Welcome to Everyday Radical, a podcast where we help the everyday Christian follow Jesus and make him known everywhere. We pray that today's episode encourages you to do just that. So let's dive right in.
SPEAKER_00I think it's surprising, and kind of not surprising, how prevalent patience is. Like in so many different places in the Bible. Like I think, uh, okay, fruit of the spirit, love, joy, peace, patience. So there's a supernatural patience that flows from the spirit. And then I start thinking, all right, where else do we see patience? Like, that's the first word that comes to Paul's spirit-inspired mind when he's describing love. Like of all the different words. That's good. Love is what comes to your mind. I I don't think patience. So that's why I mean surprising. Yeah. Because it's like, okay, I don't think that's the first word I would have thought of to describe love. But that's the first word that the spirit inspires Paul to describe love as in 1 Corinthians 13. And then, so then my mind goes to okay, wait, all the verses all over the Bible that also talk about waiting. Uh those who wait on the Lord shall renew their strength. Uh and and oh man, just uh a book I would commend, a little book called uh uh Waiting on God by Andrew Murray. It's so good. It's like a it's like a devotional book. It's uh uh just you read like a chapter, which is like a page or two, and just soak it in and then wait till the next day. You don't like sit down and just read it through an hour. You just kind of uh yeah, you can kind of just walk through it slowly. But he goes through all these places where uh the Bible talks about waiting on God and basically builds a case that I think is pretty solid that the Christian life is waiting on God. Yes, and because because wait, well, what is involved in waiting? It's trusting it's yeah. When you are waiting, you're saying, okay, I am trusting. And in fact, so one other thought, then I want you to jump in here, but my mind's going all these different places. Yeah, Isaiah 40. I'm I mentioned earlier, those who wait on the Lord shall renew their strength. You look at that word wait, and one, I remember I was studying it at one point, and one commentator said that word could be translated to rest trustfully. And bro, I've held on to that ever since. Rest trust to rest trustfully, like I can rest trustfully because I'm I'm trusting in God, I don't have to uh yeah, I can wait because He's in control. So, man, all these different pictures of patience and waiting in scripture. So this fruit of the spirit.
SPEAKER_01And it's one that I think patience is one of those things that be like, oh, pray for me. I just need to be more patient. I'm like, you know, if I pray for your patience what that means, you have to practice that patience. Like it's just the thing of uh like John Mark Comer, ruthless elimination of hurry, like going into a store and picking the line that is the longest just to practice that patience. And it's just like you walk in, you're like, but there's two people in this one, there's ten people in that one. And that's just an example of I've never done that, by the way. I have you ever tried once with you, and I was just like, I don't want to do this, but it's true, it's like it's God has a funny way of answering that prayer. I I pray for patience, and God's like, all right, here you go, here's some traffic. And I don't know, I I I feel like that's something that a lot of people misunderstand about this fruit specifically, is that if you think I just want more patience, I just want to be more patient person, that it's just gonna fall into your lap and I'm just gonna be somehow so at peace and all patient all the time. But God is saying, like, like you're saying, wait on God. That's a process. I think waiting on God has been misinterpreted to be this like, I'm just gonna sit in the corner and not do anything. But I I my mind immediately goes to Abraham when God tells him to go. He he says, Go and I shall show you the place that I'm gonna take you. It's like that is a form of waiting on God that didn't require him to just sit in one place, but rather to still take action and to step out in faith um and and to follow where God had him to go. And so I think he had to have patience in that.
SPEAKER_00I think I was just in uh patience in the context of obedience, exactly. Not yeah, passively sitting back, but actively walking with God, actively worshiping God, and actively waiting on God.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. And I also think of I was just in Matthew three or four this morning, uh, and it's talking about Joseph and Mary and how they're um taking baby Jesus from here to there, and it's just like Joseph's had like dream after dream, and it's like, no, don't go there, you gotta go here. And I'm just thinking like he had to have so much patience. And I don't think we give Joseph enough credit in the story of the birth of Jesus. Like the fact that I don't know if we talked about it, but the genealogy of Jesus includes Joseph and it traces that that's a whole tangent. But all that to say, I think that yes, like there's an active, there's an active way to patiently wait on God.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, that's really we don't talk about well, and I think it's uh one of the because all right, we're thinking about really different directions here, uh, which are both uh part of the fruit of the spirit, is waiting on God and so patience before God and patience with others. Yeah. Um, but both of them really are learned, like actively learned. I think that's part of what, as you're sharing, I I think about yeah, you don't learn patience if everything immediately comes to you exactly like you want. Like there's that's you're not gonna learn patience that way. Like we actually learn patience through sometimes an agonizing process of waiting. Like, man, as we're talking about this, I'm just thinking about and maybe you would encourage everybody who's listening to this like, what are you waiting on? I mean, because I've got I've got things I'm waiting on right now in my life, like longing for um, life, family and the world. Like, I man, even as I'm thinking about it, the list is long. Like, I the so it's learned to be patience before God, to and that's where I think about uh hmm, even the uh persistent widow, the parable of the persistent widow, when in Luke 18, Jesus says he taught them this parable to so that they might keep on praying and not give up. So, man, that's an active picture of waiting, like praying every day for this to happen and at the same time trusting God with what you are praying for, trusting his timing, trusting his wisdom, trusting, yeah, ultimately his will. And so, but there's a but that's not sitting back, okay, I'm gonna stop praying for this, which I'm tempted to do. Like I remember when we were walking through um yeah, adoption process with uh our son JD, and it was three and a half years of waiting to be able to go bring him home. And uh, and I just think there were days like I I did I regret in my faith when I was like, what what does it matter if I pray? Like I would not have I don't think I would have said that, but I was certainly thinking it like uh especially when you pray and you pray and you you think something's about to happen and it doesn't. And so it's like well, what did it matter? But to know not one prayer, that's what Jesus is telling us, and what God tells us all that not one prayer is before God is ever, ever, ever in vain. But that that you learn that through uh through long suffering, through waiting. Um and then similarly, that's the way things work in our relationship with other people, too. Like we don't learn patience by everything always going great in relationships with others, like it's we're uh yeah, we're patient with others. Yeah. Um and we gotta learn that and and learn to love that way. And man, I just think along those lines, uh, whenever I'm impatient with others, it really is a picture of pride in my life. Yeah, because God has been so patient with me. He's been like, whoa, oh, he is yes, he's so so so patient with me. And so with his spirit in me, I need to be patient with others. Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01He is slow to anger. Yeah, I think about that all the time. Of just if I yeah, if I get upset with somebody else for a minor thing, and how much more has God forgiven me, been patient with me. I just it's not fair. It's like my mind goes to the uh I think it's a the the parable of um the guy who forgives the debt. You know what I'm talking about? The king that forgives the really high debt, he turns around and says, Well, you owe me like this much out of whatever I owed the king. And he hears about it. And it's like the the that's an example of something else, but I mean the patience that God has for sinners like us who have daily need of repentance before him. Like, why don't we live with that that grace in mind for other people? Like, even as I'm thinking about that, I'm just like, why don't I live with that grace in mind for other people who wrong me in ways that are so minuscule compared to what I have done to the creator of the universe? Uh I just think my mind, I love Hebrews 12, but therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race set before us. Let us run with endurance, with patience, with waiting on God, the race that is set before us. Like we like you said, we want this quick fix. That's what social media is training us to do. That's what everything in life is training us to do, to receive as soon as we put something in. But the Lord is saying, this is a race. The Christian life is a race. And I'm gonna run with you and I'm gonna be with you, and I'm gonna cheer you on along the way, but this is a race that you are called to endure and to be patient.
SPEAKER_00Man, so two thoughts there. Uh, one, endurance, because okay, uh, my mind immediately goes to Revelation one, and it's multiple times in Revelation the phrase patient endurance. Uh, John says, I write to you, and we hear he is exiled on an island. I write to you as your brother, your partner in the tribulation and the patient endurance that are in Jesus. Like this is this is the Christian life. Like it's many things. It's many things. It's joyful always, it's all these all the fruit of the spirit. So love, joy, peace, and patience, which means, yeah, it the Christian life is patient endurance to the fallen world, through a world of sin, through a world of sorrow, suffering, death. It's holding on uh as he's holding on to us and enduring patiently. Uh, I think that's part of the point of the book of Revelation. It's not just uh get us like pulling out charts and debating the end times. It's it's intended to say Jesus wins, God wins in the end. Hold on then, hold on. You're you're in the fight, but just hold on. Like you're you're in the marathon, you're at mile, whatever, only God knows what mile you're at specifically. And so just hold on. Um, but then that's the second thing. It's not even it's not even just hold on, do your best. It's I'm in you. I that's the whole point of the fruit of the spirit. Yeah, you have that's this is where I keep thinking about as we're talking about the fruit of the spirit. We have a supernatural reservoir inside us of supernatural patience. We have the same patience of God. He we talked about, he's so patient with us. We have that patience inside of us, like his Holy Spirit dwells in our bodies, we're temples. So we've got supernatural patience, patience available to us. So this is now the prayer really is God help me to live today in the reservoir of resource you've given to me in the fullness of your Holy Spirit, which means patience, patience before you. I have supernatural. You're not just telling me to be patient, you're giving me power to be patient before you, and you're not just telling me to be patient with these other people at work or at home or whatever it might be. You have you're giving me everything I need to be like otherworldly patient with them. That's and so to live in this, this is the the fight against the flesh, again Galatians chapter five, to live in the power, in the fruit of the spirit, which is which is patience. That's so good, David.
SPEAKER_01What are some more like practical ways that someone can take after this episode? I I think one, we sat down with Andy Davis the other day, and scripture memorization is probably a great way to learn patience. Uh, what are some other spiritual practices that we can Yeah, and and I would again go back to that.
SPEAKER_00That Andrew Murray Waiting on God book is so good. And uh so then there's just all kinds of verses. So memorize verses on waiting on God or uh yeah, memorize verses on patience for sure. Uh that's always uh how how do we keep our way pure by living according to your word, just uh meditating on his word day and night. Um, I would say other things, so what second, just actively pray for patience, like God help me to I and and to pause and confess, repent of impatience. Yeah. So I think, man, that's a good exercise for us uh to do, and maybe as a follow-up, just like right now after listening to this, but but just to pause and say, is there any way I'm being impatient before God? Is there any impatience in my heart before God? Or is there any impatience in my heart toward others? And to repent of that, to repent of that before God, to repent of that before others? Is there anybody we need to go to and just say, hey, I have not been patient with you and please forgive me? So, so to confess impatience, to pray for patience, like to actively pray for it, um, and then to recognize, I think this is where for me, journaling is so helpful uh every morning because it gives me an opportunity to kind of uh look at, reflect on what happened the day before, what's happening today, and just see are there any ways God is teaching me patience right now that I need to learn? Um in the middle of just to ask, amid struggles, where do I need to grow in patience and to really internalize that that question and then let that of course lead you to pray for patience? So I a lot of that is just hard work that needs to be done. And maybe one other thing, maybe one other thing would be to in relationships with people around us to ask, do you see impatience in me in any way? Just for God to use others in our lives who love us to open our eyes to impatience. Like I'm just thinking, ask your spouse, your kids, your parents, your friends, uh just other brothers and sisters in Christ. Or, I mean, you really kind of might shock a non-believer be like, hey, do you see any impatience in me? I really want to grow in this, but but to look to others because sometimes we don't see the impatience. Yeah, and and if if yeah, brothers and sisters of Christ really know us, they might help us see impatience not just before others, but impatience before God in us.
SPEAKER_01Oh, that's so good. I when as you were sharing that, I just thought back to what you shared in First Corinthians 13. Love is patience. And I just made the connection we are talking about all the fruit of the spirit, and it's so evident in scripture how connected these fruits are. And I'm good. Uh I would love to just pray us out in closing that we would have the patience of God. So Father God, I just thank you for this episode on patience. Lord, I repent of any ways, any areas of my life where I have been impatient, especially when, like you said, you loved us first, you are patient with us first. So, Father, I just thank you for your patience. Would the Holy Spirit in all of us, God, would you, Holy Spirit, would you bring out this patience, this supernatural patience that when we feel like we need to be in a rush and always on the move and always on the go and always receiving and always doing, would you sit us down to know that it is okay to be still and know that you are God, that you will be exalted among the nations? God, I pray for patience who whoever is listening, that they would be able to practice it, that they would go to scripture and memorize words in which you have called us to be patient. God, I pray that we would be patient with our spouses, with our friends, with our parents, the people that are hard to be patient around, would you show yourself and your glory through the patience that we get to ex to show, to put on display, that it would glorify you and not us? God, would we be patient Christians who run this race with endurance, laying aside every burden and every sin? And would we seek you? Would we gaze upon you the beauty of your face? Would we inquire of you in your temple? Because you say better is one day in your courts than a thousand elsewhere. So, Father, would we rest with patience in your courts daily because it is good? Even one second is better than a thousand elsewhere in your courts, Lord. Would we just have patience that helps us grow in the fruit of the spirit and the knowledge of your son in Jesus' name? Amen.
SPEAKER_00Amen. And bro, I I gotta, as you're praying, that that was such a good word. I knew that. I mean, you're praying to the Lord, but just what he did in my own heart, yeah, and just encouragement to really be to uh wait patiently in time with the Lord, like the Psalm 27, as you were quoting that, to not be rushed, to really make sure there's a place in our lives for us. Yes, just patient sitting before God, listening to God instead of rushing through that time with God, um, just being with him. That be still as you're saying that Psalm 46, just I was like, oh yeah, I want to live in that stillness. Yes. Uh, and I'm so thankful he is God, and just to let that soak in and bring all that's going on in my life just under that reality. So yeah, God help us to be patient just in time with him.
SPEAKER_01Amen. Thanks so much for listening to this episode of Everyday Radical. We pray that it encouraged you in many ways. We do this every single week. So be sure to subscribe or follow to not miss the next episode. We'll see you then.