I wonder how many of us consider God to be patient. Some of us commit sin and feel as if God was anticipating the chance to cast us out of his presence. Rather than considering him to be patient, we think of him more like a judge with a strict, zero-tolerance policy. Christians can sometimes wonder to themselves after sinning, “How secure is my salvation?”
How about those that are unbelieving? Giving ourselves so little room for God’s patience and grace in our own lives, how much of it do we give to those that are not living in Christ? Especially to the people that speak and live in extreme defiance towards what is of God, what kind of patience do we afford them? How does that impact our picture of God’s patience for them and for us?
We need to see God for who he tells us he is and who he’s proven he is. “…Now return to the Lord your God, for He is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger, abounding in lovingkindness and relenting of calamity” (Joel 2:13). For those that turn to God in humility, in God’s compassion and grace, he forgives. He relents of his just wrath that destroys evil in favor of forgiveness for repentant people. “For I have no pleasure in the death of anyone who dies,’ declares the Lord God. ‘Therefore, repent and live” (Ezek. 18:32). Rather than allowing our personal views to dictate who God is, we need to let who God is dictate who we should become; a patient people in the image of a patient God, hopeful that even the defiant one’s would turn to the Lord.
The apostle, Peter, countering those that would one day mock or question the day of Christ’s return and the destruction of this present world, because of that day’s extensive delay, said, “The Lord is not slow about His promise, as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance” (2 Pet. 3:9). Continuing that thought, a little later he says again, “And regard the patience of our Lord as salvation…” (2 Pet. 3:15). Why does the Lord delay? Because we see again, just as we saw in Ezekiel 18:32, God finds no pleasure in the perishing of anyone. He is far from the caricature that many people create of him, the judge that has no tolerance or patience, practically begging to cast us into hell.
Don’t get me wrong, God will certainly destroy all that is evil. That’s why in talking about God’s patience, Peter can say in the same breath, “But by His word the present heavens and earth are being reserved for fire, kept for the day of judgement and destruction of ungodly men” (2 Pet. 3:7). God hates what is evil and he is a perfectly just God and judge. Yet, as we saw from Joel 2:13 and see throughout the Bible, God is also full of grace, compassion, love, and kindness. Therefore, he is, “Slow to anger” (Joel 2:13).
God takes no pleasure in the death of anyone and so he is relenting of calamity. His patience means my salvation, your salvation, and it means the salvation of all those that will call upon him in Jesus Christ. Here we are, today, two-thousand years since the death and resurrection of Jesus. Two-thousand years of patience. Two-thousand years worth of rescue, of awe-filled and surrendered praise of the saints.
I thank God for his patience with me. As he watched my lost, sinful and rebellious ways of my earlier years, he was patient; and he was merciful. It’s something I am far from deserving. None of us deserve it. Yet, his patience, mercy and grace are not a dream. They are as real as the day and full of glory. “For this reason it says, ‘Awake, sleeper, and arise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you” (Ephesians 5:14).
“What if God, although willing to demonstrate His wrath and to make His power known, endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction?
And He did so to make known the riches of His glory upon vessels of mercy, which He prepared beforehand for glory….” – Romans 9:22-23
-Pastor Ben