In the midst of growing political, social, and cultural divisiveness, there has been a lot of chatter lately about what true Christianity is or what defines a true Christian. Some people accuse other of not being "true" Christians because they have certain political ideas, belong to a certain church, engage in certain activities, or don't engage in certain activities. However, what if the true mark of Christianity had less to do with political affiliation, stating the right doctrines, belonging to the right denomination, or even "doing" the right actions? What if it had much more to do with what kind of person you have become in your personality, reactions, relationships, and everyday life? Perhaps, the true essence of the Christian life has less to do with whether you use certain terms or phrases, and more to do with you living out those values. The Bible says that the fruits of the Spirit are love, joy, peace, patience, goodness, kindness, gentleness, and self-control.
Recently, in my life I have been trying to explore what it means to let those characteristics become a part of who I am, whether it is my relationships, my job, my activities, my reactions, and my way of thinking. In the end, this is what true Christianity is about- letting the Spirit of God take our lives and form our personalities and beings into something peaceful, joyful, and overflowing with love. Obviously, this internal change will quickly flow over into actions. In the end, Jesus doesn't want to just take our same characteristics and personality and just put a Christian twist on it; he wants he to be continually reforming and reshaping our being and the way we see the world. These next couple of weeks, I am going to be blogging twice a week regarding each one of these fruits and how we can allow the Spirit to make them a reality in our lives. I hope you read along, comment, and start your own journey in understanding how we can become internally changed, so we can make a bigger impact in the world around us.