Fruit For Everyone!

Ok so this one is based on a brilliant idea I had while driving home this evening at 1am. Its about self control.
Well the Bible says;

Pr 25:28
Like a city whose walls are broken down is a man who lacks self control.

Galatians 5:22-24
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.

Now here is the one I want to look at. My good ole friend self control. I will point out right now that my number one fault in life is…I HAVE NO SELF CONTROL. And I know this is a huge part of my life that God has to work on.

We look at all these other “fruits of the spirit” and we would love to have them, or have more of them. I mean seriously, who wouldn’t want to have more love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness and gentleness? Everyone would, or at least I would think so.

But what is it about self control that we don’t like? What is it about control in anything that we don’t like? I know for myself, and I dare say that this is a pretty good assumption, that pretty much everyone in the world likes to be in control of their lives. I know that I do, I love knowing what is going on, what is going to happen and how it’s gonna be. So then why is it so hard to have self control? Could it be that having self control means that we actually give up our own control to God?

Let me explain this one some more. As humans we are free to do as we please. We are allowed to have complete control of our lives. But when we exercise self control, don’t we go against that which we want? Don’t we choose to sacrifice something, and give up control of that something that we want? When we as Christians exercise self control, aren’t we giving up what we want and choosing what we know is better? We are no longer letting ourselves be controlled by the desires within us.

Here’s a thought that I have on self control. It is never easy to give up control of anything. So would it not be easier to exercise self control in every area of our life?

Now when people say “self control”…out come the fingers, and where do they usually point. At the guys, the guys who chase girls and have no control over their obvious physical desires. But I think that this something that is important to everyone. I think that for us to gain self control in one area of our life, that we have to try to apply self control in every area of out life.

In my life I have pretty much gone where I wanted, done what I wanted, wasted my time where I wanted, spent my money where I wanted…just done this whole life my way. But there’s always been one area that I wanted to gain self control in, and I have always failed…until now. I didn’t ever notice things getting better until I applied this control in every area of my life. Having self control with where I spend my money, where I go, who I hang out with, what I do, where I use my time. And it’s only when I started having self control in all areas of my life that I started seeing improvement in the area I wanted it in the most.

So some of these thoughts may seem a little vague…some of them are certainly vague to me. But still something to chew on. Let me know what you think.