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GALATIANS 5:22g
(Reading: Ps.89:1-18; Lk.18:1-17; Gal.5:19-25)
The Fruit of the Spirit is ... Faithfulness
Congregation in our Lord Jesus Christ…
We have before us a new quality to that ripening fruit of the Spirit in our lives. As the product of the Lord’s harvest is closely held up to his divine light, we also see the essential quality of “faithfulness”. Faithfulness. This is love as persistent presence.
You see, “faithfulness” is about reliability and dependability. This is love when it’s being tested – it’s grace as endurance. This recognises the value of the other and expresses this recognition through loyalty. It’s the strength to endure. It’s that aspect of keeping on going, however hard it is.
Theodore Roosevelt, the 26th President of the United States, said, “It’s not the critic who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who’s actually in the arena, whose face is covered by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again because there is no effort without error and short-comings. That man at the best knows in the end the high achievement of triumph and who at worst, if he fails while daring greatly, knows his place shall never be with those timid and cold souls who know neither victory nor defeat.”
But who is like this? Honestly? Don’t we too often see the opposite? In the words of a first aspect to this text ... THIS SHOWS HOW WE WERE SO FAITHLESS.
You see, congregation, this world is full of those who don’t keep faith. Who hasn’t had someone forget to pick them up, someone promise to do things which they didn’t do, or someone so wrapped up in themselves they didn’t bother with you at all? Some people have been able to recite to me huge lists of how they have been let down.
They had become so hardened. In fact, they said they were that disappointed in others they always expected the very worst. So easily we can become programmed to expect not faithfulness but faithlessness!
And don’t think this is just about that really negative person. It’s actually what we’re all naturally like. Our first point is about how we all aren’t consistently trying. So that word “faithless” is apt. It is what we are ourselves without faith.
This is what the Bible tells us about. For example, in Ephesians 2 verse 12, Paul says this about where we come from: “you were separate from Christ, and excluded from citizenship in Israel and foreigners to the covenants of the promise, without hope and without God in the world.”
Whether it’s acknowledged or not, this being without God made the way we lived our lives acts of sinful nature. How could it be otherwise? That’s what it says in Hebrews 11, verse 6, “And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him.”
So our living without God was actually showing the opposite aspects to what we would be doing if are living with him. Despite what we might sometimes like to think, there is no neutral ground. Each tiny thought, the smallest and most softly spoken word, the least insignificant actions, either worships God or despises him. And if we cannot be truly faithful we are characterised by such evils as “fits of rage”, and “selfish ambition”, which we read just before the text.
The common phrase, “If you want a job done you have to do it yourself!” shows this. And that is sad. Yet how much isn’t that true of the world we live in?
I mean, who can you trust? Even the closest of relationships are suddenly shattered by completely unexpected acts of unfaithfulness! Then it seems as if our world is falling to pieces around us. “How could he do this to me?” “I really believed she was my soul mate!” And to think that for quite some time they’d been covering up. They knew what they were going to do. What a terrible deceit!
Someone once said about a certain country that you could never be sure as to where you stood with her citizens. Oh, they would be very polite to your face. Their manners were impeccable. And yet when it came to business they could suddenly turn round and go right against you! You never knew where you were with them.
But you know, congregation, this is not only limited to one country. This is in all of us. When it comes down to it we are the faithless ones. We have the “fits of rage” and the “selfish ambition”.
And don’t go thinking now of someone else you know who has a fiery temper, or seems very self-centred. You think of yourself. You ask yourself, “How have I let down others?”
It may not even mean breaking your word or otherwise letting them down. How about when you have failed to be what you should have been? As each one of us has a position in life, with its responsibilities, we haven’t been true to it.
It’s easy to blind ourselves to that. The Church at Jesus’ time had closed off her eyes. That’s why the Lord cried out to them in Matthew 23 verse 23, “Woe to you, teachers of the law and the Pharisees, you hypocrites! You give a tenth of your spices - mint, dill and cumin. But you have neglected the more important matters of the law - justice, mercy and faithfulness. You should have practised the latter, without neglecting the former.”
Still later, in verse 25, he says, “You clean the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. Blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and dish, and then the outside also will be clean.”
Let’s not think, congregation, that this was only a particular difficulty of the church before the height of God’s fulfilment in Jesus Christ. Having that wonderful faith in the doing and dying of Jesus doesn’t mean we automatically have this fruit of the Spirit called “faithfulness”. Otherwise Paul would never have had to urge it upon us.
You see, here we’re talking about something apart from our salvation. We look to showing the love of Jesus through our dependable and reliable relations with those around us. But that’s exactly the problem! We’ve found we aren’t very trustworthy. And that’s found throughout the church wherever she is and wherever she’s been.
It’s not just those obviously hypocritical Pharisees. It’s also there in the supposedly dynamic and vibrant early New Testament Church. Yes, the Church that so many Christians today keep holding up as the model to go by! This what the Spirit wrote to the church of Sardis. In Revelation 3, the verses 1 and 2, he says, “I know your deeds; you have the reputation of being alive, but you are dead. Wake up! Strengthen what remains and is about to die, for I have not found your deeds complete in the sight of my God.”
Those brethren weren’t being faithful. In fact, they were, in God’s sight, nearly without faith. So close were they to slipping away from the Lord altogether!
Imagine, to have tasted the surety of God. And, then, to have only the emptiness of self!
How appropriate that we come now to seeing the ultimate surety of where God stands with us. In the words of the second aspect to this text ... THIS POINTS TO HE WHO IS SO FAITH-FILLED.
You see, no matter how hard we try, we can’t be trusted. That’s why we must go to the one who can be trusted! Together with the apostle Paul we must wonder, as he does in Romans 3, verse 5, “if our unrighteousness brings out God’s righteousness more clearly, what shall we say?”
Do you see it? It’s so marvellous that we at least know this!
Charles Spurgeon illustrates this with a story regarding a servant in the old days. His master had become fed up with him. Angrily he told his servant, “We must part John.” “I hope not,” he replied, adding, “Where are you going?” He had no intention to go himself.
“Ah!” said his master, “I don’t intend to employ you any longer.” To which the servant answered, “Sir, if you have not a good servant, I know that I have a good master, and I don’t mean to leave him. I cannot think of going away.”
So isn’t it the most marvellous thing to know that you’re not going away from God? You have such a good Master you’re going to cling to the posts of his door. And if he kicks you out the front door, you’re going to come in at the back.
“Let the Lord do what he pleases,” says Spurgeon, “I am bound to belong to him only. Brother, resolve that if you cannot preach for the Lord, you will hear for him. And if you cannot be a leader of the church, you will be a follower somewhere. But your Lord you will serve forever!”
You see, we were separate from Christ. We were excluded from citizenship in Israel. We were foreigners to the covenants of the promise, without hope and without God in the world. Yet, as Ephesians 2 verse 13 says, “But now in Christ Jesus you were once far away have been brought near through the blood of Christ.”
Our nature was faith-less. Yet we have come to the One who is faith-filled. He is the overflowing source of everything good. Though we deserved the worst judgment for being so untrue, God’s grace has washed us clean. Now we have come to the One who’s able to save completely those who come to God through Jesus Christ. He’s the One who’s always interceding for us.
You have been saved. You have been taken out of this world and specially set apart from this world. And to do this your heart has been changed so that you could do this. You have been given faith!
This is why we now look to where our Lord is at the right hand of the Heavenly Father. We believe, as it says in Hebrews 13, verse 8, “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.”
What a love! And what a strength to keep it so! That’s the supreme consistency we want for our lives. I mean, don’t we love knowing where we stand?
Boys and girls, have you ever been away from Mum and Dad for a while? Perhaps it was for a camp. Maybe you stayed with other relatives.
You went away really keen. But within a few days you want to be back home. It’s not that where you have gone to is bad or anything but it’s a bit confusing there. There are rules you’re not used to. You’re not quite sure where you stand. Yet back home it’s so clear where you stand. You know the place so well. It’s where your Mum and Dad are. You know what they expect. You know how to please them!
Imagine, then, how much better it is to know how to please God! For we understand his position very clearly! As we read it put so beautifully in Psalm 89, the verses 14 till 17, “Righteousness and justice are the foundation of your throne; steadfast love and faithfulness go before you. Blessed are the people who know the festal shout, who walk, O Lord, in the light of your face,
who exult in your name all the day and in your righteousness are exalted. For you are the glory of their strength; by your favor our horn is exalted.”
In Christ Jesus, we who had been so far away have been brought into the very presence of God. Now, through being spiritually adopted, we cry, “Abba, Father!”
We who once were lost have been found. God never gave up working out his great and detailed plan for our eternal welfare. He is indeed faith-filled. We know where he stands.
But, congregation - you who are the people of this very King - is that what we shine forth? Do those around you know where you stand?
You know, it’s not so difficult. It’s not hard ourselves to be faithful. In the words of the third aspect to this text ... THIS INSPIRES US TO BE FAITHFUL.
Congregation, our text is not about something only a certain few can do. And that’s despite what people will often say. “Ah, he’s the steady, dependable type,” someone says. Or you hear, “If you want anything done in the church ask her.”
But now that’s just an excuse! Because while we were unsaved we could not be like that, and, in fact, we may not even have thought that that mattered at all, now we are to do exactly that! And when we keep copping out we are sinning. “Ah, it doesn’t matter if I’m a bit later for that meeting. No one will be on time anyway!”
What did the master in Matthew 25 expect from his servants? He gave them talents to use! And look what they got for being faithful to him. He praised them! In verses 21 and 23 there Jesus says, “Well done, good and faithful servant! You have been faithful with a few things; I will put you in charge of many things. Come and share your master’s happiness!”
Congregation, how do we rate? Are we known for where we stand? Do those in our church and in our community see us as absolutely dependable?
Because that’s indeed what they should see as the harvest the Holy Spirit is being shown in our lives. This isn’t what we’re doing in our own strength. It’s the fruit ripening because of what is within it.
It is in this way that we become what we are not! Only as the clay is completely mouldable in the Potter’s hand can it be what he wants it to be!
The Corinthian Christians showed this. It’s to the same church which the apostle Paul had to warn so severely in his first letter that he can write to in his second letter chapter 7, verse 12, “So even though I wrote to you, it was not on account of the one who did the wrong or of the injured party, but rather that before God you could see for yourselves how devoted to us you are.”
Here’s the harvest! And what joy the apostle has. Because how much doesn’t God love it when someone who has always been so much on the fringe of our fellowship becomes drawn closer into the heart of the church!
Do you look to see God doing that? Or do you have the same limiting thoughts about how that person can’t possibly be changing that way. And when there is a set-back you automatically assume they’ve gone back to their old ways!
Are we then being faithful to what the Lord can do? Are we praying? And are we standing up to pay the price he paid? Or could it be that our level of church involvement is only for the same reason as others are members of sport or hobby clubs. Then it’s something we’re comfortable with. And yet it’s this very faithfulness that should be making you very uncomfortable!
Do you think the widow we read of in Luke 18 really wanted to keep pleading against the unjust judge? Of course not! None of us consciously wants to make life difficult for ourselves. Yet she wasn’t budging! She knew what was right, and she was going to pursue it until justice was done.
But how prepared are we to do the same? Where are the wholesome, honest, and open relationships, which are the essence of faithfulness? How do we see love as persistent presence in our church?
We of all people should know where we stand with each other! What have you got to hide? Because of knowing where God stands with us don’t we have the way to stand with each other? We of all people should be speaking the truth. We have to be faithful witnesses! As Paul writes in Ephesians 4 verse 15, “speaking the truth in love, we will in all things grow up into him who is the Head, that is, Christ.”
There’s been more emphasis these days on speaking in love, and somehow forgetting “the truth”. But that’s far from proclaiming the Gospel. Because hasn’t God spoken clearly? And isn’t that especially so in his Last Word - his own dear Son?
It’s in this light that we alone can shine. It’s with his ripening strength coming from within that we can be the faithful one he so much loves.
It could be that he finds what he doesn’t love. That’s why in Luke 18, verse 8, Jesus asked, “Nevertheless, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?” For while the church will still exist, there is the challenge here as to how faithful she will be. Church history provides many examples of those churches and denominations which have stopped showing this fruit. And don’t their harvests so soon after that cease all together?
Congregation, pray and work for faithfulness. May it be said of you what the apostle John said of Gaius. For in his third letter, the verses 3 and 4, he writes to him, “It gave me great joy to have some brothers come and tell about your faithfulness to the truth and how you continue to walk in the truth. I have no greater joy than to hear that my children are walking in the truth.”
Believer, stand up for the Lord! Then you won’t fall for anything!
Amen.
PRAYER:
Let’s pray…
O Great Unchangeable God, you who is always the same; the One who is the most consistently loving One; the One who always thought to save us through your Son. We bow before you now, thanking you for your faithfulness.
And now we pray very much Lord that we ourselves would be blessed by your Spirit to be the same. May those around us see who we are here for. And make them keep seeing that - again and again!
Through Christ our Lord, we pray, Amen.
* As a matter of courtesy please advise Rev. Sjirk Bajema, if you plan to use this sermon in a worship service. Thank-you.
(c) Copyright, Rev. Sjirk Bajema
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