What KIND Of Patience Shall We Have? S7e21 Jim5:8

But what KIND of patience does James call us to? A passive, weak patience? Nope.

He turns to the farmer first. Farmers work hard, have spiritual-callouses, know the principle that what happens in August depends on what happens in April.  They know that August is WORTH it and is precious. There is patience in every day, a lot of "not yet today" in farming.

And look to the prophets.  They are marked by faithfulness to the end, and suffering in the meantime.  We want a patience that finishes well.

Listen patiently to 7 minutes of James making an argument and explanation of what spiritual patience is all about.  Please comment and review and write bewithme.us  or bewithme.us@gmail.com

Transcript

Michael Smith: 0:00

Good morning, my brothers and sisters Welcome to Episode 21 of be with me. We're in the final chapter of the book of James that is James chapter five yesterday, we looked at this dystopian kind of a day and where money started to talk if your money could talk, what would it say about us? It was the day of judgment where wages that were corruptly kept against workers were crying out against the current owner and silver and go gold, were corroding and treasure was flesh eating. It was the day of judgment. So today, we're going to say, what are we supposed to be doing in the meantime, before we get to that day, and that is be patient. Listen to this. This is from James chapter five, verse seven. Be patient, therefore brothers, and he's going to describe what, what kind of patience he's looking for. And so my title today is, but what kind of patience Shall we have? So listen, here, be patient, Therefore, brothers, until the coming of the Lord, see how the farmer waits for the precious fruit of the earth, being patient about it, until it receives the early, and the late rains, you also be patient, establish your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is at hand. Do not grumble against one another brothers, that you may not be judged. Behold, the judge is standing at the door. As an example of suffering, and patients, brothers take the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord. Behold, we consider those blessings, who remained steadfast, you have heard of the steadfastness of job, and you have seen the purpose of the Lord, how the Lord is compassionate, and merciful. But above all, by brothers do not swear either by heaven, or by Earth, or by any other oath. But let your yes be yes and your no be no so that you may not fall under condemnation. So this passage is all about patience. And we're asking the question, but what kind of patience shall Shall we have, and he uses a couple of different examples, he uses the patience of a farmer, he uses the patience of a prophet, he uses an example of what kind of a mouth we should be having, while we wait. And then finally, what kind of a heart we're supposed to have. So let's just talk about this. He asks us to be patient brothers. It's a it's a unisex wer word. So it means brothers and sisters here be patient, brothers and sisters, until the coming of the Lord. And then he uses the example of a farmer. It's the guy who understands what the Gallo understands that something is going to happen in August, which is so valuable that it's going to change the way that you behave in April, the April before that, that is there's going to be precious fruit. So I love this, that he emphasizes that the farmer knows that is precious fruit that he's he is after, it's something that's valued. It's something that's anticipated, and it's achieved by this feature characteristic they're talking about here is patience. So it's not a passive patience. It's a working patience. There's a whole lot of not yet today in this, this little section of scripture. So being patient, like a farmer means to work now, all the time looking towards the harvest, appreciating the value of the harvest, and trusting in the principles that if you do this, now you're going to get that then that is providing abundancy And it's going to be worth it and it's worthy and the harvest is precious. So first of all, he says uses the example of BE PATIENT Like a farmer. Another big example he uses here is be patient like a profit. And that is a guy who is aware with profit is too aware and acknowledging that there's going to be some suffering. All the prophets suffered Christ. Obviously, as our best example of that, but the prophets aren't too bad either. The point is suffering all the way to the end in being a finisher, being a conqueror, being a person that finishes well. He uses the example of job here probably the best example and there's you know, there's honestly there's some bad examples in Scripture, Jonah comes to mind. But then all these guys have in the New Testament, oh my goodness, the guys that finished so well that walked with Jesus, Peter, the super knucklehead, John's and even James who wrote this letter, other people from the Old Testament Isaiah, I was thinking in Isaiah that, that for three years, God told Isaiah This is from chapter 20 of Isaiah. He told him to walk around without pants on I'm sure that was not much fun for him, he kind of said, I want you to engage in like the spiritual street theater and ask the Oracle, because Israel is trusting in Egypt. And the point is, is that Egypt isn't wearing any pants and they don't, they're not anybody to trust in. And this is a sign against Egypt. So don't trust them. So I'm sure Isaiah was not very excited about that. But he pursued and was patient with the Lord all the way through that. So it's, it's the idea of being faithful to something that you don't fully see accomplished. Alright, so the word in verse eight is the one I want to drill down on today, which is establish your heart it means to confirm, to strengthen, to fix firmly in place until what is hoped for is achieved or seen at least, that is support your heart establishing in a place strengthen it make your hearts marked by firm determination, strong planted, established. So the hearts we're kind of have back to the the farmer, we're supposed to have the heart of the farmer who knows the win and knows that it's precious the knows the work, and has spiritual calluses in the meantime, and the heart of the prophet who is looking forward to something that has the courage to finish well, and even suffer through it. So what kind of patients should we have? Is it a passive patients not? Not at all in this passage, this passage says the patients that we're supposed to be having is a working, enduring, building, strengthening patience. It's a patient's that trusts in its accomplishment, and it sees its preciousness and its value. It's one that doesn't grumble against our fellow brothers and sisters who are with us. It's one that doesn't swear bad oaths. It's one that has an eye to judgment. So think about, you know, the future about our words. It's about farmers and about profits. That's the kind of patients that we are to have as we establish our hearts. So let's do they work, build them strong, get our spiritual calluses and be patients like farmers be patient like profits and establish our hearts. Thanks for listening. I pray that your heart be strengthened today. Established. See you tomorrow.