But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance (or self-control) – Gal 5:22-23
The underlying Greek egkrateia means self-control
Self Control is a Decision
Openly sinning is becoming a very popular activity these days. Better yet, we don’t even have to take responsibility for ourselves. We fail to train ourselves for suitable employment. We fail to maintain our health through exercise and diet. We fail to make good choices because we think we want something else. These are all simple decisions we make ourselves, but think the outcome is unfair when we don’t like it.
Dave Ramsey, the budget expert and radio show host, often says that “children do what feels good, adults devise a plan and follow it.”
Zig Ziglar, the original motivational speaker, says “overweight people got that way by choice because they never accidentally ate anything.”
Both of these ring true because self-control is the art of making good decisions and taking responsibility for them – even when they are not so good. Most of us have a “guilty pleasure” or a weakness that we know better than to entertain. Many of us simply choose to ignore the risks and do them anyway.
Peter urges us to maintain ourselves so even when we are railed against by sinners, they will know they are messing with Christians. (1 Peter 2:11-12) Our own self -control becomes very important when we are telling others about sin.
The more we avoid sin, the better we get at avoiding it. When this happens, we can present ourselves to God as his instruments for righteousness (Romans 6:11-14)
Daily Bible reading for July 16
Ecclesiastes 9:11-18
Joshua 16-17
Jeremiah 9:23-10:25
Matthew 24
July 16, 2013
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