Patience & Endurance.
In your patience possess ye your souls. Luke 21:19 KJV
By your endurance you will gain your lives. Luke 21:19 NASB
The American Heritage Dictionary defines "patient" as:
- Bearing or enduring pain, difficulty, provocation, or annoyance with calmness.
- Tolerant; understanding.
- Persevering; constant.
- Capable of calmly awaiting an outcome or result; not hasty or impulsive.
Thankfully, God is patient toward us, His people. We can see throughout the New Testament that patience is also a virtue of the new birth. You may have been an impatient, compulsive, or manipulative person before you came to know Jesus. Now, standing in Christ, you are equipped to be a person who learns to persevere. You can grow in patience and endurance through what are sometimes very long periods of waiting as God leads you by His Holy Spirit.
Mark these verses in your Bible. They're sure to encourage you in days ahead. God is faithful to lead and strengthen us by His Holy Word.
The end of a matter is better than its beginning; patience of spirit is better than haughtiness of spirit. Ecclesiastes 7:8
. . . Rejoicing in hope, persevering in tribulation, devoted to prayer . . . Romans 12:12
For you have need of endurance, so that when you have done the will of God, you may receive what was promised. Hebrews 10:36
And let endurance have its perfect result, so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing. James 1:4
Therefore, my beloved brethren, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that your toil is not in vain in the Lord. 1 Corinthians 15:58
There are countless opportunities to move (or allow ourselves to be moved) off the course of God's plan for our lives. Moment by moment let's pursue God and His will. Keeping our eyes on Jesus, we can fulfill the call—patiently enduring and emerging victorious!
Press on!
Pastor Jeff
So that you will not be sluggish, but imitators of those who through faith and patience inherit the promises. Hebrews 6:12
© 2007 St. Louis Family Church. All rights reserved. No part of this article may be reprinted or distributed in any form without prior written permission of St. Louis Family Church. Unless otherwise noted, all Scripture references are from the New American Standard Bible (NASB) Copyright © 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation.