Love is…

Love is patient. These words come from the infamous chapter on love, 1 Corinthians 13. I read this and think “What does it mean by patient? How was this patience exemplified in the life of Christ?”

Well, I’m going to try and answer those questions today. I looked up the word used for patience in this verse, and found that the Greek word used is Makrothumèo, which means “to suffer long, be longsuffering, as opposed to being given to hasty anger or punishment, to forbear, to endure patiently as opposed to despondency, involves exercising understanding and patience toward persons”

To me, this seems to be on of the most difficult concepts of love to grasp. So many times we lose patience with people, sometimes in the most ridiculous, worthless ways. A great illustration of this type of patience is found in 2 Peter 3:9. God demonstrates this aspect of love in a very, very real way.

“The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some count slackness, but is longsuffering [patient] toward us, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.”

Here, Peter states that the Lord is patient with us, waiting for us, he forbears, waiting for us to come to Him in repentance. He is God after all, He could have destroyed us. He could have left us for something else, but He didn’t. Knowing that God chose to be patient with us, knowing our sins, knowing our desire to live for the flesh, yet He still loved us enough to wait…and wait some more…and continue to wait, so that all, undeserving as we are, can come to Him, with our arms outstretched, desiring Him.

Another instance we see this patience is in Hebrews 6:15. Here the author is discussing the promise made to Abraham via God. It says

“And so, after he patiently endured, he obtained the promise”

First we saw God’s patience, and here we see the reciprocate. Many times, I think we as Christians think that certain things are for God, and God only, i.e. patience. We think, how are we to be patient? We’ll leave that up to God. But as we see in Hebrews, we are to reciprocate that patience as well. God is patient with us, and we need to be patient with Him. In my personal opinion, our patience towards God is more important. So many times we get ahead of God and his plans. We want things to happen now, blessings to come now, healing to happen now, etc. and we forget that maybe God doesn’t want it to happen now. Maybe God has us in this position for a reason, for a time of learning, for a time of blessing others. So, as a consequence of moving ahead of God, things begin to hurt, things begin to get complicated, and things begin to fail. It is imperative that we wait on God, for He waits on us to run to Him.

How do we see this patience exhibited in the life of Christ? The most apparent example to me, is Jesus’ relationship with His disciples. Everytime Jesus taught something, it seemed as though the disciples never understood. Yet, despite this, Jesus still taught. loving them with His entire being. If they didn’t get a concept, Jesus was always sure to explain it.

How can we exhibit the patience in our lives? I think we all know of areas where patience would be a necessity. In practically every area of our lives, we could use an ounce more of patience. Personally, though, I think that if we start by being patient with our Heavenly Father, patience will flow into other areas of our life. Being patient with our Creator, gives us the peace to know that He has all things under control, that all things are planned for a purpose. With that in mind, it will really help us to be patient with others, to be patient in all circumstances.

“The times we find ourselves having to wait on others may be the perfect opportunities to train ourselves to wait on the Lord.”

Joni Eareckson Tada

What about James?

Every time I read the book of James, something just jumps out at me. I don’t know what it is. Maybe that is why it is one of my favorite books in the Bible. But anywho, the tongue. What is it? What does it do? We all know (or at least I hope we do) it is a muscle in the body, a strong one, and it helps us eat, and in some cases do other things. It also, according to James 3 provides blessing AND cursing. Wait, what? Both out of the same device? Why yes. We really never think about how powerful, how devastating, and how uplifting our tongue can be, but I think it is time we do start thinking about it. I mean, how is it that one little member of our body can rip and tear one person to pieces and then build another person up a moment later? Truthfully, it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. But the verse that struck me was verse 2 “If anyone does not stumble in word, he is a perfect man, able also to bridle the whole body.” It took me until just recently to realize in fulness what this verse meant. I tried to reason through it most of the day today, and last night, thinking well is the tongue the source of all sin? No that can’t be, because we sin with our thoughts, and our hands and such. What then does this mean that a man is perfect if he does not stumble by word? If one were to look farther down the chapter, the puzzle gets put together in a beautiful masterpiece. It essentially says, that if one can control the tongue, it won’t be difficult to control the other parts of our being that sin, as the tongue is the most difficult. James 3 uses the bridle of a horse and the rudder of a ship for physical examples. But then it goes on to say that “No man can tame the tongue”! What?! It seems like a no win situation. But in reality, it is a win win situation either way we look at it. First, it shows we aren’t perfect, and that Christ was and is the only perfect person to grace the earth. Secondly, the fact that it shows we aren’t perfect, allows room for God’s grace to work in our lives. When we stumble, God’s grace is sufficient to repair the wounds, and ultimately, God is glorified. So then as Paul states in Romans, does this allow for us to sin? I would think not, but rather it allows us to demonstrate God’s grace to others, through our testimony of how His grace transformed our lives in sin, and helped us to somewhat control our tongue. Yes, the tongue can defile a man, but it can also throw him into the grace of God.