When I first began speaking about Love and about what God had begun to reveal to me, I had no idea where all this would lead. Even now I do not fully understand what will happen next. But I see amazing changes, first of all, in my own heart. I tell you this honestly. It is impossible to partake of Love in its pure form and remain the person one has always been. Through this gift, through God’s revelations, I have drawn closer to the Lord, and I can say this because I feel the inner changes that God is producing in me. Interestingly, this deep process also transforms my entire visible life: my attitude toward people, toward the truth, toward the Bible, and toward every undertaking.
When you do something, beginning it with Love, it is perceived in a different way. God lays that very Eternal foundation upon which He desires to build a house for His dwelling. I share these truths with you not because I seek to boast, but because I desire to convince you that if it was possible for God to produce such changes in me, then it will not be difficult for Him to do the same in any of you. This is truly so. This is the Gospel that Christ revealed to us. Love is Christ living and working in me.
In Galatians 5:22–23 we read: ‘But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance: against such there is no law.’ I have read these verses many times and reflected on them both by myself and in a group, trying to grasp their meaning, and I noticed that the word ‘fruit’ is singular. I could not understand how there could be so many qualities, characteristics, or, let us say, gifts—as I imagined them—and yet all of them were in one, all of them singular. It was difficult for me to comprehend this until I paid attention to a bunch of grapes. It hangs from one small branch; it is one fruit, but the individual grapes are separated from one another and grow individually. Each grape has the same kind of taste, but they are all different, and they may ripen at different rates. Then I understood that the fruit is one, but it contains all the beauty and fullness, and other qualities of Love may be added to this list, yet in one way or another they are all one.
What is interesting is that when the Holy Spirit produces fruit in me, it contains all these qualities listed here. I singled out Love not as something separate, but as one of the qualities. I will not speak of Love as though it were the only thing, because everything else is included as a matter of course. It is the Holy Spirit Who performs such a work in us. We cannot love without believing in God. We cannot believe in God without rejoicing or showing longsuffering. One flows from another. Everything is interconnected, as in one whole organism. Just as all the organs work for one another, so all these qualities of the fruit of the Holy Spirit abide in us as one whole. I share with you the revelations of my heart because you cannot look inside it. As I analyze what is taking place in my soul, I compare the present with my past life. I remember well how I thought when I lived in the world, what I was like when I came to believe, when I began to grow, and what guided me. And this fruit of the Spirit changed me.
Love is a miracle that God has produced in my character, and I would like you to rejoice in how wonderful our Lord is.
Reflecting on the changes that the Lord produced in my heart, I noticed that I had spoken much about Love, thought much about it, experimented much in this direction, observed, and studied, and then I suddenly realized that it was not merely some separate quality of my character. Love is its foundation. When I began to pray for the gift of Love, I did not fully understand what it was, but as I studied this subject, I turned to the biblical truths that speak about the Holy Spirit. I saw that the Holy Spirit cultivates fruit, and the first quality of this fruit is Love. I looked within myself and discovered that, independently of me, the Lord had produced the other qualities of the fruit in me as well. I asked Him for Love, and He gave me everything else. Moreover, this amazed me so much that I deeply desire to speak about how simple, accessible, and easy it is. Remove Love from the fruit, and what will remain? Joy without Love is gloating; faith without Love is fanaticism; peace without Love is self-deception, and so forth—that is, sin.
When I read the Bible now, I see how much it says about Love, Whose Author is God. He desires us to learn to love one another, and this is very important for our salvation. God longs for us to learn to love with unconditional Love, that very agape which does not depend on whether it is accepted or not and continues to act even when it is rejected.
Love is not a noun; it is a verb, it is action. It is not merely some character trait that can somehow be described. It is a power that works.
It is impossible to give a complete description of Love, but it is possible to tell how it acts and manifests itself through a person. I long for all of us, even now, to bear this fruit continually, bringing joy to one another and to God. And this is possible with God’s help. Heaven awaits my decision and will answer.
All people in this world are, to one degree or another, endowed with the gift of Love, but they do not understand its nature or the essence of God’s character; they do not know how to use Love and do not develop it. Among those who believe in God, this takes place more consciously. Believing, they bear fruit, but the ripening does not occur in the same way for everyone.
For example, there is a grapevine on which only one single cluster grows each year. It blossoms, grows, and ripens, and the same thing happens every year—only one fruit a year. There is some problem; something is wrong with this grapevine. What do we usually see on a normal grapevine when it is well cared for? Each year it bears more and more fruit. It is a tree. A tree has the ability to grow; it does not stop developing but continues to grow and grow when it is cared for. The tree becomes larger and larger.
Thus, God desires us to bear much fruit, and Jesus speaks about this: ‘I am the vine, ye are the branches.’ We cannot consciously love independently of God. Forget about it.
There are many songs about love in the world. People understand something about it, even wait for it, and even love in some sense. But the Love of which the Bible speaks is the heavenly fruit of the Holy Spirit; it is a quality of character of Divine origin. It is not human. People cannot produce it within themselves independently of God. This fruit of Love in all its beauty will never appear in a person who does not follow Christ. People may be gifted in some special way or even be extremely sensitive; they may even show mercy to others, but that Divine Love, Whose Author is the Most High, comes only from Him. This does not mean that all people in the world are deprived of Love. No. God sends rain upon the just and upon the unjust. And we know that rain is a symbol of the Holy Spirit, and He also touches the hearts of unbelieving people because He loves them, because they are His creation. But the fruit of the Spirit rightfully belongs only to spiritual people by virtue of their birth of water and of the Spirit—to those who are called children.
Homework 163
What did you understand from this lesson? What role does Love play in the fruit of the Spirit? How do you understand the growth of the fruit of the Holy Spirit in your heart? Can this fruit grow without the Vine? Have you met people who possess the fruit of the Spirit but do not believe in Christ? Do you believe that God is cultivating this fruit in your heart? Is it possible to enter Heaven without having the fruit of the Holy Spirit? Give examples. What Bible verses came to your mind while studying this lesson? Please read Galatians 5:22–23; Ephesians 5:8–9; John 14:26; 15:1–8; 2 Corinthians 9:10–11; and James 3:17–18 in the light of our lesson.