Fruit of the Spirit - Goodness

<p>Good morning, Five Minute Families! Thank you for joining us this morning as we continue gathering the fruit of the Spirit as we keep in step with God’s Holy Spirit.</p><p>Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control</p><p>This week is goodness. Goodness is defined in most dictionaries as ‘the quality of being morally good or virtuous.’ Because of the sometimes interchanging of words of kindness, goodness, compassion, and more, we need to define goodness in order to be able to distinguish it. God’s word uses it with righteous, kindness, truth, and more, but there is an inherent distinction. So, for our purposes, we will define goodness as ‘the actions which are taken to improve the health, happiness, or well-being of others.’</p><p>Let’s pause there a moment and think of God’s goodness. At our Father’s Day service, a couple sang the song “Goodness of God.” God’s goodness is summarized in that song with two ACTIONS… He leads us through the fire and He runs after us. These are actions, folks. Just as in John 3:16 “For God loved - AN ACTION WORD, by the way - For God so loved the world that He gave - another action - GAVE his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.” </p><p>Psalm 119:68 says it straight out, “You ARE good and DO good; teach me your statutes.”</p><p>We are to learn his statutes, so, let’s discuss what we consider the five ACTIONS of goodness every five-minute family should engage in to exhibit the fruit of the spirit attribute of goodness.</p><p>First, we must realize that we HAVE good. Having good - We have God’s spirit of goodness indwelling us. Psalm 34:8, says, “Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good! Blessed is the man who takes refuge in him!” and Nahum 1:7, says, “The Lord is good, a stronghold in the day of trouble; he knows those who take refuge in him. We must study God’s word to better exhibit the attribute of goodness.” We must actively study God’s word to know that we have his goodness