Gal 5:22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness,
Gal 5:23 gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.
I have been preaching on the fruits of the Spirit, tonight we are looking at a very difficult fruit to obtain and that is patience.
Patience-makrothumia- literally translated long to suffer-slow to anger. Something generally we are not.
I remember at the leadership banquet when my guitar came down on Stan’s hand he went on and on about it, he was real quick to suffer and let everybody else know for weeks later that he was still suffering.
People are not very patient are they?
Particularly in our society, I think we honor the type “A” personality who is aggressive and take charge, because he is the one who gets the job done. Quite frankly, that kind of personality is not very patient-
Many of us pray like this: Dear God, please grant me patience. And I want it right now.
I remember the story of the young father who came to the minister and said I need God’s help to be patient with my wife, with my kids, with the people at work, he said “could you pray for me.” The minister started, “Dear God, please bring through many different situations and trials, suffering and tribulation into this man’s life…STOP the young man yelled I want patience not more stress.
We learn patience by practicing being patient, when we understand that God is transforming us into His image as He gives us trials and situations in which we can practice our patience.
You see our lives on earth is merely preparation for perfection, it is just training on how we will live forever in heaven. Boot camp is tough, but it can save the recruits life.
Christians do you understand you are in boot camp of the army of the Lord? What you are going through at this current time is because you are in the Potter’s hands, the refiner’s furnace and He is making you into the image of His Son, IF you will allow Him too.
The times we find ourselves having to wait on others may be the perfect opportunities to train ourselves to wait on the Lord.
JONI EARECKSON TADA
I love this story:
A man’s car stalled in heavy traffic just as the light turned green. All his efforts under the hood to get the car started failed, & a chorus of honking horns behind him made matters worse. He finally walked back to the first driver behind him & said, "I’m sorry, but I can’t seem to get my car started. If you’ll go up there & give it a try, I’ll stay here & honk your horn for you."
The patient person is a person who is still, still means he is not doing anything.
He is still because he knows God is God and God is sovereign- that means a patient person knows God is in control.
The patient person knows he is to be praying, while God accomplishes the work.
Patience: accepting a difficult situation without giving God a deadline to remove it.
Now I am not saying that Christians are to do nothing, God told Moses why are you hanging around, it is time to quit praying and start moving.
What the patient person has that impatient people do not have is, the patient person knows what action to take-because he has waited on God to lead.
Because the patient person is probably close to God, because patience is supernatural- any of you who have or have had children in your home can back me up on that. We need to understand that it is the fruit of patience when we bear it – that causes the world to know there is something different about the Christian.
A patient person can lead unsaved people to Christ, because we set aside what is happening to us or someone we love and we focus on being patient.
It is easy to lose our patience when someone we love is in the hospital, maybe just brought into the emergency room, but if we will pause and remember God is in control, we can be patient with people who no matter what they do seem incompetent to us.
Incompetent, because they are dealing with us or somebody we love.
You can bet your bottom dollar, that 9 out of every 10 people medical personnel deal with are impatient, do you understand what a contrast our lives can be, when we discipline ourselves and show patience.
I know what you are saying, well its only minor surgery when it is happening to somebody else. If it is happening to me it is a major event and how dare you require me to be patient. I don’t GOD does!
I look at the patience of Jesus on the night before His death.
JESUS IS THE PERFECT EXAMPLE OF PATIENCE
In the 26th chapter of the Gospel of Matthew we see Jesus coming to the Garden of Gethsemane.
Leaving the rest of the disciples by the gate, He takes Peter, James, & John with Him into the inner recesses of the garden, & says to them, "My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death. Stay here & keep watch with me" [Matthew 26:38].
Listen to HIS words again!
"My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death. Stay here & keep watch with me"
Then Jesus went on a little farther by Himself & prayed. Luke 22:44 says, "And being in anguish, He prayed more earnestly; & His sweat was like drops of blood falling to the ground."
Then when Jesus came back, He found Peter & James & John sound asleep.
HeLLO!
Now how would you react to that? Here Jesus was experiencing the most terrible night of His life upon this earth, & they fall asleep, not once, but 3 times.
I might have said at that point “ As my cheerleader daughter would say “I am like so over you guys.”
And yet Jesus treats them with love & patience & kindness.
Or how about after Peter’s betrayal do you see anywhere in the scripture where Jesus was impatient with him.
I know it was the patience of Jesus that enabled Peter to be the pillar of the church he became.
It is certainly the patience of God who is long suffering- that means in the Greek (having put up with us for way too long) that has allowed you and me to be saved.
How many times should God have just cracked that lightening bolt from the sky and fried me right where I was.
But God suffered for me so that I might be saved!
It is in 2 Peter 3:9, where it says, "The Lord is not slow in keeping His promise, as some understand slowness. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance."
That is why God doesn’t knock Osama Bin Laden into Nebula or send a lightening bolt to fry evil men, because He wants them to come to repentance and be saved.
Do you see that when you are patient with someone who deserves to be hit in the head with a ten-pound hammer you are like God and your patience shows them the God who lives in you and leads them to God.
Pause right now and ask yourself- Who is that God has given me, placed in my life that I ned to be more patient with- If you are here tonight and you are married- you probably do not need to think very long.
If you have children at home- you do not need much time,
If you have a job,…
Think about it the next time you want to demand that something happen and it better happen now!
The door to salvation is open to the world because the Lord is patient, if He were not trust me He would have destroyed, Ybor City, New Orleans and San Francisco along time ago.
Do Not Christians and I repeat do not slam the door of salvation in somebody’s face and close them off from everlasting life because you are impatient.
I hope this fellow had patience
A man and his wife are awakened at 3 o’clock in the
morning by a loud
pounding on the door. The man gets up and goes to the
door where a drunken
stranger standing in a pouring rain is asking for a
push.
"Not a chance" says the husband- "It’s three o’clock
in the morning!"
He slams the door and returns to bed.
"Who was it?" asks his wife.
"Just a drunken stranger asking for a push" he answers.
"Did you help him?" she asks.
"NO, I didn’t-it’s three in the morning and raining
out
"Well, you’ve got a short memory" says his wife. "Can’t
you remember about
three months ago when we broke down on vacation and
those two guys helped
us? I think you should help him."
The man does as he is told and gets dressed and goes
out into the pouring
rain and calls out into the dark.
"Hello-are you still there?"
"Yes," comes the answer.
"Do you still want a push?" calls out the husband.
"Yes, please!" comes the reply from the dark.
"Where are you?" asks the husband.
"Over here on the swing" the drunk replies.
No one will ever know the full depth of his capacity for patience and humility as long as nothing bothers him. It is only when times are troubled and difficult that he can see how much of either is in him.
SAINT FRANCIS OF ASSISI (C. 1181–1226)
Patience is the ability to put up with people you’d like to put down.
We have so many opportunities everyday that give us an opportunity to be patient. I have learned that if you!" are patient while you wait, you can wait twice as fast as you used to wait. We live in a society that demands instant gratification, we are taught to continually embrace pleasure and avoid pain.
Christians what a wonderful opportunity we have in our society to be different than the world by being patient when the world expects us to be impatient.
Job makes the point doesn’t he that one can be patient in the face of trials and tribulation when one knows God is the Ruler of the universe and therefore overruling any and every situation you or I might ever face.
Job lost 10 children, all of his herds and flocks, his houses all he had left was a nagging wife who suggested he curse God and die and three friends who thought they were psychologists. But Job was patient.
God is Good and Good comes to those who wait
Tell the quick pick up story. ( If you have time)This is a personal story of when I waited for my wife for several hours at the St Louis Airport at Quick Pick Up
Let’s pray!
