God, ask God to show you what the problem is, then humble yourself and obey Him.

Cultivate the Fruit of Love by Abiding in Christ

God has given us the Holy Spirit, but we must remain connected to Him and allow Him to direct us. In John 15:5, Jesus said, “I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.” Some versions of the Bible, such as the NKJV, use the word ‘abide’ instead of ‘remain.’

Just like a branch cannot bear fruit unless it remains connected to the vine, we will not walk in love unless we abide in Christ and yield our lives to Him.

Abiding means that we maintain an intimate consistent, unbroken relationship with Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit. We do not visit with Jesus or put Him on time-out. Instead, we are yielded to His leading. We spend time with Him in worship, prayer, and through the Word so that we are ready to react in love when people or circumstances squeeze us.

(To read more on abiding in Christ to bear the fruit of the Holy Spirit, click HERE.)

Putting on the Fruit of Love

Love is not based on emotions. It is an act of the will. We decide to yield to the Holy Spirit and obey Him when He prompts us to do something for someone as an act of love. God has given us His Spirit to dwell permanently in us. Still, ultimately, we will need to decide whether we will act in love or choose selfishness.

Colossians 3:14 says, “And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity.” And 1 Thessalonians 5:8 says, “But since we belong to the day, let us be sober, putting on faith and love as a breastplate, and the hope of salvation as a helmet.”

So, we must decide to put on love, and it’s an act of the will.

There are different ways that the Holy Spirit may prompt us to put on love, depending on the circumstances and the people we are dealing with. In very challenging scenarios, when we are relating with people who are difficult to love, we need to ask God for wisdom and grace to love well.

Practical Ways to Put on Love

Putting on love may require you to pray for your offender and forgive (Matthew 5:44). Forgiving someone means that they do not owe you anything anymore and that you are going to make a choice to release them both in your thoughts and actions. You may need to go to your offender and talk to them about the situation. And you may need to take a witness as the Bible instructs us to (Matthew 18:15-16). No matter how the discussion unfolds, you need to speak the truth in love (Ephesians 4:15). The Bible also says that we may need to overlook an offense by figuratively turning the other cheek or going the extra mile (Matthew 5:38-41).

As I mentioned in my last article, walking in love does not mean that you open the door for danger to dine and sleep with you. In this world, there are some people that you will need to establish safe boundaries for. But even setting boundaries must be done on the foundation of love. If we are always building fences to keep people away from us, then claim we are setting boundaries, we may need to examine our motives for selfishness.

In the same conversation where Jesus instructs us to take witnesses with us when confronting an offender, He continued the discussion by stating that “If they still refuse to listen, tell it to the church; and if they refuse to listen even to the church, treat them as you would a pagan or a tax collector” (Matthew 18:17). As you can see, Jesus wants us to do our part to live in peaceful, loving relationships with others. We are to do everything in love (1 Corinthians 16:14).

In Conclusion

Love is a fruit of the Holy Spirit. None of us will successfully bear the fruit of love unless we are born again and yield to the work of the Holy Spirit. We cultivate God’s love in us by abiding in Christ and choosing to put on love when the Holy Spirit prompts us.

No, it’s not an easy road. But we can do it because the same power that raised Jesus Christ from the dead lives in us (Romans 8:11). And if we fail, God has promised in 1 John 1:9 that “if we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.”

In the Words of Apostle Paul from Ephesians 3:17b-19, “I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge – that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.” In Jesus’ name, Amen!!

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All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®.

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