In the Spirit

Charles Spurgeon on the fruit of the Spirit of God, and what is not. “When the Spirit of truth is come, He pours daylight into the darkness, and leads us into all truth. He does not merely show the truth, but He leads us into it, so that we stand within it, and rejoice in the hid treasure which it contains. Then we know Him as our sacred illuminator.”

No sooner has the Spirit visited us, than we have felt all alive—bright, cheerful, and intense. Then our whole heart has run in the ways of God’s commands, and we have rejoiced in his name. How true is that word, “He restoreth my soul”! Thus have we known the Holy Spirit by His operations within us. We have known the Holy Spirit in many ways: He restrains evil, stimulates us to good, instructs, comforts, directs, and enlightens us. He has been to us, the fullness, the Spirit of revival.

When we become dull, cold, barren of joy and fall asleep, He pricks us to listen to what He is saying to us. Ever present, never departing, He ignites a fire in us for more. True disciples of Christ have felt a divinely supernatural power working upon them. In His way, He lifts a word off the page, He whispers, He nudges turn here, look up and know the Father is watching. Become familiar, be acquainted with the Holy Spirit, who is not divided from the Father and the Son.

As you know the Son you know the Father, and in this way you come to know the Holy Spirit. No man cometh to the Father but by the Son, and he that cometh to the Father receiveth of the Spirit. When Jesus Christ had taught His people concerning the Holy Spirit, and they had received His teaching, Jesus said, “Ye know Him; for He dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.” If the audience refused the sayings of Christ, if they had possessed no love, not kept God’s commandments, if they had arrogantly resolved to seek and find out the mystery of God for themselves, leaning on their own understanding — apart from the instruction of their Master, they will not have obeyed the Spirit of God. Without asking, inquiring of, listening, or receiving the gift of understanding, people do not know the Spirit of God. We begin our acquaintance with the Spirit by sitting at the feet of Jesus, and accepting His testimony as sure.

The world knows nothing of the Holy Spirit; but the disciples of Christ know Him; and seek His counsel. The Lord Jesus said, “He dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.” If the Holy Spirit is bearing witness in your spirit that you are a child of God, then you are truly born of God. In those with whom the Holy Ghost works effectually “there is no guile”; they are open-hearted, honest, sincere, and true; they have an intense affection for the truth, and a zeal for it. The Holy Spirit is the teacher of truth, He is practical, and divinely effective in delivering truth. He never teaches anything but the truth. If it comes from the Spirit of God, we may receive it from Him without any hesitation. It is He that takes of the things of Christ, and shows them unto us; and these things are true, and He thus proves Himself to be the Spirit of truth.

Holy joy will also be a great preventive. The man who feels the joy of the Lord will not covet worldly joy. He will not be tempted to make a God of his possessions or of his talents or of anything else. He will say, “I have joy in God; these things I am very thankful for, but they are not my joy.” True worship is in our spirit as we mingle with His. We do not crave the æsthetic for our joy is in God’s presence, not in external forms. Some people’s idea of joy in religion lies in fine singing, charming music, fine clothing, splendid buildings, or a preacher’s eloquence. They look outwardly for joy, as they do not know the secret joy of the Lord. When a holy passion reigns within, we may sit inside four walls and not hear a soul speak for a whole hour and a half and yet feel the joy of the Lord.

In this joyfulness you shall find many great advantages. First, it is a great advantage in itself to be happy. Who would not rejoice if he could? Who would not rejoice when God commands him? Rejoicing rightly prepares us for life’s duties. “The joy of the Lord is your strength.” A man who goes about Christ’s work in an unwilling, miserable spirit will do it badly and feebly. He may do it earnestly, but there will be no life or energy about him. There is a responsibility laid upon a Christian to be cheerful. It is not merely an invitation, but it is a command—“Be glad in the Lord and rejoice, ye righteous.” “Rejoice in the Lord alway; and again I say, Rejoice.”

Gloomy Christians, who do not resist despondency and strive against it, but who go about as if midnight had taken up its abode in their eyes, with an everlasting frost settled on their souls, they are not obeying the command of God. The command to rejoice is as undoubted a precept of God as to love the Lord with all your heart. The vows of God are upon you, O believer, and they bind you to be joyful. “The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, and peace.”

Joy stands in the centre; “love” is on one side and “peace” on the other. Find a man who never loved anybody and you have found a joyless man. This man’s religion begins and ends with looking to his own safety. The only point he longs to know is,—is he himself saved? He never knows joy, poor creature; how can he? As to peace, where is it? He has none, because wherever he goes he growls, and grumbles, and snarls, and barks at everybody. There is no peace where he is, he is always quarrelling, and then he says, “I have little joy.” He does not live in the right house for joy. The joy of the Lord is diminished by our lack of submission to the Spiritof God. If ye do not believe what Jesus said, then neither shall thee be established. “My people perish for lack of knowledge. ” Ignorance is a result of not inquiring of the Spirit for understanding. Many Christians can list a thousand reasons for joy. Study the Word and ask for the teaching of the Spirit of God that you may understand it; so shall you discover wells of delight. Joy is diminished, also, by walking at a distance from God. If you get away from the fire, you will grow cold. The warmest place is right in front of it, and the warmest place for a believing heart is close to Christ in daily fellowship with He who resides in you.

It may be that the sin of bitterness, pride or unforgiveness spoils the connection to joy within. Some people are too full of the joy of the world, the joy of business, the joy of a large family, the joy of health, the joy of wealth, the joy of human love, or the joy which comes of the pride of life. These joys can become idols. The joy of the Lord will not stand side by side with an idolatrous delight in the things of this world. We examine our hearts and repent of the charms of this world so we can be renewed by the Spirit. Dear child of God, the list of Godly joys are; an easy conscience, the joy of feeling you have done right before God, the joy of knowing that your motive was purely for God’s glory. The joy jewel worn on one’s breast— is a quiet conscience. There in the quiet, we engage in the joy of communion with Christ, the joy of fellowship with His saints, the joy of drinking deep into Christ’s spirit of self-sacrifice. There is also the joy of expecting His glorious advent, when He and His saints shall reign upon the earth, and the joy of being with Him forever. The joys of heaven are countless. Begin counting them one by one, and let your praise to God mutiply into eternity. The deep joy we know is of the loveliest order, for it is unselfish and refined.

Let Jesus be exalted, and we ask no more. As He reigns we reign; if He is lifted up our hearts are more than satisfied. The Lord hath said, “I will make them joyful in My house of prayer.” And what a joy it is to get answers to our petitions, even as our Lord says, “Ask and ye shall receive, that your joy may be full.” Has not your joy been full, till your eyes have been dim with tears and you have not hardly dared to tell how wondrously God has answered you? The mercy-seat is lit up with joy. What a joyous ordinance is that of praise! We come up to the sanctuary and bring our offering to God, and present Him our obedient joyful praise. How sweet to think of Jesus Christ the Son, the glorious incarnate God, the surety, the satisfaction, the representative, the all in all of His people. We joy in God through our Lord Jesus Christ.

We wisely do not dismiss the joy of the Spirit. He who dwells within us is greater than all the woes of this world. He sanctifies us, comforts us, teaches us, convicts us and guides us on the road to heaven. Oh brethren, this is a sea of bliss, the infinite deeps of the eternal godhead! We get joy and peace in believing. When you get a grip of the word, when the glad tidings becomes a message to your own soul, and the Spirit speaks it to your own heart, then you delight thinking, “Go on, child of God for the Lord is laying His mighty hand on my soul.” “Full of glory!” That is a wonderful expression. A drop of glory is sweet, but, oh, to taste a joy that is full of glory—is that possible here? Yes, some of us bear witness that it is so: we have felt joy that we dare not tell, and could not tell if we dared: men would turn again andcondem us as utterly fanatical or out of our minds if we were to cast these pearls before them; but, oh, if they could guess what delicious truths are held within the jewelled chalice of divine communion they would be ready to wade through hell itself to drink from it. Our joy is altogether unspeakable joy at times.

It is a singular joy, too, because it is quite consistent with spiritual conflict. He that is an heir of heaven may cry, “O wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death? I thank God, through Jesus Christ our Lord. For a time I may be sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; struggling, yet always victorious; cast down, but not destroyed; persecuted, but not forsaken; troubled, and yet all the while triumphant; such is the mingled experience of the saints. Oh, this is the wondrous grace. Believers are not dependent upon circumstances. Their joy comes not from what they have, but from what they are; not from where they are, but from whose they are; not from what they enjoy, but from that which was suffered for them by their Lord. It is a singular joy, then, because it often buds, blossoms, and ripens in winter time, and when the fig tree does not blossom, and there is no herd in the stall, God’s Habakkuks rejoice in the God of their salvation.

“The fruit of the Spirit is joy,” and it is brought forth in believers: not alike in all, but to all believers there is a measure of joy. Taste the honey, but eat not much of it, or it will no longer please the palate. Let your ear be charmed with the Hallelujah chorus, but do not dream that you could endure its harmonies all the hours of the day; before long you would cry out for eloquent pauses, and sweet reliefs of silence. Too much even of delight will weary our feeble hearts, and we shall need to come down from the mount. Our bodies require a portion of sleep, and that which is inevitable to the flesh has its likeness in the spirit; it must be quiet and still. What child of God among us would make an exchange with the gayest of all worldlings? Thy lot is hard at time, and sometimes thy spirit sinks; but do not count thyself to be, even at thy worst, happier than the worldling at his best? Come, would you not take your poverty, even with your mourning, rather than accept his wealth with all his hilarity, and give up your hope in God? NO!

Dear ones, the Spirit of God is not barren: if He be in you He must and will inevitably produce “the fruit of the Spirit is joy.” We know this to be the fact because we ourselves are witnesses of it. Joy is our portion, and we are cheered and comforted in the Saviour. “What!” say you, “are we not depressed, sick and sorrowful at times?” Yes, but our joy does not depend on how we feel, or our circumstances. Thank God that the fruit of the Spirit of God never dimishes, as it consistently includes love, joy, and peace in the midst of trials. Sadly, some professing Christ with a gloomy countenance. Afraid to admit their joy is incomplete, they dread the days ahead. They do not speak with certainty, instead, without a confirmation in their spirit, they say “I hope”. They abstain from joy as they are suspicious if God will be faithful. Heads hung low the live without excited expectations for God’s promised good. Their religion of Christ knows no higher festival than a funeral, a time to mourn, a time to weep with robes of despair. Brethren, despondency is not the fruit of the Spirit. It is Love, Joy, and Peace with His assurance of better days ahead.

Many worship the Lord Jesus at a distance: they know not that believers are “a people near unto Him.” They are afraid of God, but they never delight in Him; they attend to worship, not because they rejoice in it, but because they think it must be done. Their secret feeling is—“What a weariness it is to sing praise,” but the box of necessity is checked as duty. They know nothing of a child’s joy of being fully forgiven, fully adopted, and loved spoken by the Father’s own lips. All God’s commands are fulfilled in one word, and that word is “love”; and all the fruits of the Spirit are contained in that one most sweet, most blessed, most God-like grace of love. See that ye abound in love towards our great Father. If you fail in the first fruit of love, how can you succeed in the second, which is joy? Above all things, put on love, which casts out fear. Joy sits in between love and peace. Persevere and trust God.