Today God expects fruit in the life of His children. That fruit comes from a good heart. That good heart is made good by God in a process called the new birth.

We all were born bearing fruit; only it was bad fruit - that is why God saved us. He wanted to change us from being a bad tree bearing bad fruit into being a good tree bearing good fruit. Fruit means change and that is what God is seeking in your life and mine today.

Twenty-six hundred years ago God explained the new heart that bears fruit in Ezekiel 36. Turn there with me and see what He says.

Ezekiel 36:26-27

"I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you (that is when God gives us the good heart of Mark 4.8 & 20);

I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh (then God removes the hard, crowded, and shallow hearts);

I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes (then God gives us the power of His Spirit so we can do what God expects);

and you will keep My judgments and do them (that is our responsibility to respond in the fruitfulness that God expects from us)."

There is no heart God can't change. There is no life, no past, no sin, no stain, no failure, and no habit that God can't change if you will let Him. Are you letting the Lord change you? Are you responding? Is Jesus Christ controlling you more each day?

So in our lives the anointing of the Holy Spirit is the moment-by-moment appropriation of God's power over the pests that irritate and nag us in life. Only the Holy Spirit can free us from frustrations and irritations. Only the Holy Spirit can quiet us and bring us to contentment.

At salvation we received all of the Holy Spirit. But to possess Him and to be controlled by Him are two vastly different conditions. It's the application that matters.

The fruit of the Spirit is actually a list of Christ's personality traits when the Holy Spirit runs our lives. There are 9 evidences called the fruit of the Holy Spirit in Galatians 5:22-23:

love                                                joy                          peace

Longsuffering         kindness             goodness

faithfulness             gentleness      self-control

The Holy Spirit pours His LOVE over my strife, and brings peace.

The Holy Spirit pours His joy over my envy, and brings peace.

The Holy Spirit pours His peace over my disputes, and brings peace.

The Holy Spirit replaces my personality with Christ's. The results are dramatic, life changing and overflowing. There is always enough left over for others, an overflowing life is meant to be shared. The fruit of the Spirit is for me. The overflowing life is for others.

To continue reading this message on Christ Abides in My Attitudes please click here.