I dabble (some might say I cheat) in the practice of food preservation. My specialty is “Strawberry Freezer Jam á la Sure-Jell,” and it’s pretty tasty on a slice of toast. But I have a deep admiration for homesteading practitioners who go the distance and actually can the season’s bounty into rows of pretty jars. They convert pecks and bushels of juicy fresh peaches into pints and quarts of gold — tangy gold that calls to mind the essence of summer even on a winter’s day. Blackberries and blueberries, rhubarb, pears, grapes. All get prepped, jarred, sealed, and stored — artisanal fruit jams and jellies to bring brightness into the rotation when a dormant season sets in.

In life, the prized, plump, ripe fruit of a God-guided existence tastes like love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. (Galatians 5:22-23) Collectively, these attributes are known as the Fruit of the Spirit. In his own translation of the Bible passage, Eugene Peterson says that when we live God’s way, God “brings gifts into our lives, much the same way that fruit appears in an orchard.” Appealing and delicious, they are there for the picking!

But what happens if the orchard itself goes dormant? What if it struggles through a harsh season? What if the trees are blighted? Does the quality of the fruit suffer?

Sorting through a bin of emotional produce grown in troubled times, the commodities of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control seem increasingly bruised and decidedly less plentiful than in other seasons.

Peace, for example, shrivels on the branches.

In a recent news conference, United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres announced: “The world is spending far more on waging war than on building peace … Military spending is rising across all regions, diverting crucial resources from health, education, poverty reduction and climate resilience.” He called the current trajectory “unsustainable.”

Other fruits have taken a beating as well. As if battered by hail and high winds, kindness is battle-scarred. The 2025 Compassion Report of the Muhammed Ali Center indicates that 61% of Americans feel compassion has been in decline for several years. And joy? The most recent World Happiness Report shows that the United States has fallen out of the top 20 happiest nations and notes anxiety and dissatisfaction among our younger generations. Americans under 30 ranked 62nd in the world for life satisfaction.

Fresh fruit doesn’t flourish in a noxious environment. In contrast to the juicy Fruit of the Spirit described in Galatians, that same chapter contains a description of toxicity: It is obvious what kind of life develops out of trying to get your own way all the time: repetitive, loveless, cheap sex; a stinking accumulation of mental and emotional garbage; frenzied and joyless grabs for happiness; trinket gods; magic-show religion; paranoid loneliness; cutthroat competition; all-consuming-yet-never-satisfied wants; a brutal temper; an impotence to love or be loved; divided homes and divided lives; small-minded and lopsided pursuits; the vicious habit of depersonalizing everyone into a rival; uncontrolled and uncontrollable addictions; ugly parodies of community. I could go on…

When fresh fruit is out of season, it’s time to rely on what has been preserved. It’s time to raid the pantry for those stashed away Mason jars and be nourished. When discouraged, open a jar of joy. When crushed, turn to kindness. When utterly wrecked, break out the best — the jar of love.

And share. The folks I know who whip up batches of jams and jellies enjoy giving jars away. From our own root cellars, we can be lavish in sharing our own stockpiles of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Until these commodities are back in season, until the environment is once again conducive to growth, until such a time as orchards teem with fresh Fruit of the Spirit, we will be sustained.

The Rev. Christine Sobania Johnson serves as the pastor of College Hill Moravian Church in Bethlehem, where all are welcome. www.collegehillmoravia.org.

https://www.mcall.com/2025/09/13/faith-values-preserving-the-fruit-of-the-spirit/