Patience

July 14, 2018

2 Timothy 10  we see Paul reminding Timothy of his suffering in different cities. He is attempting to encourage Timothy to stay strong for the long term. When in verse 12 Paul says,"Yes,  and all who desire to live Godly in Christ Jesus will suffer persecution." He reminds Timothy that from all of his persecutions he had been delivered by God. From these verses we see that when your heart is with Jesus you will suffer and from this long suffering,  patience is the fruit that is reaped !  This all because of love for Jesus. The same fruit is for us when we have a biblical (godly) love. Yes, we will long suffer but patience through love is our reward.

2 Peter 3 : 9 " The Lord .....is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance."  Here we can see that God is willing to endure much from us in order that in the end we are saved. Why ?  God desires an eternal relationship with us who believe on His Son. He created us to have a relationship with His creation who choose to have one with Him. Because we are sinful He knows that we are not capable of godly love without patience and much help from the Trinity. While that work is being done in us, He must be longsuffering with the reward of  us not perishing but receiving life from Him !

One of the literature truths used in the bible is this : when a matter is important it is repeated twice. Either word for word or idea by idea. In proverbs 16 : 32 we see an example of the latter. " He who is slow to anger is better than the mighty. And he who rules his spirit than he who takes a city." You can see the comparisons used to make the same point. "Slow to anger" is the same as longuffering or patience. So the writer is saying that he who is longsuffering  and he who rules his spirit is better and mightier than kings and rulers. As followers of Jesus we should always strive to be patient so that in God's eyes we are better and mightier (in spirit) than kings and rulers are (in body) !

When we are talking about patience being a biblical key to love, there is no better biblical proof than 1 Corinthians 13 : 4. This whole chapter is known as the love chapter. It breaks down biblical love with a list of  "is and is not's". The first three words in verse 4 show the close connection. " Love suffers long .." In any love relationship if we are willing to endure for the long term, the reward is a relationship. God does this for us and here we see that we should do this for our love relationships. This is completely different than what the world teaches. If you are not happy you should walk away and try to find happiness. God says you should endure the hard time until you find the relationship !