But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against things like this. Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the self with its passions and its desires. If we live by the Spirit, let’s follow the Spirit. Let’s not become arrogant, make each other angry, or be jealous of each other. – Galatians 5:22-26 (CEB)
We continue with Martin Luther on the Holy Spirit. Other weeks we have looked at the Holy Spirit in creation, the role of the Holy Spirit giving life, and the work of the Spirit giving us faith. In turning to chapters 4 and 5 of Galatians, Luther focuses on the Holy Spirit as being sent. The Spirit pours forth love wherever it dwells, thus prompting the building of a caring community. This again is his concept of faith active in love, which he explains is not a work but rather a fruit of the Spirit. If faith is genuine then it will produce fruits, but these fruits are the result of the Holy Spirit working and not a requirement for justification. He explains, “Now you see how faith alone is not sufficient. Yet faith alone justifies, because if it is genuine, it obtains the spirit of love.”1 The fruit of the Holy Spirit is freedom from the Law; yet this freedom is the freedom to love: “For freedom consists in this, that we have no other obligation than to love our neighbor. But love teaches very easily how all things are done rightly.”2 The fruit of the Spirit here is friendship with God’s law, not because it is a command but because through it we can learn how to best love our neighbors.
In looking to the final chapter of Galatians, Luther reminds us that the Holy Spirit is also a protector. He writes that the Spirit protects us, “in the presence of God and comforts us by giving a good testimony to our conscience and to our trust in the mercy of God.”3 The Holy Spirit works not only in our hearts but also in the world around us. In the 1535 lectures he particularly focuses on the importance of the Holy Spirit interceding for us, as it says in Romans 8:26. For Luther this intercession not only supports us in difficult times, but it also refines the believer into having a right relationship with God and with humanity.
From this overview of Luther’s lectures on Galatians, we can see several key themes about his theology of the Holy Spirit. These include his understanding of the Word of God, the indwelling of Christ in believers, the Spirit working in the holy community, and an ethic of faith active in love.
1 LW 27:371.
2 LW 27:347.
3 LW 27: 388.