Thought of the Day 12.23.08

The Bible teaches us that “the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.” (Gal 5:23) But why does Paul use the singular “fruit” rather than the plural “fruits” to label this? I think I know why.

See, most of us read that passage and perhaps we think of a single tree producing nine different kinds of fruit, sometimes being patient, sometimes being joyful. But Paul is using a nature metaphor, and this just isn’t how things work. A tree only yields one sort of fruit, and a given seed will always produce that fruit.

Honoring the grammar, then, we must say that when the Spirit grows, It produces a single fruit with all nine of these characteristics. And just as an apple without skin isn’t really an apple and an orange without segments isn’t really an orange, we must realize that a person with anything less than all nine flavors of the Spirit isn’t really a Christian, just a fruit impostor.