You must be in fellowship prior to your Bible study, so that the spiritual information you receive can become a source, of blessing to your soul and produce spiritual growth.
22 But [de] the fruit [karpos] of the Spirit [pneuma] is [esti] love [agape], joy [chara], peace [eirene],
longsuffering [makrothumia], gentleness [chrestotes], goodness [agathosune],
faith [pistis], KJV-Interlinear
22 But the
fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness,
faithfulness, NASB
The fruit of the spirit, is the spiritual production that you have when you are, in fellowship. The fruit of the flesh is the carnal production that you have when you are, not in fellowship. Most people live their lives, out of fellowship, and therefore most human production is carnal and not spiritual.
You get credit for spiritual production as far as your spiritual life goes. You never get credit for carnal production.
Gold, silver and precious stones, are the typical references for spiritual production. Wood, hay and stubble refer to carnal production, or production of the flesh.
When you get to heaven and stand before Christ, a special fire will burn away all flesh production and only spiritual production will remain. Such that only the spiritual production will remain for credit for eternal reward.
If you do good, while out of fellowship, that is carnal production and useless. If you do anything while in fellowship, then you get credit for all that you do while in fellowship.
But as we have already seen, all works of the flesh are transgressions, or evil, or corruption, based on arrogance and human effort. God does not recognize human effort.
Spiritual production, or the fruit of the spirit, begins with knowledge of doctrine, ‘agape,’ which is the content of the scriptures, that you must learn and assimilate into your soul.
And this continues with joy, or a calm delight.
And peace, or a relaxed mental attitude.
And longsuffering, which is patience.
And gentleness, which is charity.
And goodness, which is virtue.
And faith, which is certainty and confidence.
