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Patience according to Strong’s Greek:
hoop-om-on-ay’ From the root word pronounced: oop-om-en’-o (root first)
to remain i.e. abide, not recede or flee
to persevere: under misfortunes and trials to hold fast to one's faith in Christ
to endure, bear bravely and calmly: ill treatments
patience is cheerful (or hopeful) endurance,
steadfastness, constancy
in the New Testament the characteristic of a man who is not swerved from his deliberate purpose and his loyalty to faith and piety by even the greatest trials and sufferings
a patient, steadfast waiting for _________________________________
a patient enduring, sustaining, perseverance in spite of _______________
According to Webster’s 1828:
PATIENCE, noun pa'shens. [Latin to suffer.]
1. The suffering of afflictions, pain, toil, calamity, provocation, or other evil, with a calm, unruffled temper; endurance without murmuring or fretfulness. patience may spring from constitutional fortitude, from a kind of heroic pride, or from Christian submission to the Divine will.
2. A calm temper which bears evils without murmuring or discontent.
3. The act or quality of waiting long for justice or expected good without discontent.
4. Perseverance; constancy in labor or exertion.
5. The quality of bearing offenses and injuries without anger or revenge.
What is God working on in my life?
Hmmmm.
The answer should not be, “I don't know.”
The answer should be, “I'm open to learning what the answer is.”
So here's the question.
“What do you believe God is trying to teach you in this season of life?”
84% of people surveyed said, “I don't know, or I don't want to think about it.”
However, God is a great Teacher.
God is consistently endeavoring to bring maturity to our spiritual Christian walk.
He's trying to make us conform to the image of His Son.
God definitely has a goal for us.
We might not have a goal, but God is trying to work, even if we don't want to show up to work.
So, perhaps it feels like God is trying to increase your patience.
You're feeling stretched.
You're feeling pressed.
Feeling a little bit of like a rubber band being pulled back for launch.
Hopefully, we're getting ready for the next season of usefulness.
Even while it seems we're temporarily in limbo.
Alright, so I looked up a couple verses on patience because God doesn't want us to figure this all out by ourself.
He did give us a good dictionary, a good understanding, a good definition in Scripture of what patience is and how we can get it.
These are not shortcuts to patience.
Patience is strongly tied to the word time.
God's timing is significantly different than our timing, our perspective.
You know, God lives outside of time.
One preacher said it this way, “God sees all of time in one frame.”
Like a panoramic view, God sees from the end to the beginning all in one shot.
We can't really wrap our minds around it, but maybe that illustration helps.
Anyway, I'm going to read a couple verses on patience, and if you could be patient to listen.
That was meant to be a dad joke, which there are only half of the time are they funny.
So the word patience only appears in the New Testament, which is interesting.
I'm sure there's a synonym in the Old Testament.
We can dig into it, but we only got a couple minutes.
So we're just going to read a verse and ask the Holy Spirit to teach us.
How can I learn patience?
So in Matthew 18:2 & 28, we're talking about an illustration or a parable
“And the servant therefore fell down and worshiped him, saying, Lord, have patience with me, and I will pay thee all.”
Isn't that what we say to our creditors, the people we owe money?
Lord, have patience with me, and I will pay thee all.
Give me a little more time.
Let's work out a payment plan.
Can I give you something today?
Interesting.
And then again, in verse 29,
“His fellow servant fell down at his feet, and besought him, saying, Have patience with me, and I will pay thee all”, basically the same words.
And the one forgave, and the other one didn't.
I guess that's part of life.
But patience is timing.
Luke 8:15.
“They on the good ground, which are they which in an honest and a good heart, having heard the word, keep it and bring forth fruit with patience.”
Fruit doesn't happen overnight.
Fruit grows gradually.
Fruit with patience results with time.
Not speeding up the process, but keeping it healthy.
Luke 21:19, “In your patience, possess ye your souls.”
There's a lot there.
I'd rather you hear it
straight from heaven.
So we'll just read the verse and you ask God, the internal Teacher, to open up that box and make it make sense.
In your patience possess ye your souls.
So on the surface, I mean if we were going to try to unbox it, I would start with the word “souls”.
My soul.
My soul is my personality, preferences,
My intellect, my will, my decision maker.
What makes me unique?
I'm supposed to possess that.
Possess my soul?
Like, own it?
Like, patiently?
Wow.
I don't know.
I need to study that.
In your patience possess ye your souls.
Romans 5:3, “And not only so, but we glory in tribulations also.”
Oh my goodness.
Does that mean we bring out a glow under pressure?
“Knowing that tribulation worketh patience.”
So we've got to go through troubles, trials, tribulations, stressful times to work patience.
Romans 5:4, next verse, “And patience worketh experience, and experience worketh hope.”
And it finishes, I added the word worketh because it's implied in the pattern of the language.
Tribulation worketh, or produces, patience, and then patience worketh, or produces, experience, and experience worketh, or produces, hope, and hope maketh not ashamed, because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us.
Wow.
Romans 8:25, “But if we hope for that which we see not, then do we with patience wait for it.”
So
Patience does not have all the evidence.
It says here, we hope for that we see not.
You might not see the future.
You might not have a clear vision.
You might not know what door is going to open.
You might only see doors that are closing.
God might say no several times before the yes shows up.
“But if we hope for that we see not, then do we, with patience, wait for it, wait for it,
Wait for it.”
Maybe enjoy the season of anticipation.
Wow.
Romans 15:4,
“For whatsoever things were written aforetime were written for our learning, that we through patience and comfort of the Scriptures might have hope.”
What is hope?
A sure promise, believing that God will come through.
I want to have hope.
How do we get it?
Through patience and comfort of the Scriptures.
What about the Scriptures?
For whatsoever things were written aforetime were written for our learning.
All these illustrations, all these people's lives, how everyone navigated through their troubles.
How did David do it?
How did Job do it?
How did Solomon do it?
“For whatsoever things were written aforetime were written for our learning, that, or for the purpose, that we through patience and comfort of the Scriptures might have hope.”
Don't lose hope.
Next verse, Now the God of Patience.
Man, I'm not good at that.
Now the God of Patience …
and consolation grant you to be like-minded toward one another according to Christ Jesus, the God of patience.
God does things over time.
He pays out gradually.
We are instant non-waiters.
2 Corinthians 6:4, next mention.
“But in all things approving ourselves as the ministers of God,” how?
In much patience.
Proof that you're a minister of God, much patience.
Wow, into afflictions.
In all things,
In all the list of these things, approving ourselves as the ministers of God, check box number one, in all patience.
Am I proving that God wants to work through me to minister to others by exercising all patience?
Much patience.
Help us.
In afflictions.
Why afflictions?
To approve ourselves as the ministers of God.
Not to approve ourselves, but to prove that God made a good choice when He decided to work through us to be a minister to others on His behalf.
To prove that we're in partnership, that we're a channel.
It's only a person with God's help can have a sweet spirit while in affliction.
Oftentimes we get a clog in our pipe.
We are designed to be a pipe, a large volume conductor of liquid from on high to others.
The word is “channel”.
We've got to clean the clog out of our pipe so we can be a blessing to others and forget about ourselves and just be there as a supply.
Alright, so you might have heard this song growing up.
Hopefully you did if you grew up in conservative Christianity, but if not, just ignore the notes, but listen to the message.
We'll start with the chorus.
Channels only, blessed Master, but with all Thy wondrous power flowing through us, Thou canst use us,
Every day and every hour.
[Starts off] How I praise Thee, blessed Savior, that Thy love laid hold on me.
Thou hast saved and cleansed and filled me, that I might Thy channel be.
So I'm saved, selected for service, and cleaned by continuing to be a conduit.
As the flow goes through me, it cleans the junk off from me.
Just a channel full of blessing to the thirsty hearts around,
To tell out Thy full salvation all Thy loving message sound.
Emptied that Thou shouldst fill me, a clean vessel in Thy hand
With no power but as Thou givest graciously with each command.
Witnessing Thy power to save me, setting free from self and sin.
Thou who boughtest to possess me, in Thy fullness Lord, come in.
Jesus fill me now … sing the last one.
Jesus fill now with Thy Spirit hearts that full surrender know
That the streams of living water from our inner self may flow.
Channels only, blessed Master, but with all Thy wondrous power flowing through us, Thou canst use us every day and every hour.
Wow.
Patience and purpose-filled.
Colossians 1:11.
“Strengthened with all might.”
Do you feel strengthened today?
“According to His glorious power.”
Do you feel the glow of the sun shine within?
Unto... So what do we get strengthened for?
What do we get the glorious power for?
“Unto all patience.”
So we'll need strength and glow
To endure with a smile “unto all patience and longsuffering with joyfulness.”
Now we have a joyful suffering servant.
Longsuffering, patient, while joyful.
That's an insane combination.
Definitely not naturally occurring.
Would make people scratch their head and wonder, why is that person so excited when it's obvious they're under so much pressure?
Here's maybe part of the answer, 2 Thessalonians 1 verse 4, “So that we ourselves glory in you, in the churches of God.”
So we want to talk about somebody positive because they're bringing a light, a glow of God.
And we tell others that God is working in you.
How?
“For your patience.”
We're praising you.
We're appreciating “your patience and faith in all your persecutions and tribulations that ye endure.”
You're enduring in such a manner with joy, with God, that it's praiseworthy, “so that we ourselves glory in you in the churches of God.”
We go around telling other people in the church that that guy has patience and faith “in all your persecutions and tribulations that you endure.”
Wow.
Second Timothy 3:10, the older preacher telling the younger preacher how to be a proper vessel for usefulness.
“But thou hast fully known my doctrine, manner of life, [my] purpose, [my] faith, [my] longsuffering, [my] charity, [my] patience,”
You completely know my manner of life, including the proof of patience.
What Is God Working On In Your Life?
Titus 2:2,
The Author of Scripture giving instruction on how to be a leader in the church.
“That the aged men be sober, grave, temperate, sound in faith, in charity, in patience.”
Hebrews 6:12, “That ye be not slothful.”
So that's maybe the opposite of patience is you grow weary and you turn into a slug, a slothy.
“That you be not slothful, but followers of them who through faith and patience inherit the promises.”
Who's your heroes?
Those who have inherited the promises, those who captured the prize, those who laid hold on the security of eternal life in Christ; those who ran the race with two ingredients, patience, where was it? …
and faith, “that you be not slothful, but followers.”
So the opposite of slothful would be diligent, a diligent follower, a passionate follower.
Examine the pattern, follow the pattern.
“Followers of them”, you can fill in the name, put your grandpa in there, you could put a Bible hero in there, you could put somebody that you know in there, but “followers of them who, through faith,”
That's strong belief in following the instructions that God gave.
Believing that God's instructions will turn out best and doing it, “through faith and patience, inherit the promises.”
Not instant, not immediate, delayed gratification.
Wow.
Hebrews 10, “For ye have need of patience.”
Well, don't we know it?
Welcome to traffic.
“For ye have need of patience, that, after ye have done the will of God, ye might receive the promise.”
Hmm.
Do the will of God receive the promise?
Hmm.
Hebrews 12:1
“Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses.”
See the Colosseum, see the stadium, see all the fan base.
See the bleachers filled.
“Wherefore seeing we also are compassed.”
That's like a compass, all the way around.
It's not, it's not compassed about, it's compassed all the way encompassing with so great a cloud of witnesses.
“Let us lay aside every weight and the sin which does so easily beset us and let us run with patience the race that is set before us.”
LD, Long Distance, Durability.
James 1:3, “Knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience.”
I want to believe God.
I really do want to try.
I'm trying to believe God.
Dear God, help me believe You.
“The trying of your faith worketh patience.”
Get your work out today.
Next verse, “But let patience have her perfect work.”
Perfecting work, polishing work, maturing work.
“That”, so what's the work of patience?
“That you may be perfect,” mature, grown up, established, and entire, complete.
Wanting nothing, not lacking, not having a big gaping hole in your personality, not being …
Instant outburst, reactionary, compulsory child.
Wow.
“But let patience have her perfect work.”
I don't want to stretch the Bible too far, but I think we could probably say it like this.
But let allow patience to have her perfecting work, that ye may be perfected and entire
Wanting Nothing.
More Mature.
Next Level.
James 5:7
“Be patient therefore, brethren, unto the coming of the Lord. Behold, the husbandman waiteth for the precious fruit of the earth, and hath long patience for it, until he receive the early and latter rain.”
It's going to take a while before Jesus comes back.
Be patient, therefore, brethren, unto the coming of the Lord.
James 5:10, “Take my brethren the prophets who have spoken in the name of the Lord for an example of suffering affliction and of patience.”
Patience, duration, time, under pressure.
Without collapse and crumbling and cracking and falling apart and running away and quitting and giving up, even though you want to feel like you should.
Elijah.
James 5:11
Man, this James guy, he must have been under a lot of … high pressure lifestyle.
He got his head removed.
He was one of the youngest to be executed.
But before he got executed, he wrote these Scriptures.
“Behold, we count them happy, which endure.”
Happy, endure.
Happy, endure.
What?
Put those two words together.
Behold, [take a look].
“We count them happy, which endure.”
You have heard of the patience of Job.
Who wants to sign up to have the patience of Job?
Who wants to go through the stretching of the trials of Job?
You have heard of the patience of Job and have seen
The end of the Lord, the result, that the Lord is very pitiful and of tender mercy.
Hang in there, Job.
Wow.
Second Peter 1:6, “and to knowledge, temperance, and to temperance, patience, and to patience, godliness.”
It's in the list.
Gotta have it to be a fully equipped, mature Christian.
Revelation 1:9, “I, John, who also am your brother and companion,
In Tribulation and in the Kingdom and Patience of Jesus Christ.”
Why do we have to wait?
God said so.
Why does God want us to wait?
How should we wait?
Anticipation!
I am your brother, companion in tribulation and in the kingdom and patience of Jesus Christ, was in the isle that is called Patmos for the word of God and for the testimony of Jesus Christ.
Wow.
Earnest expectation of a thing being received.
The promise will come shortly.
Hope.
Fixated, focused on the finish line.
Knowing that time is short.
Believing that urgency is present and that action must be taken with God's help.
Patience.
I'd like to look up the 1828 Webster's Dictionary definition and also the Strong's Concordance
Revelation 2:2 Christ, the head of the church, commendeth the church.
One of the churches saying, “And I know thy works, thy labor, and thy patience.”
They were patient people.
Revelation 2 verse 3, “And hast borne, [or carried on your shoulders], and hast patience, and for My name's sake hast labored, and hast not fainted,” working hard consistently for decades.
Revelation 2:19, this is a whole different church now.
“I know thy works, thy charity, thy service and faith and thy patience.”
Revelation 3:10, “because thou has kept the word of My patience.”
So what are we supposed to be?
To get admiration, to get accommodation and affirmation from the Captain of our souls.
He wants us to be the patient kind of people.
Revelation 13:10,
“Here is the patience and the faith of the saints.”
Wow.
Next chapter, 14:12.
“Here is the patience of the saints, and here are they that keep the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus.”
They that endured great trials, tribulations, pressings,
I want to look up the Webster's 1828 real quick.
What Is God Working On In Your Life?