“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.” Galatians 5:22-23 NIV
The last area of the Fruit of the Spirit is self-control. A person who has good self-control is able to prolong gratification, make wise choices and keep their thoughts in line with the will of God. A person who does not have good self-control tends to do impulsive things, say what they are thinking as soon as it comes into their mind and make choices that end up causing them trouble at some point.
Why would self-control be part of the Fruit of the Spirit? When I think of a person who is demonstrating the Fruit of the Spirit as a whole, I think of a loving person, who puts others first, who is calm, generous and loyal. I believe that if that person was not able to control their thoughts, their feelings and/or their actions then they would not be able to be a loving, calm, generous, loyal person who puts others before themselves.
To be loving, you have to control your thoughts of distrust and hate. To be calm, you have to control your feelings of excitement or depression. To be generous, you have to control your thoughts of wanting to keep what you have for yourself and your actions of actually giving what you have away. To be loyal, you have to control all of those because our thoughts about distrust which can turn to feelings of depression. When you are depressed, you are not as likely to be thinking of others or very giving of your time or resources.
Controlling oneself can be difficult if we try to do it on our own. As we develop this area of the Fruit of the Spirit, as with each of the other areas, we need to rely on God for help. He put the seed of each one of the areas inside of us and He is the One who is able to water the seed, feed the seed with His word and help it to grow. Trying to grow or develop this characteristic in particular by your own power can be problematic because of how intertwined it is with the other areas.
Sometimes I think that this area is the hardest area to develop/grow into maturity. As the sinful, immediate gratification seeking people that we are, telling our flesh ‘no’ can be difficult. If we struggle with small areas of control such as what we say out oud or what we eat or what we watch, how much more difficult can maintaining our desire to follow God’s will be?
God asks us to make statements and perform actions that we do not have the strength to say or do on our own. The wonderful news is that we don’t have to do any of it on our own. God is willing to be with us each day, in every situation, letting us lean on Him and giving us what we need to do what He is asking. That is great, but there is one thing we have to do and that is be willing to let Him help us.
We have to be willing to say ‘Lord, please help me’. We have to be willing to follow His lead when He instructs us on what we are to say and how we are to say it. We need to follow His lead about what He wants us to do and how He wants us to perform the action. We have to be able to take whatever amount of self-control we posses and use it so that we don’t run away from God when He asks us to make a statement that we don’t believe we can make. We need to not run when He asks us to perform an action that we don’t believe we can perform.
The number of times over the years that I have argued with God about saying something to another person that I felt uncomfortable saying because I didn’t know how they would respond, is too large a number for me to even imagine. The sad thing is that what God was asking me to say may have been exactly what that person needed to hear, but I was not willing to control my fear and rely on God in that moment.
I have developed this area over the years, but I am not even close to where I need to be. Thankfully I believe God isn’t done with me yet and is still there to help me each step of the way.
Do you struggle with self-control? If you do, have you ever asked God for help in this area? Be ware though, because just like patience, the only way to develop self-control is to experience situations where self-control is required. I believe that every one of us can do this with God’s help. He is not willing to leave any of us behind, so I encourage you to go to Him and ask Him for help today. Don’t put it off, He is waiting for each one of us, patiently.
Have a great day and stay connected to God.