I’ve been thinking a lot lately about fruit. Not the kind that grows in orchards or fills our kitchen bowls in the summer, but the kind Paul writes about in Galatians 5:22–23—the fruit of the Spirit. And I’ve been paying attention to the way he says it: the fruit—singular, not plural.

It’s not a basket of virtues we can mix and match. Not a spiritual to-do list to perform our way through. It’s one integrated whole. One fruit. One beautiful outgrowth of a life lived close to God.

Love. Joy. Peace. Patience. Kindness. Goodness. Faithfulness. Gentleness. Self-control.

Not separate, but connected. Not immediate, but slowly ripened.

And last Sunday, Bryan Barley said something that’s been echoing in my heart all week: We don’t force fruit. It doesn’t grow by effort or exhaustion or willpower. You can’t clench your fists and squeeze out more gentleness. You can’t manufacture real peace by pretending things are okay. Fruit only grows when it’s connected to the vine, nourished by something deeper than itself.

This is so counter to everything the world teaches us. In our culture of constant striving—where identity is often measured by productivity, appearance, or performance—the idea of something good emerging from rest, from abiding, from slowness and surrender? It feels almost impossible. But it’s exactly what Jesus offers.

He says in John 15:4, “Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me.”

The fruit of the Spirit isn’t a demand; it’s a result. It’s not a test of how hard we’re trying; it’s the evidence of how closely we’re staying.

And this matters. Not just for our own souls, but for a world aching for something real.

We live in a time when suffering is everywhere. War rages. Families fracture. Loneliness grows like a shadow. Abuse and injustice steal safety from so many. And in the midst of this, it’s easy to feel overwhelmed or cynical or numb.

But what if the fruit of the Spirit is not just about our personal spiritual growth—but also about healing the world, one quiet act at a time?

What if a Spirit-led life is a form of resistance against a culture of cruelty, haste, and self-preservation?

Because the fruit has practical implications:

It looks like gentleness when someone shares a vulnerable truth and we don’t rush to fix them.

It looks like peace when the news is grim but we light a candle and pray anyway.

It looks like kindness when someone lashes out, and we choose not to return harm for harm.

It looks like self-control when we could post that angry comment or make that cutting remark—but we don’t.

It looks like love that stays. Love that listens. Love that doesn’t ask for proof someone is worth it.

The fruit of the Spirit is how heaven touches earth—through the lives of ordinary people who stay rooted in an extraordinary God.

It’s not a fast process. Fruit ripens over time. It grows in hidden places, in the slow work of surrender, in the dailiness of choosing Jesus again and again. It grows in us when we don’t even notice it—when we are tired, and aching, and wondering if we’re making a difference.

But the Spirit is faithful.

And where the Spirit is, fruit is coming.

Not perfectly. Not without pruning. But it will come.

And so the invitation today is not to try harder, but to stay closer. Not to strive, but to abide. Not to fake fruit, but to yield to the Spirit who brings it to life.

Because the world doesn’t need more polished performances. It needs more people ripening in love.

And that’s what the Spirit does—in you, in me, in all who stay near.

May we be those people. And may the fruit of the Spirit in our lives be a taste of God’s goodness in a world that’s hungry for healing.