What Are Spiritual Fruits & Gifts Of The Holy Spirit, According To Galatians 5
These spiritual fruits are gifts good for the body, mind and soul.
Nathan Cowley via @pexels What are the gifts of the Holy Spirit, according to the Bible? According to Galatians 5, God gifts Christians spiritual fruit to encourage and strengthen faith.
Fruits are good for you, at least that’s what we were told growing up. Plenty of studies have come out debating the topic. So, if physical fruit is healthy, imagine how beneficial fruits that are gifts from God can be for your body, mind, and spirit.
What are the fruits of the spirit, according to Galatians 5 in the Bible?
“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faith, gentleness, and self-control. Against such things there is no law.” — Galatians 5:22-23
The Catholic Vulgate says that there are 12 fruits of the spirit: charity, joy, peace, patience, benignity, goodness, longanimity, mildness, faith, modesty, continency, and chastity. Some faiths argue that there are 7 and some say there are 9 spiritual fruits given to believers who are growing in their faith with God.
What does each fruit of the spirit mean?
Most of these are qualities that you would’ve (or should’ve) been raised with. You’re taught to love everyone, be patient when waiting for something, be kind to one another and so on.
It’s something you’ve probably been practicing your whole life without even realizing it. And, even if you don’t cover all nine, you probably at least cover one or two of them.
If you’re unsure if you exemplify each spiritual fruit or how you can start to demonstrate the maturity of a believer, allow me to explain each gift from God, according to Galatians 5 of the Bible.
1. The first spiritual fruit gifted by God is love.
This one’s pretty simple. There are all sorts of ways to show love, whether it’s for a family member, friend or significant other. Just showing that you care is typically enough.
2. The second spiritual fruit of the spirit that believers receive from God is joy.
You should be joyous in your life in Christ. Find what makes you happy through God. True joy can only be found through journey and self-discovery and it certainly doesn’t hurt to have a bit of guidance too.
3. Peace is a spiritual gift often called a fruit, too.
The Bible defines the gift of peace as maintaining harmony. Don’t go out of your way to cause violence and make the best effort you can to get along with everyone. Look for inner peace as well, because it’s just as if not more important than outer peace.
4. God gives patience, which is also a fruit of the spirit.
This is another one that’s pretty self-explanatory. Whether you’re waiting on a person or a package, reminding yourself to be patient can help to keep your mind at ease (which also helps with peace)!
5. Kindness is a fruit of the spirit.
This is kind of like love but in a more casual sense. You should make the effort to be kind to everyone you know and meet. This means not being insulting or ragging on others and making an effort to help when the opportunity arises.
6. Goodness is a fruit of the spirit as described in the Bible.
If there was an actual scale of whether something is good or bad, this fruit would embody it. It’s telling you to do the best you can to stay on the good side. This isn’t like the idea of if you do enough good things you get into Heaven.
It’s more like not intentionally sinning, asking for forgiveness and doing your best to be good in God’s eyes by living faithfully in Christ.
7. Faith is a spiritual gift and a biblical fruit.
This is straightforward. Listen to God and learn from the Bible. Live your life under the guidance of Christian principles. Doing that shows your faith not only to God but to others as well.
8. Gentleness is a fruit of the spirit.
Another way to put this would be understanding. Think of it as a parent and child situation. When the child does something wrong, rather than yelling at them, the parent is gentle, even in discipline.
9. Self-control is a fruit of the spirit.
Perhaps the hardest of the fruits to practice in life. It applies to so much of our lives, from preventing impulse buys to controlling your temper. But without it, the world would be much more chaotic than it already is.
10. Which spiritual fruit is the greatest and best gift to receive?
Honestly, none of the fruits rank higher than another. They’re all of equal importance because they’re all things you should practice in your daily life.
Even putting aside being a Christian, these are the qualities that make up a decent human being. The Fruits of the Spirit are like guiding principles in life.
Now while they’re all equal, none of them quite embodies all the others like love.
According to 1 Corinthians 13, a popular Bible scripture love is the greatest gift of all.
“Love is patient and is kind. Love doesn’t envy. Love doesn’t brag, is not proud, doesn’t behave itself inappropriately, doesn’t seek its own way, is not provoked, takes no account of evil; doesn’t rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, and endures all things.” — 1 Corinthians 13:4-7:
To put it another way, love is joyful, love is peaceful, love is patient, love is kind, love is good, love is faithful, love is gentle and love is using self-control to have the best possible relationships with others.
Love is a gift and it covers so much in life. It’s why there are so many romance movies, why love and friendship is a theme in so many shows and why we care so much about our families (even if we don’t want to admit it). Love gives us all of the Fruits of the Spirit wrapped up with a nice little bow.
However, just because love touches all the bases doesn’t mean that’s the only one you need. Just as the body can’t live off of apples alone, the soul needs all of the fruits. Practicing all of them will make you the best version of yourself in your faith.
Jesse Oakley is a writer who writes about love, relationships, self-care and spirituality/astrology.