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The Fruitful Life: The Overflow of God's Love Through You

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As with all books from Jerry Bridges, this book is also firmly rooted in the scriptures. Bridges explores nine aspects of the "fruit of the Spirit" as described in Galatians 5:22-23. But I want you to know that this book is derived from his earlier book "The Practice of Godliness" (ISBN-10: 0891099417) which examines what it means to grow in Christian character and helps us establish the foundation upon which that character is built. It contains all the chapters in this book plus some more wonderful chapters adding up about 50 pages. So, if you are interested in studying this topic in more detail, I suggest you read the earlier book.

I love this book! "The Fruitful Life" is easy to read and like many other Bridges' books, it has plenty of Bible verses to back his words, so you know you are reading biblical sources. Best of all, this book contains study questions at the end of each chapter for you to read and meditate upon. "The Fruitful Life" is just what a Christian needs when it comes to "bearing more fruits" or "be more like Christ." This book teaches the basics of each fruit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control, or simply Galatians 5:22-23.

For instance, before I read the chapter on Love, I thought love as in loving others like how God loves us or love others as much as yourself. Well, I was right in a sense but loving others also means that we give our time, energy and money. Loving others means we are to forgive them and show care for them. Loving others isn't just loving the one you love, but also loving the ones you don't love, or your "enemies" sort of speak.

We only know the "dictionary" meaning of these fruits but when it comes to how to practice them in life...Bridges got the answers.

One of the first Christian books I read was Bridges' The Pursuit of Holiness. He continues his tradition of very readable advice for everyday Christian living in The Fruitful Life. This is a practical book, filled with helpful insight. New Christians and mature Christians alike will benefit from the wisdom in this book. This is a great little guidebook for living lives worthy of the grace we've been given.

If you're like me, and you tend to avoid guidebooks in favor of thought-provoking books, there is something for you as well. Indirectly, Bridges brings up a concept that every Christian should consider: God is sovereign in everything yet we are not puppets (because we are responsible for what we do). Our actions and thoughts have eternal significance yet we are not free agents (because God's eternal plan determines all that comes to pass). This is non-trivial and may challenge our ideas about God and ourselves.

I've been reading The Fruitful Life...and before I've even finished reading it the first time, I've had to order a few copies to share as Christmas presents! Previous works by Bridges I have read all or parts of, I found to be a little meaty and overwhelming for my needs and personality. But this book takes the best elements of his style and focus on the Word, and gives an extensive overview of Galatians 5:22-23 that is very applicable to our daily lives in today's world, challenging the reading in a good way without overwhelming the reader in a negative way. Those who have studied the Word for years and those who are new believers can all benefit from the simple yet straight-forward nature of this book.

One of the dangers you encounter when reading a book about the Christian life is that you underline all the most challenging parts of it and think of all the "lukewarm" Christians out there it applies to. I first remember falling into this trap while reading The Cost of Discipleship by Bonhoeffer and being amazed at how applicable it was to the lives of so many people I could think of. This was pretty ridiculous, of course, seeing as I was no better than any of them, and that before I can ever call anyone else to discipleship I need to have first committed to going there myself.

I kept that in mind as I read "The Fruitful Life: The Overflow of God's Love Through You" by Jerry Bridges. He writes books that urge deeper understandings and practices of discipleship. I read his classic The Pursuit of Holiness on a trip to Africa several years ago and found it to be a tremendous challenge to the sort of haphazard attitude toward discipleship that I can easily fall into.

This book is about the fruit of the Spirit. In recent years I have come to see just how relational the evidences of the Holy Spirit's presence in our lives really are, and I have been trying to read the Bible and other books through that lens. Too often, when it comes to application time at the end of the sermon we are asked to examine what's going on inside our heart and mind, and whether we have been spending our quiet time with God, and based on these questions to gauge our spiritual health. There's nothing wrong with this sort of introspection. But if the Spirit of God is alive in us, the fruit isn't just going to show up in these very personal, private ways. It's going to turn our relationships upside down. Changed hearts will mean changed lives, and our lives necessarily involve other people.

To be honest, I expected to have to read this into Bridges' reflections, but I was pleasantly surprised to discover that he is eager to make this point as well. He writes that the fruit of the Spirit is both formational and relational, and that "several of these character traits have a definite outward focus to other people" (p. 8). In fact, in Bridges' work with the college ministry of The Navigators, he says that they are intentional about making sure that when they help to lead students in discipleship it always involves serving others. Discipleship does not happen in a vacuum.

Chapter by chapter, character trait by character trait, Bridges leads us through reflections that both challenge and encourage us as we seek to be good soil in which the fruit of the Spirit can grow in our lives. The Spirit's work takes root in the deepest places of our being, transforming us at the core, but it doesn't stop there. Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control will eventually begin to emerge in the lives and communities of transformed people, and the world will never be the same.

Disclosure of Material Connection: I received this book free from NavPress Publishers as part of their Blogger Review Program. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission's 16 CFR, Part 255: "Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising."
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It is pretty obvious that if we all lived with our lives being led by the Spirit, as exemplified by its fruit, this world would not only be a better place, but we'd be happier and more God-honoring people. In his book, `The Fruitful Life: The Overflow of God's Love Through You,' Jerry Bridges takes a deep look at the qualities written about by the apostle Paul in the fifth chapter of the Book of Galatians.

Here is the synopsis of this book:

How can we put on the garment of grace? As we become serious followers of Christ, we want to live loving, joyful, anxiety-free lives. Yet loving our enemies seems impossible. Even being patient with our family is often difficult. How can we put on the gentle garments of grace when we're so busy battling our odd behavior patterns?
In The Fruitful Life, beloved author Jerry Bridges explores the nine aspects of the "fruit of the Spirit" described in Galatians 5: 22-23; love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. He clarifies the cultivation process by showing us how to practice the fruit in real life.
Bridges says these qualities of character can truly mark our lives if we devote ourselves to a twofold pursuit: God-centeredness and God-likeness. This book will guide you on that quest by focusing on God's nature as revealed in Scripture and by helping you cultivate the beautiful fruit given by the Holy Spirit.

Here is the biography of this author:

Dr. Jerry Bridges is an author and conference speaker. His most popular book, The Pursuit of Holiness, has sold over one million copies. He is also the author of Transforming Grace and The Practice of Godliness (from which this book is derived). Jerry has been on the staff of The Navigators for over fifty years, and currently serves in the Collegiate Mission where he is involved primarily in staff development, but also serves as a speaker resource to the campus ministries. A popular speaker known around the world, Jerry lives with his wife, Jane, in Colorado Springs.

Dr. Bridges explains why he thinks it's important to take a look at the fruit of the Spirit in our day:

We should also notice that the fruit of the Spirit is both formational and relational - not just a matter for private experience. For example, "joy" is more accurately "joy in the Holy Spirit" (Romans 14:17), "peace" is the peace Christ gives us (see John 14:27), and "love comes from God" (1 John 4:7). Further, several of these character qualities have a definite outward focus toward other people. They require practice in the midst of the world. As Jonathan Edwards said, "All true Christian grace tends to holy practice."
Another reason for revisiting the fruit of the Spirit is that I often hear a certain possessiveness today about "my spiritual gifts." Certainly, we can be thankful that in the last generation there has been a thriving literature on spiritual gifts. But again, sometimes there is a self-focus for the gifts. We use "assessment instruments" to nail down what our gifts are and seek to use them in a way that can tend toward personal fulfillment. The danger is that the gifts of the Spirit will be separate from the fruit of the Spirit. This can lead to prideful ambition rather than humble, loving service. Sinclair B. Ferguson writes that the fruit of the Spirit "should be distinguished from the gifts of the Spirit, but ought never to be absent in their exercise. For without love, and the humility which accompanies it...the purpose of the gifts of the Spirit is thwarted." (pp. 8-9)

It is important that Christians are strongly devoted to God:

The attitude of devotion to God is composed of three essential elements:
* The fear of God
* The love of God
* The desire for God
From this godward attitude arises the character and conduct that we usually think of as godliness. So often we try to develop Christian character and conduct without taking the time to develop God-centered devotion. We try to please God without taking the time to walk with Him and develop a relationship with Him. This is impossible to do. (p. 30)

I will focus here on a couple of the fruits of the Spirit that are most meaningful to me at this point in my life - Joy and Peace.

In the chapter on Joy, Dr. Bridges points out that we have to make a decision:

So the choice is ours. We can be joyless Christians, or we can be joyful Christians. We can go through life bored, glum, and complaining, or we can rejoice in the Lord, in our names being written in heaven, in the hope of an eternal inheritance. It is both our privilege and our duty to be joyful. To be joyless is to dishonor God and to deny His love and His control over our lives. It is practical atheism. To be joyful is to experience the power of the Holy Spirit within us and to say to a watching world, "Our God reigns." (pp. 85-86)

Wow - that paragraph is really convicting to me. I spend, and have spent, more time than I like to think about (or admit) focusing on the negative. I failed to consider the fact that that grieves the heart of God...

In the chapter on peace, Dr. Bridges admits that his mindset is similar to that of many of us:

I doubt that any Christian is more vulnerable to worry and fretfulness than I am. I sympathize with others who are also prone to anxiety. I am well aware that it is only by the power of the Holy Spirit that we can experience His peace. But God tells in His Word that His peace is available, and we must not be content until we experience it (see Philippians 4:7). We must persevere in prayer until He answers. (p. 94)

Working on our relationship with God will bring positive results:

The practice of developing our relationship with God should never be thought of as drudgery. We are seeking to grow in our devotion to the most wonderful Person in all of the universe, the infinite glorious and loving God. Nothing can compare with the privilege of knowing Him in whose presence is fullness of joy and in whose hand there are pleasures forever (see Psalm 16:11, NASB). From this joyful relationship flows the rich harvest of our transformed character. (p. 178)

Each chapter ends with `Exercises for Practice and Discussion.' I think this is a very biblically sound book, and think it would be a wonderful tool for personal or group study. I appreciate Dr. Bridges' heart and intellect, and thank him for putting it down in print for the rest of us.

This book was published by NavPress and provided by them for review purposes.

Reviewed by Andrea Schultz - Ponderings by Andrea - [...]

I have been hesitant in the past to read a book about the fruits of the spirit. My hesitancy laid in some of what I see in the culture we live in. In our culture, the church often gets caught up doing what Sarah did when God didn't work as she wished. We don't wait on Him and seek to do things His way. We find ourselves in the land of self-help.

Setting all that aside, I decided to embark upon reading The Fruitful Life by Jerry Bridges. This year I have read several other books by Bridges and so I was hopeful that this book would not fit into the mold of the self-help culture that we live in. Thankfully, it didn't.

Later Bridges writes it this way, ..."the fruit of the Spirit, the result of His work within us. This means not that we bear no responsibility for the development of Christian character but rather that we fulfill our responsibility under His direction and by His enablement." p. 13

He began with a discussion of godliness from which all of these stem. He identifies on p. 29 that godliness is "the idea of a personal attitude toward God that results in actions that are pleasing to God." The quote from pg. 13 explains Bridges's understanding of how these fruits develop in our lives. He examines each of the fruits of the spirit: humility, love, joy, peace, patience, kindness and goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. The chapters on each of these held deep challenges for my heart that God threaded through my days as I read this book.

I fear that I cannot even begin to adequately describe how each individual chapter challenged me, so I will pick one. Patience. In this chapter, Bridges talks about the different faces of patience--longsuffering, responding to provocation, perseverance vs. endurance, and waiting on God. Throughout the chapter, Bridges reminds the reader of God's patience for us that we might see the need for patience in our own lives towards others. It helps us take our eyes off our temporary circumstances and put them back on God, on the the things that are eternal.

Bridges has a way of taking deep spiritual truths and conveying them in very understandable ways without simplifying them. He is honest about his own struggles and weaknesses in his books as he shares his own stories and examples. He writes with great humility of spirit and love for the Lord.

I highly recommend this book. I am thankful that God has brought his books into my life this year. They have been deeply encouraging and challenging. I can't shy away from the truth of God's love and grace for me. I am confronted with it and reminded to keep it on my heart and mind all day long.

Please note that I received a complimentary copy of this book for review from NavPress.

I found Jerry Bridges' book The Fruitful Life much more rewarding than The Discipline of Grace, my last foray with Jerry Bridges. The Discipline of Grace was by no means a bad book, but The Fruitful Life is more compelling, more thought-provoking, and the insights more heartfelt.

The point of the book is to address the "Fruit of the Spirit", classically those found in Galatians 5:22-23. But Bridges is wise to point out that this is not meant as an exhaustive list. He actually begins with two non-standard fruits - devotion and humility - and these lay a framework for the other gifts to operate within. The point being, the fruits are not reason to boast in our spiritual position. They are reason to be thankful and continue in our progress towards Christ-likeness.

When dealing with humility, he makes the following observation:

"While writing this chapter, I had the occasion to express appreciation to a fellow church member for a job well done. I liked his simple, humble response: 'It was the Lord who did it.' Humility with regard to ourselves, then, consists in ascribing all that we are, all that we have, and all that we have accomplished to the God who gives us grace."

While that made his point well, I find myself a little turned off by this sort of "simple, humble response". It is right to recognize in humility that our very life is a gift that we cannot take credit for. At the same time, I have seen this used as false modesty, when people were noticeably seeking attention, and the "the Lord did it" was just the "Christian" way of going about it. (I might add that there is no dishonesty in accepting a compliment for a job well done. This is just as likely to be misunderstood as a lack of modesty as the latter is to be misunderstood as an abundance of it.)

His coverage of love spoke to me very powerfully, especially page 68:

"I recall a personal struggle a number of years ago in loving one of my brothers in Christ. One evening, the Holy Spirit addressed to my mind the rather startling question, 'Do you believe I love him just as he is?' I hadn't thought of that before, but I did concede that surely God must love him just as he was, faults and all. And then God pressed this question to my mind, 'If I can love him, can you?' God was teaching me to love as He loves, to forgive as he forgives."

I was also very pleased by the execution of some repeating themes. When addressing peace, the subject continually turned to promise. When the subject was patience, it repeatedly turned to forgiveness. In each case the pairing was insightful and helped cement the concept under study.

But I think Bridges makes a number of statements that are projections of his place in the Christian culture of the developed world, and should be considered carefully before trusting their conclusions. On page 91 he offers, "Proverbs 16:7 tells us that He even promises to make our enemies live at peace with us." While certainly a nice thought, I have trouble with it on a number of levels. We should carefully consider whether turning the book of Proverbs into "promises" is reasonable, in general or in specific. Paul was certainly not met with peace on every side. Many Christians have not found their societies, governments, even families to be peaceable audiences to their faith.

Similarly he offers, "One of the thoughts that most disturbs a suffering Christian who has not learned patience is the issue of justice. He is concerned that the tormentor will escape justice." I just think this is an over-generalization, and may not reflect the suffering experienced by those who live in Africa, or East Asia undergoing religious persecution - or even those nearer to home facing economic hardship. While we certainly need to grow in patience, I cannot just take at face value that the issue of justice is the thing most disturbing to those undergoing suffering. I worry it has much more to do with our Western sense of entitlement and "rights" than with a general rule about the nature of suffering and patience.

Overall, I think this book is well worth the read, and will help young believers as they strive to become like Christ in the power of the Holy Spirit. More mature Christians will find this a welcome reminder to bear fruit, and under what source.

I just finished reading The Fruitful Life: The Overflow of God's Love Through You by Jerry Bridges. And I have to say that I am pretty impressed.

In The Fruitful Life, Bridges addresses the nine Fruit of the Spirit from Galatians 5:22-23: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. To these, he adds the characteristics of humility and devotion.

In my opinion, this is an excellent resource that can help a person really start to dig into a practical understanding and application of these attributes. While each of these spiritual qualities aren't dealt with in close detail; they are addressed in such a way that one can easily grasp and begin to apply some direction for each characteristic into daily life.

At the end of each chapter is a fairly well-written series of questions and Scripture passages for further study or memorization. These are great discussion starters or thought provoking ideas, but there isn't quite enough there to really facilitate an extended discussion within a small group setting. That being said, it would be easy to deepen these to the level needed for a small group to easily use this book.

The only drawback is that the qualities of kindness and goodness were lumped together into one chapter. I realize their similarity; however, it would have been nice to hear a bit more of a distinction between the two.

All in all, I felt like The Fruitful Life was a great help to me in continuing to understand the Fruit of the Spirit. And we may just give this book a deeper look in my small group in the near future.


Disclosure of Material Connection: I received this book free from NavPress Publishers as part of their Blogger Review Program. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission's 16 CFR, Part 255: "Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising."

To the best of my recollection, I have read ten books by Jerry Bridges. In each decade of my adulthood, one or two of his books were just what I needed. In my 20s I read "The Practice of Godliness" and "The Pursuit of Holiness". In my 30s it was "Transforming Grace" and "The Discipline of Grace". In my 40s it was "The Gospel for Real Life" and "Respectable Sins". Now as I turn 50 it is "The Fruitful Life".

It seems Bridges and I have come full circle. "The Fruitful Life" is a reworking of "The Practice of Godliness". The major difference is both the author and I have twenty-five more years experience under our belts. As Bridges felt a need to revisit the fruit of the Spirit, I likewise have a need to reexamine the Spirit's fruit in my life.

Jerry Bridges is eighty years old and has worked with the Navigators (a discipleship ministry) for over fifty years. His writing reveals a humble believer who is not afraid to confess his faults. As I read this book, I felt like I was sitting across his breakfast table as he shared the details of his spiritual growth. I highly recommend this book.

NavPress freely provided this book for review and there was no expectation of a positive review.