PATIENT ENDURANCE

PATIENT ENDURANCE
3101

INTRODUCTION

Recently, in a book titled Listening for God by Marilyn Hontz, I read a suggestion that I thought had some merit. Mrs. Hontz wrote that beginning several years ago she would, through prayer, ask God for a word or phrase that God wanted her to work on in her life throughout the coming New Year. She said that several suggestions would come to mind, but, by the first day of January, she and God had narrowed it to one. She would then keep that word or phrase in mind throughout the coming year, pray about it, and work on it. He provides the word, and then she works at it. It is work that God has given her to do; it is a gift from God.

I found this to be a very interesting means of allowing God to improve oneself. I thought about this approach for only a moment before I too asked God for a word or phrase I could work on in my life. Almost immediately the phrase “Patient Endurance” came to mind. I can see why God might have made such a suggestion; neither patience nor endurance have been dominating qualities in my life.

I am patient with people most of the time; however, I am almost never patient with machines like copiers, telephones, computers, or any other mechanical device that in some way tries to control or regulate my life. People is a different topic. I like people and do my best to be patient with them knowing that they, like me, are creations of God. My impatience comes in when there is a very laze-faire attitude; I expect commitment from people to some thing or some cause. I detest the current popular saying of “whatever” or “oh well.” Commit yourself to something; get off the fence or out of the middle of the road!

Endurance is another area of my life that could use a little work. I am one that will start a project when it sounds interesting but after a while I tend to lose interest. I tend to give up on something before giving it every chance, every opportunity, and explore every option to bring it to fruition. Then the project gets shoved aside and another one is begun. Eventually I may get back to the first project but not with the same enthusiasm I experienced the first time around.

But “Patient Endurance” is an interesting term. I knew patient, patience, endurance, and persistence, another form of endurance, were all in the Bible but, I could not recall ever seeing the term “Patient Endurance” used anywhere in the Bible. In fact, with patient endurance the term “Patient Endurance” may be found several times in the Bible.

To me, “Patient Endurance” means waiting for God. He has His own schedule, His own timetable. He will work things out for the good of those who love Him as He sees fit in His own time. He will not be rushed; He will not be badgered into acting against His will. If the endeavor we are occupied with is within the will of God, it will come about; God will always see to it that His will prevails. But, we must be patient and endure through the trials of life while we await the promise. The God given gift of faith is required to be patient; one must have faith in the promises of God in order to endure with patience.

Patient endurance is a godly trait. There are a number of passages in the Bible to back up this statement. In the book of Psalms we read that His name will endure (Psalms 72:17). In the same book we read that God will endure forever (Psalms 102:12) and that His glory will endure forever (Psalms 104:31). In Romans 15:5 we read about the God of patience and in Revelation 1:9 we read about the patience of Jesus. To be patient is to act in a godly manner. Throughout history, man has been testing the patience of God, yet the love and mercy of God endures. From the beginning when Eve succumbed to the temptation of being God-like, man has been testing God’s patience. Sodom and Gomorra exceeded the patience of God and perished. Nineveh repented and was saved. Just look at His tolerance with the Israelites in the Old Testament. Time and again they rejected God and His laws. God was patient. Time and again they followed other gods. God was patient. Time and again, they griped and complained. God was patient. The Israelites repeatedly tested the patience of God. Some of them perished, others repented and were saved.

Are we any different? Are we any better than the Israelites? Like a child who constantly tests the limits of his parents, we keep testing the limits of God and in his boundless mercy He forgives us as we repent. We question God and the reality of the salvation provided by His Son. God is patient. We follow other gods, job, money, physical beauty. God is patient. We gripe and complain about the circumstances in which we live or work. God is patient. Can’t we see that God is being patient with us, giving us chance after chance to turn to Him, to submit our lives to Him, to follow Him?

Many of us surrender our lives to Him and expect everything to be rosy. Unfortunately, that is not always Gods’ plan. In spite of our acquiescence to God, we are required to face a wide spectrum of circumstances we must endure throughout our lives; they are a part of life. It isn’t always easy, but endure we must. Some are pleasant, some are not. The most serious of these circumstances is death, the death of friends, of family, and eventually we must face our own demise. We must endure relationships, divorce, rebellious children, financial reversals, job changes, illness, and the list goes on and on. Life is not fair, nor will it ever be. When we are young, we may endure school while others thrive on it. When we are older we may endure a job or the lack of a job while others are content with their station in life. When we are parents we must endure nightly feedings. When we are older we must endure more aches and pains. When we are children, we must endure naps. When we are older we must endure missing a nap now and then. We look around us and we want a bigger house, a nicer car, and a fatter paycheck. We want things that we think will make us happy because other people have them and because they have them, they must be happy. Thinking that things will make us happier, we simply endure a smaller house, an older car, and learn to budget a smaller paycheck No matter who we are, no matter what our social or financial status, all of these circumstances are realities of life that must be endured.
So, what do we do?

We must learn to adopt the trait of patient endurance. When we adopt this godly trait we will be rewarded for all of eternity. In Matthew 24:13 and again in Mark 13:13, Jesus makes a promise to those of us who follow Him to the end. He said that those of us that endure in the faith will be saved. This is a promise from Jesus Himself that those of us who remain anchored in the faith will join the Lord on the day that He calls us home.

Second Timothy 4:3 gives us warning from Paul: Not everyone will be saved. Some will turn to follow false doctrine and false prophets preaching a theology that sounds good but is false, and ultimately fatal. Unless they return to the Truth of Jesus and His resurrection they will be lost. Lost to what? Hell. The world doesn’t like to think about that. Satan likes that, he prefers that humankind deny the existence of hell. It makes his work easier. Throughout scripture we are reminded that hell is real and a lot of people will be lost.

When we look to scripture for human models of patient endurance, three examples immediately come to mind, Abraham, Job, and Noah.

Abraham was a man of faith. He never wavered. Sarah his wife was much the same. When God appeared to them in their old age and told them that they would have a son, Abraham immediately took God at His word. Yes, the birth of a child seemed incredible at their advanced ages but Abraham never doubted Gods’ ability to produce miracles. When God told Abraham to climb the mountain and sacrifice Isaac, he knew God had a plan. Abraham had been told that from him would come many nations, and it could be only through Isaac that Gods’ plan could be completed. That was the kind of faith that Abraham had in our God. Paul wrote of Abraham in Hebrews 6:13-15, that he had patiently endured and has received the promise of the Father.

Job too was a giant of faith. No matter what the devil took from him, he patiently endured in his faith in God, he never wavered. Job lost everything, possessions, children, servants, everything.

Those of you who have suffered the loss of a child know that even though you may eventually have other children, the one that has died can never be replaced. No matter how many other children you may have, the one that has died is forever lost. Unfortunately, I speak from experience in that Mary, my wife, and I lost a child many years ago. God has since provided us with two wonderful children, both now married, but the sense of loss is always with us. How Job endured such a loss can only be explained by his incredible faith in the Lord. Eventually, God provided Job with additional children and restored Jobs’ possessions many times over. If anyone in the Bible ever had cause to doubt, Job is the man.

A third great example of patient endurance is Noah. He too was a man of great faith. God told him to build a boat, not just any boat, but an ark, a huge ark. According to the instructions handed down to Noah by God, it was to be 45 feet high, taller than a four story building. It was to be 75 feet wide and 450 feet long. That is longer than a football field which is 360 feet. This boat was huge! It has been said that it took Noah and his family in the area of 100 years to build the ark. That is endurance! I’m sure that Noah must have encountered the ridicule of his neighbors and friends as he laid out the keel and then the sides. Can you imagine the years of rumors that must have sprung up as the ark took shape on dry ground? But Noah patiently endured.


JESUS IS OUR PERFECT EXAMPLE OF PATIENT ENDURANCE.

Jesus endured the lack of faith in His own disciples. He endured the unbelief of many who would follow Him then fell away. He endured the ridicule and torture of His tormenters. And, He endured the agony of the cross. One thing, among many, that Jesus had which we mortals lack is a perspective of life eternal. He came from heaven, He knew it was His home and He would return there to be with the Father. We too know that there is a heaven, but we as mortals don’t know that much about it. The point is that like us, Jesus was eternal but He knew that He had to endure this world for but a short while in comparison to eternity. We need to take that same eternal perspective and understand that we too must patiently endure for only a little while, eternity awaits.

In the Old Testament there are a number of statements relating to God and His patient endurance, as stated earlier, patience and endurance are godly traits.

In 1 Chronicles 16:34 we are told that the mercy of God endures forever, God is mercy. In the book of Psalms 30:5, we learn that His anger endures a very short time, which is good. Also in Psalms 100:5 it is pointed out to us that His goodness, truth, and righteousness endure forever. These are all godly traits that we as followers of Christ need to adopt.

In Matthew 10:22 Jesus tells us that we will be hated because of our beliefs, but we are reminded that those of us that endure the hardships and hatred of the world will be saved in the end. I don’t personally know anyone who hates me because I love the Lord. But, there are people in this country and around the globe who are biased against the Christian. The vital thing for us believers is to endure patiently with the adversity of hatred in order to receive the prize of eternal life. It will not be taken from those who endure the animosity of the world; rather, the prize is theirs.

We are not to just sit back and twiddle our thumbs and call on God to do all the work. We are to remain active in pursuing the work that He has provided just as Abraham, Moses, and Noah did. These faith giants had a close, intimate relationship with our Lord. That is what God wants with us as well. We should look forward to each day, each moment, and have the faith that God will provide according to His will.

I am an old farm boy and if a farmer knows anything, he knows that after a seed is planted in good soil it may be days or weeks before the plant germinates and emerges from the ground. Patience is called for. Sure, all farmers after waiting a few days after planting a crop will go out to the field to poke a finger or two into the soil to uncover a couple of seeds, especially with soy beans and corn. This way he knows that the seeds have germinated and are starting to grow. But the farmer knows that the harvest is weeks or perhaps months away and there is nothing he can do to hasten the day. Life is a lot like that. We have hopes and aspirations that we want to yield good fruit. Some endeavors will take longer to mature than others; some we see germinate but will never see the mature fruit. Some we will. We must patiently endure the days and weeks, perhaps years before some of our seeds will come to fruition. That is life as God meant it to be.

A few years ago, Mary and I were praying that we might be able to move our family to a larger city, not a big city, but one that was larger than the city of 10,000 population we were in at the time. We prayed for such a move so that if the kids wanted to live close to Mom and Dad when they were grown and had families of their own they would at least have the option in respect to career possibilities to do so. God answered our prayer in a way we could not have imagined. The company I was working for was sold into a city with a metro area of about 80,000. I always thought living in a city of that size would be good, I was right. We love our new home town.

In our newly adopted home the children received a great education in the local school district. They were involved in activities they would never have been involved with in my home town. They both graduated from different but excellent universities. They both are now married to spouses they met while in college. Neither child lives real close to our home but they both have that option if they so desire. Our son Ryan lives in Virginia doing work that he enjoys and for which he is very gifted. Our daughter Jill has chosen rather than to use her degree in elementary education to become a staff member of Campus Crusade for Christ on the Western Kentucky University campus where she graduated. She is only seventy miles from home. It was a good move in all respects for our children.

Keep in mind that the timing of God is perfect; He has never made a mistake. His timetable may take a little longer than we would like, but He is consistent in the fact that His will prevails and it is quite likely His timing is different than our own. It isn’t always easy to wait on the Lord. I am reminded of the person who said, “Lord, give me patience, and give it to me now!” We need to learn to slow down and embrace the quiet assurance that God will act in a perfect manner in His own time and in His own way. All situations in our lives will be resolved according to His perfect will.

Those of you who have or are now in the process of raising children know the patient endurance required. Years of it. Looking back on the years we invested in our children, there is very little I would change with the exception that I would have spent more time with each of them. In my biased opinion we raised two terrific children to adulthood. The experience of child rearing gives me a little bit of a perspective on what God must go through and how he must sometimes feel as he rears us to be committed Christians. It can’t be easy but he never gives up on us. He disciplines those who he loves. He must love us very deeply to put up with our idiosyncrasies, our tantrums, our pouting and shouting. He must care for us very much to feed, clothe, and house us in spite of our rebellion. What an awesome God we have.

When we patiently endure, we are going against human nature, the nature that says to hurry up, don’t just stand there, do something. Unrestrained activity is paralleled with success in life. This is a lie we have been taught from the beginning. We must learn to slow down, quit depending on ourselves and trust in God. He has already, through Jesus Christ, assured us of our salvation; let us look to eternity in our hearts with eternal eyes. Let us learn to wait on God.