Fruit of the Spirit: Kindness

Have you ever noticed how much of Christ’s life was spent in doing kind things?
– Henry Drummond (Christian Quotes)

I am sure that you will agree that Jesus should be our ultimate role model. While he was a man, had full access to the Holy Spirit just like we do today. When we read the gospels it is easy to put ourselves in the shoes of the disciples. But the truth is that they did not yet have that access before the cross. So we should not aspire to be like them, but instead we should model our lives on that of Jesus himself.

What is the definition of kindness?

kindness (noun): The quality of being friendly, generous, and considerate.
– Oxford Dictionary

It is easy enough to be friendly, generous and considerate to our loved ones. Well, most of the time anyway. But the purpose of our living in the world is to be ambassadors for God.

2 Corinthians 5:20 (WEBBE): ²⁰We are therefore ambassadors on behalf of Christ, as though God were entreating by us: we beg you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God.

An Earthly ambassador is supposed to accurately represent the country where he or she is from. In the same way, as children of God we are supposed to accurately represent the nature of God to the world. So is kindness part of God’s nature? The answer is a resounding yes!

Luke 6:35 (WEBBE): ³⁵But love your enemies, and do good, and lend, expecting nothing back; and your reward will be great, and you will be children of the Most High; for he is kind towards the unthankful and evil.

Ephesians 4:32 (WEBBE): ³²And be kind to one another, tender hearted, forgiving each other, just as God also in Christ forgave you.

The great thing about kindness is that it often takes very small gestures to make a pretty big difference. Next time when you are shopping for groceries, just be friendly with the lady behind the bakery counter, and see what a difference it makes to her day! Or next time when you are approaching a door just as somebody else is arriving too, let that person go first – with a smile!

If we can learn to be kind to ALL the people around us, it will go a long way towards convincing people that being a child of God is worthwhile. And as with all other things we are not alone in this – we have the Holy Spirit in us to teach us and guide us every moment of every day.

New: Verse Images

Communication today tends to be very visual. People are looking for beautiful images to share, with striking messages that will not take long to read. I totally understand that – I like sharing those too.

But only really recently did I come to realise that I can contribute to sharing the Word in this way! I have plenty of photos of gorgeous scenes in nature that I can use to create images of my own. And so I have started to create and upload images here, on the brand new Verse Images page. There are two sections – one for English and another for Afrikaans.

Feel free to share the images everywhere!