The Daily Planet » Blog Archive » Patience Is A Virtue

April 14, 2009

Patience Is A Virtue

Published in Growing In Grace Magazine, Me Myself and I, Published Articles, Reflections of a 19 year old, What the Bible means to Me- A 19 year old

Patience is a virtue. How many times have we been told to be patient for something? My personality is that when I am doing something or need something done, it should be done right then. But is not how some things should be done. Some times we need to be patient and wait on the Lord.

Psalm 40:1
I waited patiently for the LORD; and he inclined unto me, and heard my cry.

When we wait on the Lord, we give up the control our flesh wants to have and we let the Holy Spirit be in charge. Thus, letting the Spirit triumph over the flesh and letting God be in charge. When our flesh is not winning, then we allow the Spirit to lead us in God’s way and we end up having a much better time of becoming who we are supposed to be through Christ.

Being patient is also called longsuffering. Longsuffering is one of the fruit of having the Spirit lead your life.

Galatians 5:21-23

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, Meekness, temperance: against such there is no law.

To get a better understanding of what it is to be patient and longsuffering and have patience, I looked up the words in the dictionary and was surprised at what I found. When you think of patience or longsuffering or being patient, you think of Waiting for something, right? Well what I found was actually different from that understanding:

LONG’SUF’FERING, a. Bearing injuries or provocation for a long time; patient; not easily provoked.

PATIENCE, n. pa’shens. [L. patientia, from patior, 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.

PATIENT, a. pa’shent. [L. patiens.]
1. Having the quality of enduring evils without murmuring or fretfulness; sustaining afflictions of body or mind with fortitude, calmness or christian submission to the divine will; as a patient person, or a person of patient temper. It is followed by of before the evil endured; as patient of labor or pain; patient of heat or cold.
2. Not easily provoked; calm under the sufferance of injuries or offenses; not revengeful.
3. Persevering; constant in pursuit or exertion; calmly diligent.
4. Not hasty; not over eager or impetuous; waiting or expecting with calmness or without discontent.

PA’TIENTLY, adv. With calmness or composure; without discontent or murmuring. Submit patiently to the unavoidable evils of life.
1. With calm and constant diligence; as, to examine a subject patiently.
2. Without agitation, uneasiness or discontent; without undue haste or eagerness; as, to wait patiently for more favorable events.

To have patience is to bear times with a calm and unruffled temper. To be patient is to be content to wait for whatever is going on that you are waiting on. Not only is it waiting for something, but it is waiting on something with a calm and content attitude. Not an “I want this done right now and won’t be satisfied til its done“, it is with an “I am going to be content with waiting and while I am waiting I am going to be happy.“

Waiting is something that we don’t want to do because we want things right now! Our flesh doesn’t want to be told to wait and do it calmly, it wants to have its way RIGHT NOW! Most of the time, we let the flesh take over and when we are impatient with others we are disagreeable to be around. The Bible says:

1 Thessalonians 5:14
Now we exhort you, brethren, warn them that are unruly, comfort the feebleminded, support the weak, be patient toward all men.

Be patient with a sweet temper to everyone, because more than likely they are going through something too and need your patience. An added blessing to being patient with someone is that they will then see that it is possible to be patient while in the midst of a trial and will pass on patience to others. A rippling effect.

We are to even wait patiently on a situation where someone is sinning, maybe against you, for God to handle it and take care of the person in sin:

Psalm 37:7
Rest in the LORD, and wait patiently for him: fret not thyself because of him who prospereth in his way, because of the man who bringeth wicked devices to pass.

God will not allow sin to endure forever, just a time. We must let Him be in charge of when that time will end. Just be patient that He will take care of everything and the only thing you need to worry about is being content to wait!

In the end of your experience of learning to be patient and longsuffering, you will obtain a something that you can be happy you earned:

Ecclesiastes 7:8
Better is the end of a thing than the beginning thereof: and the patient in spirit is better than the proud in spirit.

When God knows that you have overcome your spirit of being impatient you can rest assured in the wonderful promise that the fruit of the spirit will not return void:

Romans 2:7
To them who by patient continuance in well doing seek for glory and honour and immortality, eternal life:

To have eternal life through Jesus Christ is the best thing you can go after! I am going to work on my patience level, because I know that a lot of times I want things done in my time. I end up finding out that God’s time is the best time though. I am learning and leaning on that fact and trust that everything will be made perfect when God wants it to!