We’ve been talking a lot about equipping the saints for works of ministry. When people are bound together in love, that unity produces maturity. Iron sharpens iron. We see things and experience things that we otherwise would never have experienced. There is no room in the kingdom for unproductivity. We are workers for the kingdom and we’re supposed to produce fruit.
And speaking of fruit, Paul tells us what the fruit of the Spirit is. When we are disciplined in the fruit of the Spirit, we do not indulge in the things that keep us from God. Not only that, Paul reminds us that there is no law against doing them: “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law” (Galatians 5:22, 23 ESV).
As we equip one another, we need to be reminded to bear Spirit fruit. That fruit is pure, righteous, and will keep us from doing wrong. Paul urges his readers to “walk by the Spirit” and they will not gratify the desires of the flesh. The great news is that we can become practiced in living out the fruit of the Spirit. We hear a lot about detoxing the body and, in a very real sense, we can detox our spirits by partaking in Spirit fruit.