Galatians 5:22-26 (JDV)

Galatians 5:22 But the fruit of the Breath is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness,

Galatians 5:23 gentleness, and self-mastery. There is no law against such things.

Galatians 5:24 But those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its sufferings and cravings.

Galatians 5:25 If we live by the Breath, let us also keep in step with the Breath.

Galatians 5:26 Let us not become egocentric, provoking one another, envying one another.

fruit of the BreathPaul’s language here is saturated with resurrection imagery, but the metaphor often slips past modern readers because πνεῦμα is usually translated as Spirit. That word easily evokes the idea of a ghostly presence taking possession of someone, which is far from Paul’s intent. His use of πνεῦμα points instead to breath—the animating force of life itself. In Genesis, God breathes into Adam and he becomes a living being. In Ezekiel, the Breath enters the dry bones and they stand on their feet. Paul draws from the same well. The Galatian believers had been spiritually dead, and the Sacred Breath had breathed new life into them. Their conversion was not a moral improvement or a religious upgrade. It was resurrection.

Before this divine animation, their lives naturally produced what Paul calls the “works of the flesh.” These were not merely pagan sins; they were the predictable outcomes of a life animated only by human impulses—whether irreligious or religious. The flesh can express itself in immorality or in legalism, in indulgence or in self‑righteousness. The form changes, but the source is the same. The Galatians had once lived in that old mode of existence, and the results were evident.

But when the Sacred Breath entered them, a new kind of life began. This life bore different fruit—the fruit of the Breath: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self‑control. These qualities were not achievements to be earned. They were the natural outgrowth of the new life God had breathed into them. The contrast between the two lists is not a contrast between bad people and good people, but between death and life, between the old creation and the new.

The tragedy in Galatia was that a heretical group had convinced the believers that true righteousness required returning to the old system of law‑keeping. They were being told that the path to maturity lay in adopting Jewish traditions and rituals. This teaching appealed to the flesh because it offered measurable achievement and a sense of control. But it was a return to the grave. Paul and his team urged the Galatians to reject that path entirely. They had not come to life through human tradition, and they could not walk in newness of life by returning to it.

The call was simple and profound: keep in step with the Breath who made them alive. The resurrection life must be lived by the same power that created it. Human effort cannot sustain what only divine breath can animate.

Lord, keep us constantly aware of the new life you breathed into us. May we keep in step with your Breath, and allow him to produce his fruit through us.