A Virtuous Lifeনমুনা

A Virtuous Life

From the very beginning, you were created by God to be a person of virtue. A person whose life reflects the goodness of God. A person whose actions bring light into the world and push back darkness. Whose every word is true, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. And whose example shows others what a life changed by the grace of Jesus and guided by the Holy Spirit could and should look like.

This is a high calling. And, as impossible as it may seem, it’s absolutely worth pursuing. Why? Because becoming virtuous, becoming righteous, isn’t something you have to do on your own. It’s something God does in you as you choose, daily, to trust and follow Him.

As you read this Plan, it’s important that you keep this big idea in mind: The Holy Spirit shows us how to live like Jesus and shapes us into people who love like Jesus.

Who is the Holy Spirit? The Holy Spirit is not a thing. The Holy Spirit is a person. The third person of the Trinity. If you’re unfamiliar with that language, that’s okay. A core belief that Christians have held is that God is a Trinity (tri-unity), meaning He is three distinct persons all united as one being. Those three persons are God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. After Jesus ascended into heaven, He sent His Spirit, the Holy Spirit, to fill us with power and guide us with truth. When we commit our lives to Jesus, He gives us the Holy Spirit. That means God Himself is living in you. And it is His power and truth working in you that makes you the person you were made to be.

Who were you made to be? Someone who lives and loves like Jesus does. He is completely good, totally perfect, and absolutely righteous. He is virtuous. And He wants all of us to know Him, trust Him, follow Him, and become like Him. But that’s not something we could ever do on our own. Because we aren’t God. The only way we could ever be who He was and do what He did is with a whole lot of help.

Are you starting to see it? The Holy Spirit is the helper (advocate)we need to live into our potential and live out our purpose as God’s people!

And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate, who will never leave you. He is the Holy Spirit, who leads into all truth. … John 14:16-17 NLT

This is why the gospel is such good news. Faith in Jesus leads to the forgiveness of our sins, and it brings about a newness of life. Life, not under the oppressive rule of sin, but under the loving guidance of God’s Spirit. A life where virtue comes not through following the old covenant law, but through following the lead of the Holy Spirit.

And all of this setup brings us to the fifth chapter of Paul’s letter to the Galatians. The Christians in Galatia were having a difficult time because their understanding of the good news had been distorted. They had begun to believe that all followers of Jesus, Jews and Gentiles (non-Jewish people), were required to follow the Law of Moses. Paul spends the first four chapters correcting that false idea by making it clear that you don’t have to become Jewish in order to be Christian. The Law of Moses was given to a particular people (the people of Israel), for a specific purpose (to show the world how different the true God is from the false gods that other nations worshiped), for a period of time (until the arrival of the Messiah). But when Jesus kicked off His ministry, He announced that a new and better kingdom had come with Him. A kingdom not of this world, but the kingdom of heaven. A kingdom not limited to one group of people or a set period of time, but a kingdom open to everyone, that will stand for eternity.

In the Bible, the Old Testament tells the story of God’s partnership with human beings up until the arrival of Jesus, and it’s defined by a set of laws and commands that God’s people were meant to follow as citizens of Israel. But, because of Jesus, the old covenant passed away, and the new covenant has been established.

… For by the power of the eternal Spirit, Christ offered himself to God as a perfect sacrifice for our sins. That is why he is the one who mediates a new covenant between God and people, so that all who are called can receive the eternal inheritance God has promised them. …Hebrews 9:14-15 NLT

All of this created a lot of questions for the early Christians. Especially those who were Jewish. Because if the old covenant, with its commands and promises, was passing away, and the new covenant was taking its place, then how were believers supposed to live? What were they supposed to do? What was off limits? These were questions that the Law of Moses answered very thoroughly with its 613 commands. But, as good and helpful as the law was, it was never enough to save us from our sins or make us righteous. No matter how hard the people tried, they still fell short. Why? Because all of us have been affected by sin. A disease of selfishness that tempts us to disobey God and mistreat people. More than we need the law to instruct us, we need Jesus to save us and the Spirit to lead us.

This was Paul’s answer to the question that many Jewish Christians were asking. As good as the law was, it was never enough to make us virtuous. We need something new and better. We need the power of God to fill us and the truth of God to guide us. And, because of Jesus, that’s exactly what we have! We have the Holy Spirit to show us how to live like Jesus and shape us into people who love like Jesus!

So I say, let the Holy Spirit guide your lives. Then you won’t be doing what your sinful nature craves. The sinful nature wants to do evil, which is just the opposite of what the Spirit wants. And the Spirit gives us desires that are the opposite of what the sinful nature desires. … But the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against these things! Those who belong to Christ Jesus have nailed the passions and desires of their sinful nature to his cross and crucified them there. Since we are living by the Spirit, let us follow the Spirit’s leading in every part of our lives. Galatians 5:16-17, 22-25 NLT

For the rest of this Plan, we are going to dive deep into the fruit of the Spirit, the virtues that Jesus embodied and the Holy Spirit produces when we trust and follow Him. We’ll learn about each fruit, identify the counterfeits the world tries to sell us, and discover what it looks like for us to partner with the Holy Spirit to become virtuous.