Immersed in Christ: Sixth Monday of Easter: May 10, 2021

Faithfulness Is Relationship

The fruit of Faithfulness appears when it is evident that everything one does is an act of living out one's personal relationship with God. And this relationship is one of faith; that is, knowledge of God as Person—Three Persons with whom one has entered into a covenant relationship.

Faith is the gift of sharing in God's own act of knowing himself. Jesus said, "No one knows the Father except the Son" (Matthew 11:27), because to know God as he is you have to be God. To know the Father as Father you have to be the Son. When he added, "and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him," he was promising to make us sons and daughters of the Father "in the Son" by sharing with us his own divine life.

The Christian relationship with God is the New Covenant "in the blood of Christ," who died to give us divine Life by the sacrifice of himself (Hebrews 9:26). The Fruit of the Spirit is to act in Faithfulness to that Covenant, that relationship of divine union with God in knowledge and love.

This is diametrically opposed to "Phariseeism," the religion of law-observance. Faithfulness appears in those whose religion is spirituality: warm, loving, intimate interaction with God as Three Persons. It is the fruit of responsiveness to the Holy Spirit, the "bond of unity" who makes us one with the Father, Son, and Spirit, as they are One with each other. Faithfulness is relationship made visible.

To experience Faithfulness, focus on relationship.