"The Choice (part two)" Galatians 5:22-23, Galatians 6:7-8

If we want qualities like true joy and true love and true kindness and true goodness and true peace –if we want those kinds of qualities in our lives, then we’ve got to sow the right seed. We sow the right seed by choosing to walk in the Spirit instead of the flesh.

In Galatians chapter 6, Paul explained it like this: He said that whatever we sow, we will reap. To think otherwise is to mock God –but God can’t be mocked.

If we are sowing seeds that produce death and destruction, we shouldn’t be surprised when harvest time comes that we find ourselves reaping a harvest of death and destruction. But on the other hand, if we sow according to the Spirit, when harvest time comes we will reap spiritual fruit. The fruit of the Spirit that comes as a natural consequence of following the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control (Galatians 5:22-23). 

Understand that there are natural consequences for our choices. If we sow to the flesh, we will reap a natural (flesh) outcome –if we sow to the Spirit, there will be a spiritual outcome.

We now can choose to walk in the Spirit. We now can choose to sow good seed that produces the spiritual qualities we want and need in our lives.

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"The Choice (part one)" Galatians 5:16

We have a choice. I’m talking now to all of us who have already asked Jesus into our hearts and lives and have claimed Him as our Savior. We can follow God or follow our own path. But we can’t do both. We can do one or the other. And that’s good news.

There was a time when we had no choice –before we came to Jesus, we were slaves to sin –we didn’t have the choice to sin or not to sin, we only had the choice to sin –there was no other option. All have sinned and fallen short. We all were slaves to sin, doing whatever our own best thinking and the physical senses and our flesh demanded. 

But now, as Believers, Jesus has set us free from bondage to sin. We once had no choice –we were slaves to sin. Now, however, we have a choice. We can choose to sin –but we can also choose to not sin. We can now choose to obey God. That’s the part we could not do apart from Christ –but now we can.

Galatians 5:16 says,  ^"So I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh."  We can choose to not sin because now, if we are in Christ, we have the Holy Spirit living in us. That’s what the Bible says.

Now the choice I have moment by moment, hour by hour, day by day, in every situation is this: will I listen to the Spirit who is in me speaking to my heart, prompting me, leading, guiding me, helping me to know wrong from right? Or will I listen to the Flesh –my own best thinking, the world’s best thinking, the stuff I perceive with my senses instead of my spirit. Will I trust God, or trust myself? This is the choice.

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