On Self-Control

St. Paul Square, St. Nicholas Church, Kavala, Greece (2014)

In our Winter Sunday School Class, the Rev. Leigh Spruill has been teaching on the fruits of the Spirit with the primary Scripture verse from Galatians 5:22-23a:“By contrast, the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.”We’ve been studying different “fruits” since early January and today we studied on “patience”. But the one that keeps ringing in my ears is “self-control.”Self-control has always been difficult in various areas of my life like pride, anger, and affection.It is no consolation that others struggle with self-control, too. In Romans 7:15-20, we hear St. Paul in a perceptive self-examination: “I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. Now if I do what I do not want, I agree that the law is good. But in fact it is no longer I that do it, but sin tha