Fruit Of The Spirit # 5

Every day they go around destroying:

• People’s happiness

• People’s lives

• People’s character

It is just a way of life with them! They are a walking disaster.

Illus: They remind me of one of these slimy worms that crawl around and wherever they go they leave behind them a trail of slime.

The Bible teaches the world in which we live we are KNOWN BY THE FRUIT THAT WE BEAR. Matthew 7:16-17 Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit; but a corrupt tree bringeth forth evil fruit.

And Galatians 5:22-23 teach us what kind of fruit we should be bearing.

Look at Galatians 5:22-23 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, Meekness, temperance: against such there is no law.

We have already talked about LOVE, JOY, PEACE, AND LONGSUFFERING.

In this sermon we want to talk about the fruit of GENTLENESS.

It is important that we allow the Holy Spirit to teach us how to be gentle, because we come into contact with people every day that are as rough as a corn cob. And they have a way of bringing the worst out of us.

They seem to have a talent for doing the wrong things and saying the wrong thing, for example they might come to us and say…

• With a frown on their face they might say, "Why did you buy such an ugly car?”

• They are the type that come right out and ask, "How much weight have you gained since the last time I saw you?"

• They will say, "You have aged so much that I almost didn’t recognize you!"

Some people remind me of cockroaches! I can’t help but wonder why God put those critters on this earth.

I know one thing; one reason heaven is going to be such a wonderful place to live is because that crowd will not be there making life miserable for everyone!

They should be ashamed of themselves, but they excuse themselves by simply saying.

"It’s not my fault. That’s just the way I am. It’s in my genes. I inherited it from my mother or my father. That’s the way they were, too."

The only thing they are admitting to is that, along with them, their mom and dad were a couple of miserable people also.

If you happen to be such a person, God wants you to allow the Holy Spirit to make you live a gentle life.

As Christians, we cannot turn people to Christ if we are turning them off with our rude disposition.

So that we might have this fruit of the Spirit in our life, let’s look at THREE things, such as:

I. THE DEFINITION OF GENTLENESS

What is "gentleness?"

The NT was originally written in the Greek Language. When the Greeks developed a word, they not only gave it a definition, they almost always illustrated it.

Let’s look at the definition, and I will give you some illustrations also that will help you to understand what Gentleness is.

The Greeks definition of gentleness was "Power under control."

That definition might not make a bit of sense to start with, but remember I told you they not only gave a definition they also illustrated the meaning of a word.

For example:

• Gentleness is like a powerful elephant under the complete control of a trainer.

• Gentleness like raging water that is kept under control by the large dam holding it back.

• Gentleness is like a big bulldozer under the control of a skillful operator.

• Gentleness is like a dangerous disease that could kill millions but is controlled by a vaccine that prevents it from affecting people.

When we think about GENTLENESS, we need to think about:

• Power under control

• Anger under control

• Our emotions under control

We have looked at THE DEFINITION OF GENTLENESS, but the best example of POWER UNDER CONTROL is -

II. THE EXAMPLE OF GENTLENESS

When you think of the life of Jesus, you have to think about a lot of things.

But the thing I want you to think about is; He was the MOST POWERFUL INDIVIDUAL that has ever walked on this earth. He could have destroyed everyone on the face of this earth. BUT YET THIS POWER HE POSSESSED WERE UNDER CONTROL.

Illus: During the war with Iraq, before Saddam Hussein was dethroned, the United States warned him and his army that they were going to release their program called “Shock and Awe!” When the time came, the world had never seen such power released.

Yet we were told by the experts that some of the bombs dropped were not a fourth of the power that could have been released.