Patient in Affliction

“Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer” – Romans 12:12

Today’s world believes against patience. Each and every thing, people wants instantly. For standing in a queue at a grocery shop, people get so frustrated that they think they may lose some seconds. They try to walk over other person and get into trouble. This happens in every walk of life. Even the character of people does not support patience. They get angry and in that anger do lots of things which should never be done. If you go and enquire about how the prisoners ended up there, you will find out, if they had little patience, they wouldn’t have been there.

“Do not be quickly provoked in your spirit, for anger resides in the lap of fools” – Ecclesiastes 7: 9

There are times when people lose patience. When their child irritates, same in the case of his boss, when his spouse irritates him, and more and more, even the traffic block which can be seen daily.

If you are in need for patience, then the only place to ask for it is to God. God is patient with us, even for the people who haven’t trust in Christ and failed to repent. God is patiently waiting for unbelievers to repent and accept Christ. God shows patience even when his children are tortured by unbelievers and are waiting for the same unbelievers to repent and accept Christ.

If God can show these degrees if patience, we who are his creation should also show the same. But the choice is always yours.

“And the Lord’s servant must not be quarrelsome but must be kind to everyone, able to teach, not resentful” – 2 Timothy 2:24.

Patience

In John 4:4-26 we see Jesus Christ talking to a Samaritan woman who came to draw water from the well. Jesus asked her water, but she was surprised how a Jew asked anything to Samaritans, since Samaritans were lower than Jews in cast. You can see in the end of the conversation Jesus telling those who drink the water he gave will never be thirsty and the woman replying to give her so that she won’t be thirsty and won’t need to come to get water. She did not understand what Jesus was saying so her immediate reply was this. 

She was interested in Jesus’s message because she thought it could make her life easier. Christ did not come to take away challenges, but to change us on the inside and to empower us to deal problems from God’s perspective. The woman did not immediately comprehend what Jesus was talking about, but she gradually understood. Jesus did not force her to make her understand. He knew the Holy Spirit will change her thinking and make her understand.

Patience should be shown to the evil also. When the devil try to take away you riches and blessings, show patience and prayerfully seek God. God will open new doors for you. He is a God who can create anything from nothing. You need to show patience. “Be still in the presence of the Lord, and wait patiently for him to act. Don’t worry about evil people who prosper or fret about their wicked schemes. Stop being angry! Turn from your rage! Do not lose your temper – it only leads to harm. For the wicked will be destroyed, but those who trust in the Lord will possess the land” – Psalm 37: 7-9.

Even the mighty God has patience in dealing us. The sins we do against him, he is slow to anger and if we confess our sins, he will forgive us. He patiently will wait for us to confess the sins, but if we don’t, the Judgement will come upon you. “The Lord is slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, forgiving iniquity and transgression, but he will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, to the third and fourth generation” – Numbers 14:18

I pray that you live a holy life, pleasing to God and have patience in your life so that your life will be a blessing to you as well as others.