Don't See Fruit of the Spirit in Your Life?

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walking in the Spirit or walking by the Spirit? I think if you were to ask 10 believers, 10

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Christians, who are serious -minded, what does that mean? I think you'd get a number of different responses, and so you and I are going to take the bat off our shoulder and take a swing at this today.

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When he says walk by the Spirit, there are three aspects to that. He's talking about faith in the work of Christ.

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To walk is another way of saying trust or faith, or it's what it means. You're placing yourself in the hands of something other than yourself.

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Is that fair? To walk is to live. It's also that language of living or abiding as well.

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I think those are fair, everything you're saying. Yep, agree. Continue. These are the three areas that we're going to pull out this morning for you.

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Faith in the work of Christ is what he means by walking by the Spirit. Faith in the power of Christ or trust in the power of Christ, living by the power of Christ.

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Then thirdly, in his truth, faith in his truth, meaning the truth of what the law is for us, the do's and the don'ts.

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That is definitely a part of walking in the Spirit, but if you disconnect the first two, which I would call is the actual source and power.

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The first part is our identity, where we will not want to go anywhere else. This is the work he's done for us.

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The second aspect of it is the actual capacities to do something, like bear fruit, which

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Galatians tells us to do. It's not a power that comes from us. Therefore, to walk in line with Christ's truth, you have to have the first two.

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In Romans 8 .4, it is to trust the righteousness of Christ, to receive the righteousness of Christ, and not to seek to establish your own righteousness.

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That is walking by the Spirit. That's that first prong, like you said. You're trusting in the works of Jesus. Secondarily, you're trusting in the power of Christ.

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Here we go, unto sanctification, godly living, dare we say. That's a

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Romans 6, 7, 8, etc. reality, where it is the union that we have, a vital union with the

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Lord Jesus Christ, whereby we have been united to him and his Spirit lives in us and works in and through us, that we are then empowered to live unto him.

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That's massive. That's that second prong. Then, how do we know what a righteous, upright, godly life looks like?

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What's that third prong? It's the law. It's obedience to Christ's commands, or we could say more broadly, obedience to God's law.

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These things flow one into the other. We're trusting Christ for our righteousness. We're trusting what he's done.

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We are, via our union with him, empowered unto life in the Spirit. Then lastly, we're guided by the law.

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You notice that John and I are starting point one, point two, with objective, indicative, declarative realities of what

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Christ has done and of our union with him. That sets your mind there before we get to point three, which is obedience to God's law or obedience to the commands of Christ.

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Paul, in his mind, is saying, I'm having a hard time obeying what you're wanting me to do. Jesus says, no, you're going to do it better because you're going to do it in your weakness, in my strength, instead of your own strength.

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If you have these two parts correct, Justin, that leads us to the third, which is absolutely true.

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We need to be emphasizing the truth of Christ, the truth for our life in this world.

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We would categorize this in theological terms, the third use of the law, where Christ says, love

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God, love neighbor, produce these fruits in you, but they are the product of Christ's work and power, not the product of the flesh, which is so weird to say, but we have to say it.

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What do I mean by it's the product of the work and power of the Christ and not our flesh? That it is the power of Christ's Spirit working in and through us only that can produce this fruit, period.

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It is not our effort that produces this. Now, do we participate?

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Yes, yes and amen, but we are enlivened. This is the language of our confession in chapter 16 on good works.

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The power to do them comes from Christ's Spirit alone. We are enlivened by the

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Spirit to actually do these things and produce this fruit. You could be hearing this and going, but I don't see these evidences in my life.

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Well, this is an ongoing, life -altering experience for us. By the way, if we're accurately embracing point one, that means we have a great high priest who's ever interceded for us.

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And as we fail to walk by the Spirit and we give into the flesh, we confess our sins to our sympathetic priest who then says with boldness, run into the throne room of the

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Father and tell me, how did you fail child? You didn't trust the Spirit today. We know. Now look to my love, look to my power and go and love your brothers because I have loved you, right?

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We confess our sins because he is faithful and just to forgive us of our sins. And do you know what comes after Romans 8, 18?

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The rest of it, when he says, nothing will separate you from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus. So the motivation to keep walking and obeying the