Memory Verse Challenge: Week 49

Happy "one week until Christmas day" to you.  What better way to celebrate the season than with some presents - specifically the gifts of the Holy Spirit.  Sure, you've probably already memorized this verse but just in case it's been awhile - dust off the package and unwrap it.  Enjoy it once again.

I think we sometimes take all the characteristics of this gift for granted.  We simply throw them all together and label them "good behavior" traits.  But they're more than that.  They're not simply a way to act but a way to live.  

We can all act out these traits from time to time.  But acting them out and being filled by them so completely that they change our very nature are two different things. Without this gift, we couldn't possibly exhibit them on our own. 

We can't, however, expect the gift to supernaturally change us.  The gift is given.  We must nurture it and allow it to grow.  Things like anger, jealousy, and hatred will stunt the growth of our gift easier than just about anything.  We must feed the one and eliminate the things that would suppress it.  Only then will true transformation happen.

Have you noticed that each one of the traits listed are characteristics of God?  He is so abundantly filled with them that He cannot behave in an opposing manner.  How beautiful to know that He has given us a bit of Himself so that we may learn to exhibit the very nature of God.


See more about the Memory Verse Challenge here.
See the complete list of Challenge verses here.