Fruit Salad
The fruit of the Spirit
by Brian Radcliffe
Suitable for Key Stage 3 - Church Schools
Aims
To explore our understanding of our emotions and personality.
Preparation and materials
- Have available a selection of fruit to display.
- The list of the fruit of the Spirit can be found in the Bible in Galatians 5.22-23.
Assembly
- Show the selection of fruit.
I love a good fruit salad. It combines so many elements and can be different every time. You can have the sweetness of strawberries and raspberries, the tang of citrus fruit, the softness of banana, the crunch of apple, the pop of a grape and the exotic flavours of kiwi, mango or other tropical fruit. A fruit salad is tasty, refreshing and healthy too. You can have your five-a-day, or more, in one bowl. And, of course, there’s the optional extra of a nice big scoop of ice cream! - Did you know that we’re all a bit of a fruit salad? At least, the Bible reckons so. Saint Paul, in one of his many letters to early Christian believers in Greece and Turkey, talks about ‘the fruit of the Spirit’. He writes that we are a fruit salad of different emotions and personality traits. His list comprises love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, humility and self-control.
- I wonder what our fruit salad contains at this moment.
- Love. Do we dare to say that we love people rather than liking them? Love is not just an emotion; it’s an active willingness to put others before ourselves.
- Joy. It might be an old-fashioned word, but do we have a happiness deep down that sometimes seems to fill us up?
- Peace. Of course we all want peace, but how do we handle criticism, aggression and conflict? Do we react or can we display peace?
- Patience. How long are we willing to wait, to put others first, to give people a second chance?
- Kindness. Are we kind? Do we do things to benefit others, without expecting anything in return?
- Goodness. Are we good people? How do we tell? Surely it’s connected to being honest and trustworthy.
- Faithfulness. Are we loyal, a supporter in good times and bad, someone who will see a project through to the end?
- Humility. Do we need to be at the front of the queue, the voice that speaks loudest, the self-proclaimed best, or can we stand back when appropriate?
- Self-control. This one is perhaps the most difficult of all. Do we wear our heart on our sleeve, or can we keep our emotions in check until the right time to act or speak? - So today, is our fruit salad sweet or sour, soft or crunchy, plain or nicely balanced?
Time for reflection
This list of the fruit of the Spirit may make us feel rather uncomfortable. Most of us probably feel like we are lacking in many of these qualities and wish we could be better people.
Christians believe that these personality traits don’t come from inside us, they need outside intervention. In one way, this is reassuring because it means that we don’t need to get frustrated or guilty when we don’t succeed in acting or speaking how we want to. However, it can be a little confusing as to where these traits come from. For Christians, the answer is straightforward: they come from God’s Holy Spirit when we invite him to be part of our lives. The Spirit is the one who can change our personalities from day to day, adding to the wonderful people we already are.
Many faiths teach us that we need help outside ourselves to develop into better people. If we have no religious faith, counsellors or mentors might be able to provide help with this too. The point is that we can’t do this on our own. Our fruit salad needs some input from outside.
So, what’s on the menu today? How can we become better people and develop good qualities?
Pause to allow time for thought.
Prayer
Dear God,
Please help us to work at becoming better people.
Thank you for all that is good about us.
Please help the fruits of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, humility and self-control to be seen more and more in our lives, day by day.
Amen.
