Galatians [5:22] “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.”
True human kindness in its purest form comes from the Spirit of God. Within ourselves our attempts would be feeble. We were brought up to be kind to others, but do we always display that to others?
What are the various shades of Kindness or the opposite of kindness? I have labeled the opposite of Kindness to be Meanness. I think we would all agree that Meanness exists in many forms. Hitler killing the Jews would be one of the examples. Ethnic cleansing between Hutus and Tutsis another. Being kind to your friends and family is pretty easy. Being kind to those who agree with you is also easy. But if we have God’s Spirit living in us then our lives should be characterized by Kindness. We should be considered to be a kind person.
This fruit should be evident in our lives. We are not perfect and therefore we find ourselves in the middle ground on a lot of these things. What is in that middle ground between Kindness and Meanness? Cruel jokes, bullying, relentless teasing. Not hard to agree with those. What about idle gossip and speculation? What about constantly pointing out the flaws in others? Don’t get me wrong, I know there are times that we speak out on an issue of importance. We may do this vigorously and with passion. But somehow kindness must also be there. Disagreeing with the issue rather than shredding the person.
Kindness can cause us to still wish for an Islamic terrorist to be saved despite what he has done. Kindness can cause us to give money to a beggar and treat him with respect even though we may dislike many things about him. And closer to home, Kindness can cause us to edit what we say on Facebook. We show Kindness because we don’t just represent ourselves, but we represent Jesus if we are Christians. Let’s get out the magnifying glass today and make sure we are getting it right on the issue of Kindness.
As we head into the Thanksgiving Holiday it is a privilege to bring to you this opportunity for self-reflection. This series of devotions are written by Harriet Bowman and allow for us to consider the work of God’s Spirit in our lives.