Goodness, A Fruit Of The Spirit!

Goodness: excellence, virtue

Today, I would like to share with you one of the fruits of the Spirit - the fruit of Goodness. Goodness is a virtue that we must all possess - not just in words where we talk about it here and there - but in action so that fruit can work on the inside of us. Once it's working down in us real good, it will reflect on the outside.

Someone might be thinking, "what do you mean when you say fruit of the Spirit?" What I'm talking about is the nature and character of a person. Think about it like  it's a fruit tree: once that tree grows up and those roots are deep enough, it begins to bear fruit. Similarly, when the Spirit grows deep enough on the inside of us, we should bear fruit as well - doing good, acting good, and being good. 

Dr. James Hamilton said it best: "Goodness is love and action. Love with its hand to the plow, love with the burden on its back, love following His footsteps who went about continually doing good,"  In Acts 10:38, the bible tells us how Jesus went around doing good - He actually sought out people to show His Goodness to. When He healed the blind man, when He touched the lepers, when He touched and healed little children - He didn't send someone else, He did it personally. Showing Goodness should be a hands-on, personal and up-close performance.

Let me share an example with you so that you will know how the Lord wants us to show Goodness. Joseph's brothers put him in a pit, took him out and then sold him. Joseph was sold to Potiphar, who was an officer of Pharaoh, but the Lord  showed him goodness and he was a prosperous man.  After Joseph got out of prison for something that he didn't do, Pharaoh made him governor over all the land. There came a time of great famine across all of the earth and Joseph's brothers had to come and buy food from him - only they did not know that he was their brother. Joseph, on the other hand,  recognized them and remembered everything they had done to him. He could have had them killed, but instead he showed them Goodness by giving them food. He eventually made himself known to them and moved his father and all his brothers and all their families to Egypt with him where he took care of them in spite of what they did to him - now that's Goodness!

My friends, it's imperative that we show the fruit of the spirit - Goodness - to everyone that we can, in all the ways we can, whenever we can.

With all that said, let the Church say Amen... and AMEN!