On the Virtue of Patience, Part 4: Trusting in the Calendar of Another; and Moscow Mood!
On the Palouse again...
It’s been a busy few days here in Moscow, ID. The central point of my trip is to speak at the Missions Conference this evening. I hope to see many of you there. I will focus on how the Church goes to the world, is for the world, and is sometimes in danger of being in the world.
We have had meaningful meetings, including attending the Knox Presbytery in Moscow. It was a delight to see so many pastors from the Pacific Northwest and Canada. And additionally, we met at the new Christ Church Hall building, which is suitable for over 1,000. The building is beautifully located, and I know a labor of love.
Our congregation in Pensacola purchased a piano from Clint Hughes, who is in the resurrecting piano business. It was great to see our piano in person in Potlatch, ID. Hopefully, it will arrive during Eastertide in May to christen our new sanctuary with divine music.
Among the other great meetings, it’s always fun to spend time with my dear friend, David (Choc Knox). David has an uncanny way of seeing the world, and every time we talk, I wish we had recorded an episode.
Part One, On the Virtue of Love
Part Two, On the Virtue of Joy
Part Three, On the Virtue of Peace
On the Virtue of Patience, Part 4: Trusting in the Calendar of Another
A child spills milk on himself right before you are about to walk the door to go to church; a car in front of you who appears to have all the time in the world while you have the world’s time on your shoulders; a person who never stops talking; someone whom you perceive to be treating a loved one unkindly; people making constant bad decisions; the declining health of someone you love…I could list another thousand such circumstances.
All these scenarios are tests of our patience.
Patience Defined
Patience assumes that there is a timetable that is different from ours. Patience means hitting the pause button on how we expect our day to go and trusting someone else’s calendar, namely, casting your cares on Jesus, for he cares for you.
So, what is patience? In sum, patience is trusting in the calendar of Another.
Now, I don’t want to treat patience like some sweet and savory little virtue we can acquire if we just set our minds to it. Some personalities don’t handle pressure well; their escape route is to scream their way to their desired outcome. They cope with their anxieties by drinking too much, being harsh, and having outbursts of anger.
And then some of you are incredibly timid. You are not the social butterfly, but you have quiet and subtle ways of exploding, of throwing temper tantrums at the littlest things. Patience is no respecter of persons or personalities.
In the Fruit of the Spirit, patience describes a “godly reaction to a variety of circumstances.”[1] Now, understand that patience is not accepting passively whatever someone may do to you. Patience is not suffering mistreatment from others. Patience is not uttering fatalistic words like: “Well, I am just a victim. I can’t do anything about this.” No. Patience is quite active. Patience accepts the circumstances of our lives as God’s providence but is active in praying, repenting, and waiting on God’s promises. Patience does not spend our entire lives bitter and angry at our circumstances, but moves forward in light of the circumstances.
Vengeance is Mine, Saith the Lord!
When we fail to trust that God’s character is for us, we ultimately don’t trust God’s ways are for us. So, we take our routes and enact our justice. But this is contrary to the intent of the Holy Scriptures. Only God is altogether just. Patience is the opposite of retaliation. Paul says in Romans 12: “Vengeance is mine, I will repay.” Patience is trusting Jesus’ calendar for us.
We often feel that if we don’t retaliate with a harsh word or a visceral reaction, we are letting our tormentor escape justice. And by tormentor, sometimes that may be a spouse, a child, or a friend. If we don’t act now in anger and an outburst of rhetoric, then that person will escape the due wrath that he/she deserves. How many of us parents have responded with anger to our children? How many of us wish to take back certain things we have said to our spouses or friends?
Look: Patience is a difficult virtue. We must be reminded that it will be our downfall if we don’t bring it under God’s control or submit our words and actions to God's calendar and timetable.
Whoever has no rule over his own spirit is like a city broken down, without walls (Prov. 25:28).
Patience is a fruit of the Spirit because patience is an attribute of God. The Psalmist says: “The Lord is compassionate, gracious, slow to anger, abounding in steadfast love.” (Psalm 103) The Spirit reveals what he sees displayed in the Godhead. The Apostle James says to be slow to become angry. Paul says in I Corinthians that love is not easily angered. The best way to develop patience is to reflect on the patience of God toward us.[2]
God’s Patience Towards Us
How often do our sins grieve a sinless God? Imagine what it means to rule over a creation filled with shortcomings, anger, and sin. Yet, God chooses from all eternity past to be slow to anger. God does not say he is never angry, which means there is time for our righteous anger. But I propose that invariably, we rarely, if ever, express a kind of righteous anger. Instead, we tend to run fast to the finish line of anger before marathoning our way to anger. But God waits patiently.
The clear example of God’s anger is in Genesis 6, where the Bible says, “The Lord saw how great the wickedness of the human race had become on the earth, and that every inclination of the thoughts of the human heart was only evil all the time.” But before he destroyed every living thing, he offered the world 120 years to repent and turn to him.
God’s patience is magnificently perfect.
So, any patience we express toward our children, our neighbors, and our co-workers is a gift from God. Our flesh wants nothing more than to display our carnal death wishes on others. But patience is trusting Jesus’ calendar when it is easier for us to impose our timetable on others.
“Why is that person not growing as he should?”
“Why can’t she just be like me?”
Let’s be honest: we struggle to tolerate the shortcomings of others. People often do things that ordinarily irritate us. The reverse of that is that we often do things that irritate people. But of course, we conveniently choose not to believe this. It is much easier to show patience toward people you don’t see or those you rarely engage with. But then we go home to our children and spouses, or church members, and suddenly, the patience we have expressed so diligently to co-workers disappears, and suddenly, everybody in the home is subject to our wants and schedules.
I have an old friend who often says, “People have a wonderful plan for your life.” It’s true. We all have plans for people we know best and sometimes for people we barely know. Impatience stems from thinking that everything and everyone needs to follow a great script you wrote, and when people don’t follow the script as you wrote, you are justified in showing a director’s fury.
But you don’t write the script for your children and friends. God is the director of our lives. And when we rush to anger with our fellow laborers, we are taking God's place as director. We are supplanting God’s function in our stories as the great writer.
The Labor of Patience
So, patience is hard; how do we manifest it? I want your spouse or friend to tell you about a week from now: “I have noticed you have improved in patience.” Wouldn’t it be great to hear? “You are kinder to the children, more loving towards me, more gracious in the classroom, more loving to your brother, less argumentative…”
Don’t we want that? Don’t we want to please our God, who is slow to anger with us?
Where do we begin? There is no magic pill. There is no magic mantra or book…there is just practice.
If anything, when we read those words “slow to anger,” I would pause on that word slow. King James uses the word forbearance, which means to “bear with strength,” or the New King James uses “long-suffering,” which means to “show extended patience.” In Paul’s context, to have patience and to forbear is to accept the faults of others with strength. It doesn’t mean approving people’s sins but bearing with one another in love.
People may view reacting to people’s shortcomings as strength, but the Bible says strength is bearing, tolerating, and overlooking people’s weaknesses with strength. Peter says that love covers a multitude of sins. People sin. In that sin, you can do two things: reveal your utter contempt for them or work through and overlook their weaknesses in love and compassion.
Disarming with Patience
Some years ago, I wrote something on the goodness of God. Somebody I knew in college responded with absolute anger. He said, “What kind of God allows me to lose my wife in a divorce and my children?” I could tell he wanted a fight; he was ready for war. So, I had a response. And I tell you, it was great. It was full of insights from philosophy and the Bible about how God is ontologically good and at the same time he creates a world where he allows for suffering to take place for his own glory and that you have no right to argue with the concept of God’s goodness because it is contradictory to argue against God’s goodness without affirming that he is good to begin with.” Then before I posted it, I thought for a second. I was deliberately slow. I deleted everything and wrote: “Dear friend, I am so terribly sorry for all your loss. This must be incredibly hard for you. Can we talk? Here’s my cell number.” He replied with something like: “I am sorry I overreacted. What time is best to reach you?”
I wish I could say I always react like this. I don’t. But I think what happened in that exchange is that I disarmed him with patience. He wanted to trigger my boxing instincts, and I brought his reasonableness to the forefront. Blessed are the de-escalators, for they will be great in the kingdom of God!
I think patience disarms angry people. Patience is trusting Jesus’ calendar for us. Jesus wants us to bring people closer with our answers, not to drive them away. And so, I ask you: “How do your responses to things you perceive to be irritating bring you closer to that person?” The answer is to be slow to anger.
Patience comes when we stop imposing our calendar on everyone else and submit our lives to a perfect calendar from above.
I like the way counselor Ed Welch puts it:
The Lord is so patient with me—so patient. And other people have to be patient with me every day. Therefore, it is my honor to be able to extend that patience to others.
The Apostle Paul prayed in Colossians that we would have great endurance and patience. Patience is the outworking of our devotion to God. Patience is the fruit of that when we are faithful in our piety, prayer, and practice. Patience sometimes can mean a gentle correction instead of a harsh word, disarming someone’s anger, or showing kindness instead of shouting.
The Telos of Patience
Remember the Gospel story about the man who was forgiven much—about a million dollars’ worth of debt? Once he had received this remarkable forgiveness from a patient master, he turned around and found someone who begged him to forgive his debt. The man was forgiven a million dollars, but someone owed him a few dollars, and he acted in rage, demanding prison time for this poor man who owed him little.
I think the Gospel teaches us an important lesson: those who have been forgiven much ought to forgive others who may add a few petty irritant moments to your life. To whom much is given, much is required.
Will you own your impatience and seek their forgiveness? Will you ask God to plant seeds of patience in your life? Will you begin anew to look at friends, acquaintances, and family members with the dignity they rightly possess and show patience and slowness to anger? Will you stop imposing your calendar on everyone else and submit to Jesus’ calendar for you?
The Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in steadfast love.
[1] Chapter 7, Jerry Bridges
[2] Bridges, The Fruitful Life.
Uriesou T. Brito
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I enjoyed your talk at the conference, and this article, thank you for your wisdom!
Thank you for this. A much needed word at a much needed time on this topic, having just had to apologize for and repent of going off on another person earlier this week specifically over my frustrations at relying on someone else's calendar and schedule and inability to control unexpected diversions and difficulties. This was as if you were speaking directly to me.