Self Control

Galatians 5:22-23 – “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control…”

Self-control is also known as Temperance in the King James Version, but it is the Greek work Enkrateia derived from the word “kratos” meaning “strength”. In order to walk in self-control, we must have power over our will. Self-control is a fruit of the “Spirit”, not a fruit of self-will. There is a will that is of ourselves and some have developed this will more than others. We refer to the strength to carry something out as our “willpower”. For example, someone who is addicted to smoking and is trying to quit, if they have enough willpower, they can eventually stop smoking. Then there are the others with a lack of willpower who just can’t seem to quit no matter how hard they try. People in themselves can accomplish things by their own willpower, but how much can our will take? Yes, we all have willpower, some can abstain from things, but for how long does the willpower remain? How much pressure will cause it to break?
In today’s society, self-control isn’t widely practiced. We are taught to give into our desires, our feelings, whatever we want to do, just DO IT! After all, it’s our life, we only have one, let’s live it to the max, let’s have fun, let’s do things that are out of the ordinary, let’s be wild and crazy, let’s be sporadic and unpredictable, let’s do things that please me! Drugs, alcohol, sex, curse, party, whatever it is, we don’t want to miss out, but here’s the thing - it’s widely believed that this lifestyle is fulfilling, it’s exciting, it’s fun! But it’s only fun for awhile…Sin has devastating results. You’ll see that the things I just mentioned are actually found earlier on in the Galatians 5 as being deeds of the flesh (it’s actually living out of control), and you’ll see in Romans 8 that the nature of the flesh is directly against the nature of the Spirit. See, as we walk according to the Spirit, as we are bearing this fruit, our desire to do the deeds of the flesh will diminish and eventually be naught. If you are caught in these things (not just these, any sin) and you would consider maybe one or some or all of these things to be habits, know this – there is freedom. There is power to walk in the self-control which is a fruit of the Spirit, to not be defeated and bound to the deeds of the flesh but to walk in the self-control that we were made to walk in.
Many people think that if we were to walk in self-control and not partake of these deeds of the flesh that our lives would be boring and nothing fun would ever happen, but it’s actually quite the opposite! The most fulfilling life ever to be lived is one that is bearing the fruit of the Spirit, but I’ll get into that later.
We must begin to control ourselves, to take control over the old nature that is crying out to do evil deeds, to partake of sin, to have “fun” and be satisfied…True satisfaction comes after we begin to walk in self-control, to walk in domination over those things, and to develop in more and more self-control every day.