I don't know about you, but when I see an article or message on "Patience" I tend to tune out pretty quickly. I think it's partly because I don't particularly struggle with being patient with people (though it hit me last night when planning this topic that where I excel in being patient with people, I make up for it by being VERY impatient with myself in certain situations). Also, patience just isn't a sexy word these days, unless we tie it to something specific like being patient in your singleness as you wait for a spouse, patient with your children, etc. But even those are just common-sense teachings.
We're looking at JESUS, how He is patience, and thus how we have His patience because we have Him. So let's start there!
The first thing I thought of when thinking about patience in Jesus' life was His relationship with His disciples. If you've read through the gospels, you may notice that for being THE disciples of THE Messiah, they were a little...dense. Out of all the men in the region, He chose these dudes who were not professional scholars or priests to be His "students" and the ones who would carry on His ministry. (Now, to be fair to the disciples, no one had dreamed that the Messiah would be the way Jesus was. And anyone would've had great difficulty comprehending the Kingdom that Jesus brought and presented and taught). Jesus definitely had to exercise patience with His disciples AND others around Him.
Matt. 8:26 But He said to them, “Why are you fearful, O you of little faith?”
Mark 9:18-19 "...So I spoke to Your disciples, that they should cast it out, but they could not.” He answered him and said, “O faithless generation, how long shall I be with you? How long shall I bear with you? Bring him to Me.”
Jesus had to frequently explain His messages to His disciples, clarify things they were confused about, and settle their silly arguments. But He was always loving, even when you can catch a hint of exasperation in His tone.
John 11:11-16
After He had said this, He went on to tell them, “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep; but I am going there to wake him up.”
12 His disciples replied, “Lord, if he sleeps, he will get better.” 13 Jesus had been speaking of his death, but His disciples thought He meant natural sleep.
14 So then he told them plainly, “Lazarus is dead, 15 and for your sake I am glad I was not there, so that you may believe. But let us go to him.”
16 Then Thomas (also known as Didymus) said to the rest of the disciples, “Let us also go, that we may die with him.”
And speaking of the story of Lazarus... not only does it contain that small example of Jesus having to rephrase His words to get through to the not-so-sharp disciples, but we have a huge (unfortunately cliche) example of patience which we've almost all heard before: the fact that Jesus tarried for days after learning how sick Lazarus was. The amount of time that he made Mary and Martha wait for Him was offensive. He didn't even show up to the funeral. But He had a plan.
The second thing I thought of concerning the patience of Jesus was His patience with me!! And here's what I mean: I'm still learning things from God every year. He teaches me huge lessons, and the interesting thing is that He takes His time doing so. I look back at the last 5 years and see where God spent about a year teaching me about His grace, a few months teaching me about brokenness, a season teaching me about the supremacy and enormity of Jesus, then more months teaching me more about grace...etc. God takes His time cultivating your soul and spirit and sanctifying you for Himself. It doesn't happen overnight. And YOU can't make it happen overnight, because growth doesn't come from you -- it comes from HIM.
True patience exists in Jesus. We can learn what patience is by looking at Him, studying Him, and listening to Him. And my challenge to you would be to find areas in your life where you struggle not only to be more patient with others and your surroundings, but also patient with yourself. (I laugh at some of my mistakes, but I also really give myself a hard time for other things. I KNOW I'm not alone in this). And then decide to let Jesus live through you and become your patience, so that it's not by your own effort, but simply by yielding to Him.
You are IN Christ and Christ is in you, so not showing patience is out of character for you. Again, we live not of ourselves, but by the indwelling life of Christ Himself.
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