Family Connection – The Fruit of the Spirit

In the car...

Today’s Lesson — The Fruit of the Spirit

Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. These are actually a lot to remember, and then on top of that we should be acting them out in our daily lives, too! It’s not always easy to remember these things and use them as we go about our days.

As you drive, talk about how there are many things we do and remember. Like driving: we need to remember all the rules of driving, be aware of our surroundings...the list goes on. We get to use this as positive reinforcement for us to memorize the fruits of the Spirit and enable them in our everyday life. A plus is that the Holy Spirit is there to help us!

At home...

Read Galatians 5

These fruits are the opposite of sin. When we are sinning, it shows the contrary to the fruits of the Spirit. It accentuates that we are not living by the Spirit and, as Paul mentions, we will not inherit the earth. We need to remember that as we are living by the Spirit, the fruits will reveal themselves and guide us in the opposite direction of sin and the dreadful fruits of that sin. Paul tries his best to explain simply how we should be revealing the Spirit inside of us and that the Holy Spirit will produce the fruit and guide us away from sinning.

As you discuss the dreadful fruits of sin, talk about how you can use the fruits of the Spirit to guide you back to God and help you behave in a way that pleases Him.

Around the table...

Well, to be quite obvious, the fruits of the Spirit can be memorized by using fruit! As you prepare one of your meals this week, plan on a fruit salad, or perhaps a green salad, or even a casserole. As you prepare this, make sure it has enough separate ingredients to represent ALL of the fruits of the Spirit. As you begin the preparation, invite the family to help cut, peel, chop, and assemble the elements. As you assemble the elements together, name each one after a spiritual fruit and then ask which one is which at the table. Hopefully, this will create a fun memory exercise for the family.

GO DEEPER: As a family, talk about the dreadful fruits of sin. I believe Paul is guiding us through recognizing the difference between the fruits of the Spirit and those of sin. Talk about the ugly ones, too, so that when they appear, we are not blind to them. Follow up with the good ones and how they are demonstrated by the family.