Practice Patience
(Minute Meditation - July 2001)
No, God does not send us patience but he does expect us to be patient. The writer to the Hebrews tells us, "For ye have need of patience, that, after ye have done the will of God, ye might receive the promise." The Lord Jesus said, "In your patience possess ye your souls."
The lack of patience has been the undoing of many otherwise successful people. Could the lack of patience be the cause of our condemnation by the Lord Jesus when he comes? How do we get the patience we know we should have? What steps can we take to get it?
Young children are not born with patience. It is a virtue that must be cultivated - but how? The answer is found in James: "Know this that the testing of your faith produces patience. But let patience have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing."
So God does not give us patience, He gives us trials that test our faith and this testing in turn produces in us patience. The saying is true: God sends us moments that make us practice being patient, over and over again. If we got everything we wanted right when we wanted it, then we would have no opportunity to practice patience.
Lee Iococca once said, "We are continually faced by great opportunities brilliantly disguised as insoluble problems." Our great opportunities to develop faith and patience come in the adversities sent by God, repeatedly, for the purpose of perfecting us and making us ready for the kingdom. We are told, "Whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth;" and "In bringing many sons unto glory, (He made) the captain of their salvation perfect through suffering." As the writer to the Hebrews explains, "No chastening for the present seemeth to be joyous, but grievous: nevertheless afterward it yieldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness unto them that are exercised thereby."
Jesus told us to be of good cheer. Why? He goes on to explain that we are going to have problems. "I have said this to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world."
So cheer up, says Jesus, you are going to have tribulation, but you can overcome, and that is the good news. Jesus overcame and was perfected through suffering. If only we will learn to look upon our insoluble problems as brilliantly disguised opportunities, then we can be of good cheer. We will learn patience. We can overcome.
The reward for doing this is great for as Paul tells us, "To them who by patient continuance in well doing seek for glory and honor and immortality, eternal life." Paul knew the purpose of trials, and that is why he could cry out in faith, "For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory; while we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen: for the things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal." His light afflictions were trials beyond what most of us have ever experienced, and his "moment" was for many years.
By remembering the purpose of our adversities and the joy set before us, we can with good cheer work out our salvation with fear and trembling. James continues his exhortation on patience by saying, "Therefore be patient, brethren, until the coming of the Lord. See how the farmer waits for the precious fruit of the earth, waiting patiently for it until it receives the early and latter rain. You also be patient. Establish your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is at hand. Do not grumble against one another, brethren, lest you be condemned. Behold, the Judge is standing at the door! My brethren, take the prophets, who spoke in the name of the Lord, as an example of suffering and patience. Behold, we count them happy which endure. Ye have heard of the patience of Job, and have seen the end of the Lord; that the Lord is very pitiful, and of tender mercy."
The end of our probation is nearer than we think. Our Lord is at the door. Let us not grumble at our many opportunities to practice patience. God will not test us beyond what we can bear because He is of tender mercy and lovingly is grooming us by specific trials to prepare us for the kingdom
What is the conclusion as expressed by the writer to the Hebrews? "Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God."
Robert J. Lloyd