The Fruit of the Spirit Author:George Washington Bethune Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: LOVE. The apostle holds forth to us a rich cluster of graces, but he names first the stem from which the rest hang. For as upon Christ, the living vine, all t... more »he living branches grow, and from the Spirit, through Him, derive their vigour and fruit- fulness ; so it is from love the other graces proceed, and through love are ripened unto perfection. Yet it Vere an unworthy figure to make love, the sweetest fruit of the cluster, a mere stem, which is dry and tasteless. We should rather compare these graces to fruits, which grow the one out of the other, love being the first formed and chiefest. Love has never been accurately defined, but we know it to be, That affection which has delight in its objects, and desires their welfare. A rational being loves not without a reason, which seems to him good. The reasons of a Christian's love are drawn from the word of God,guiding and governing the sensibilities of his soul. He loves God, because of his holy excellence, his loving-kindness toward him, and the enjoyment he has in his communion. He loves those to whom he is bound by the closer ties of life, not only because of the natural affections the Creator has implanted in his heart, but because God has, in a greater or less degree, entrusted their welfare to his care. He loves Christians, because they are beloved by his heavenly Father, bear His image so far as grace has transformed them, and because their sympathy and friendship is a mutual blessing. He loves all men, because God has commended them to his love; and he desires and delights in their welfare, as God loves the world. He loves the holy angels, because they are faithful and honoured servants of his God, minister to him now by Christ's gracious permission, and will be his loving companions in the praise of God throughout ...« less