Patience. In our society of go, go, go; get there quickly; fast food; immediate internet news; and the like (shoot, even Starbucks is now making instant coffee!) the idea of patience is probably a hard one to wrestle with. I know that waiting for results is something we do not like to do. We are trained to make things happen, and when they don’t or they’re not up to our expectations; we’ll let them know about it! But God is patient.
Ponder that a second.
Why is God patient? If anyone can make things happen instantly it’s Him! After all, He is the one who said, “Let there be . . .” and there was! Why is He willing to wait? To hold off? To put up with our less-than-perfect results?
Peter knew something that His friend and fellow apostle John knew, something that Paul, who was very impatient, learned, something we do well to hold tight to. Peter knew God is patient because, “God is love.” (1 John 4:8)
God doesn’t want SOME people to be saved, he wants ALL people to be saved. So he waits. He gives opportunities. He lets things unfold (not that He isn’t in the middle of the unfolding, too!).
Dealing with people coming to faith is to deal with something very fragile, and God is very gentle. He will sometimes tear at us with the Law but it is always to open us up to receive the Gospel. His purpose is to give us the life of Jesus’ love, not to destroy us. So by our standards, He is slow in coming back. He is slow to judge the living and the dead – because he wants to open more of the dead and make them alive!
There is a story about two monks in a garden. The younger is bold and desires action and can’t understand how his order can be so slow and patient. The older picks an unopened rose – basically a hard green ball on the end of a thorny stick and tells the younger to open the rose. The younger monk takes it and starts prying the petals apart, pricking his hands on the thorns and basically destroying the rose – not because he wanted to destroy it, but as he pulled it apart he couldn’t help destroying it. It was impossible for him to be gentle enough with it. The older monk points out to the younger that if they had just been patient – watering, fertilizing, tending, and weeding – that rose would have been opened and would have been beautiful. Only God can open up the rose, and He does it in His time.
We certainly have work to do as we wait for Jesus to return. We want to share the good news wherever we can! But Peter also exhorts us to, “grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” You see, we too are like roses in the garden, slowly opening in God’s time.
I wonder sometimes is we don’t focus too much on growing in the knowledge of Jesus at the expense of growing in His grace. God is not done with us yet. He is patiently opening us to His love. (Even when we are impatiently stomping our feet with another person he is working on!)
Grace, mercy and peace are ours because of Jesus’ sacrifice for us. Let’s pray to grow in them.
Ponder that a second.
Why is God patient? If anyone can make things happen instantly it’s Him! After all, He is the one who said, “Let there be . . .” and there was! Why is He willing to wait? To hold off? To put up with our less-than-perfect results?
Peter knew something that His friend and fellow apostle John knew, something that Paul, who was very impatient, learned, something we do well to hold tight to. Peter knew God is patient because, “God is love.” (1 John 4:8)
God doesn’t want SOME people to be saved, he wants ALL people to be saved. So he waits. He gives opportunities. He lets things unfold (not that He isn’t in the middle of the unfolding, too!).
Dealing with people coming to faith is to deal with something very fragile, and God is very gentle. He will sometimes tear at us with the Law but it is always to open us up to receive the Gospel. His purpose is to give us the life of Jesus’ love, not to destroy us. So by our standards, He is slow in coming back. He is slow to judge the living and the dead – because he wants to open more of the dead and make them alive!
There is a story about two monks in a garden. The younger is bold and desires action and can’t understand how his order can be so slow and patient. The older picks an unopened rose – basically a hard green ball on the end of a thorny stick and tells the younger to open the rose. The younger monk takes it and starts prying the petals apart, pricking his hands on the thorns and basically destroying the rose – not because he wanted to destroy it, but as he pulled it apart he couldn’t help destroying it. It was impossible for him to be gentle enough with it. The older monk points out to the younger that if they had just been patient – watering, fertilizing, tending, and weeding – that rose would have been opened and would have been beautiful. Only God can open up the rose, and He does it in His time.
We certainly have work to do as we wait for Jesus to return. We want to share the good news wherever we can! But Peter also exhorts us to, “grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” You see, we too are like roses in the garden, slowly opening in God’s time.
I wonder sometimes is we don’t focus too much on growing in the knowledge of Jesus at the expense of growing in His grace. God is not done with us yet. He is patiently opening us to His love. (Even when we are impatiently stomping our feet with another person he is working on!)
Grace, mercy and peace are ours because of Jesus’ sacrifice for us. Let’s pray to grow in them.
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