FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT
PATIENCE
DR. JIM DIXON
MAY 18, 1986
JAMES 5:7-11
He prided himself on his punctuality. His alarm went off every morning at 6:30 AM, exactly at 6:30 AM and he’d jump out of bed, he would take a shower, and then he’d shave. Then he’d clothe himself and he’d go downstairs and eat his breakfast. Then he’d come back upstairs, and he’d brush his teeth, he’d grab his briefcase, he’d go down to the garage and get into the car, and he’d drive to the ferry landing where he would park his car, board the ferry, cross the water to the business district, and he’d walk three blocks to the building where he worked, get on the elevator and take the elevator to the 17th floor. He’d entered his office and then he’d open his briefcase and spread the papers on the desk, and he’d sit down in his chair at exactly 8:00 AM—not 8:01, not even 7:59, but exactly at 8:00 AM. It had been this way for eight years, but then one morning his alarm clock failed to work, and he woke up at 6 45. He was panicked. He jumped out of bed, and he took a hurried shower. He cut himself shaving, he threw on his clothes, went downstairs, ate half a bowl of cereal, came upstairs and partly brushed his teeth, grabbed his briefcase, rushed down to the garage, got in the car, and raced down to the ferry landing where he parked his car, jumped out of the car and he looked down. He saw the ferry just out into the water a few feet from the dock. He said to himself, I can still make it if I run, so he raced down to the pier, and as he approached the end of the dock, he ran still faster, and when he was at the edge of the pier, he jumped and he flew through the air over the water, and incredibly, he landed on the deck of the ferry.
The captain came over and asked him if he was all right and helped him up and said, “Man, that was an incredible jump, but you know, if you’d waited just a few more seconds, why we’d had come to the dock there and you could have walked right on board.” Now, that’s certainly a dumb story, but it does illustrate that when people are in a hurry, they make a lot of mistakes, and we are in a nation that is in a hurry. We are a people that are in a hurry, and that is why we have fast food restaurants. That is why we have Federal Express. That is why we have freeways. That’s why we have express lines at grocery stores, and that is why we have instant tellers. That is why we have supersonic jets. That is why we have TV dinners, and that is why we have microwave ovens. The list just goes on and on because we’re a nation in a hurry. Europeans don’t understand us. The South Americans certainly don’t understand it. We just don’t like to wait, and patience is a very rare commodity in this land. But the Bible tells us that God wants Christians at all times and in all places to learn patience and to wait faithfully. And the Bible speaks of two types of patience. These comprise our two teachings this morning.
First of all, the Bible speaks of patience towards God. God wants us to be patient with him, to trust his timing, to trust his will, to wait for his blessings. This quality was exemplified by the Old Testament saints. Noah waited 120 years for the promised reign. Moses waited 40 years wandering in the wilderness before he was able to view the promised land from afar. Abraham left the Ur of the Chaldees with his father, Tera, and they came to Canaan, and it was there that God gave Abraham a new name—changed his name from Abram to Abraham, which means “the father of multitudes” or “the father of nations.” God gave Abraham this new name in accordance with God’s promise that Abraham’s descendants would be as many as the stars of the heavens and the grains of sand by the seashore. This new name and this new promise seemed kind of ironic to Abraham and Sarah since they were childless. As the years passed, many, many years, they remained childless, but they were patient, and finally, when they were very, very old, God gave them a son whose name was Isaac, and all the Jews on the face of the earth today are descended from Abraham through the seed of Isaac. The Bible says that Abraham because he “patiently endured,” obtained the promises,
God wants each one of you to learn patient endurance. He wants me to learn that—to understand that sometimes his blessings are delayed. In a little book called “Expectation Corner,” the story is told of a person named Adam Slowman. In this book, he was taken to heaven where he was given a glimpse of everything that was there, and as Adam looked around, he saw incredible things, wonderful things, and he was taken into the mansion of God, and there in the mansion of God, there was a very large room, and the door to that room had this inscription, “Delayed Blessings Department.” When Adam opened the door, he was amazed to see gifts everywhere, incredible gifts all stacked up on shelves, each gift placed there in response to a person’s prayer on the earth, each gift with that person’s name on it, and each gift with a date. And some of the dates were years and years away, God would give that gift in accordance with his omniscience and in accordance with his perfect timing when things would be just right, “Delayed Blessings.” You see, patience is really based on faith if you really believe that God is going to provide.
When I was 20 years old, I wanted one thing more than anything else. I wanted a wife. I wanted to be married. Now I wasn’t ready to be married, but I wanted to be, and I had seven friends that were very close to me, and we kind of hung around together in college and we competed in sports together, and six of those seven were already married by my junior year. I wanted to be married. and as the next two years passed, I did everything I could to fall in love, but it just didn’t seem to work out. At the conclusion of my college experience, I remember I was walking along the beach in Santa Barbara, and this is a very vivid memory for me, was a moment when I came to a deeper relinquishment to Jesus Christ. As I walked along the beach and I was all by myself, I said, “Lord, I give up. I’ll remain single the rest of my life if that’s what you want from me. I don’t want to be single, but I’m willing.” I said, “Lord, I’ll do what you want me to do. I’ll go where you want me to go. My life is in your hands.” I went to seminary, to theological school, and it was three years later that I met Barbara. Barbara was God’s perfect gift to me, and I was God’s flawed gift to Barbara. You know, I started praying for a wife, asking God for his choice when I was very, very young. It was the same way with Barb. She started praying when she was very, very young, and I honestly believe that our marriage is an answer to prayer, and it’s an answer to patient endurance. It’s a “delayed blessing” that God gave us.
God wants to provide every need in your life. He knows you better than you know yourself. He knows everything that you truly need in this world, materially, spiritually, emotionally, and relationally. He knows it all and he loves you. If you belong to Jesus Christ, then you are a child of God and you are his very own, and he’s committed to taking care of you, and he asks you to be patient with him and to trust his timing.
You know, George Mueller was one of the greatest preachers, one of the greatest Christian leaders in the world at the turn of the century, and he lived in Bristol, England, and he was famous for his prayer and for his prayer life. And he was called the ‘Prince of intercession.’ He had more than 10,000 prayers documented as specifically answered in his life, miraculously answered. And people ask George Mueller, “What is the key to your prayer life—to the power of your prayer?” George Mueller said, “The key is patience to be patient with God in prayer, to wait for his promises, to wait for his blessings, and to persevere in prayer daily.” When George Mueller accepted Christ, he began to pray for five of his friends. None of them knew Christ, and he began to pray that they would come to know Christ as Lord and Savior. George Mueller, by his own testimony, stated that he prayed for those five people every day. He did not miss a single day of prayer for them, and his first friend became a Christian. five years later. His second friend became a Christian.ten years later. His third friend became a Christian. eleven years later. His fourth friend became a Christian. 25 years later. His fifth friend never became a Christian. Why George Mueller lived. George Mueller prayed for him all the days of his life, and his fifth friend accepted Christ three months after George Mueller died. But George Mueller had prayed for him every day for 52 years. You see, he was patient towards God, and he was willing to wait for the blessings of God and for the timing of God.
Of course, patience towards God is not merely waiting for God’s blessings, but it’s also waiting for his deliverance because sometimes it’s not really a gift that we’re wanting. We just want to escape because we’re in situations of suffering or test or trial, persecution, situations of stress, and we want God to deliver us, and that requires patience too. In fact, the Greek word for patience is the word ‘makrothumia,’ which literally means’ long-suffering.’ God wants a special group of people, people who have such faith that they’re willing to suffer long believing that he will deliver them.
Many of you, I’m sure, are going through situations now where you’re required to suffer some. When we think of Job, we think of his patience in the midst of suffering. I don’t think many people have lived and suffered as much as Job did. Job lost all of his sheep, 7,000 of them, and he lost all of his camels, 3000 of them, and he lost all of his oxen, 500 of them, and he lost all of his donkeys, 500 of them. He lost all of his servants, and he lost all of his children, seven sons and three daughters, and he lost his health. His body was inflicted with some kind of strange and mysterious disease, and his body was riddled with boils, but Job trusted God, and he was patient. In the midst of it all, he said, “The Lord giveth, the Lord. taketh away. Blessed be the name of the Lord.” He said, “Though he slay me, yet shall I trust in Him,” and he said, “I know that my redeemer liveth.” That’s the kind of people that God is looking for today— “clay in the hands of the potter”—relinquished. Patient and trusting God in every circumstance of life.
Seven years ago, a woman who was a member of Faith Presbyterian Church in Aurora was dying of cancer. She was a Christian woman. She loved Jesus Christ with all of her heart, a wonderful woman, and, she’d had cancer for two years. The cancer had spread throughout her whole body. She was in the hospital. In the last three months, things have been very painful for her. In fact, she went through more pain than most people will ever have to experience. Her family and her friends, and her loved ones had begun to pray that, that she would pass away and leave this world and go into the presence of the Lord so that she could be delivered from her body of death. Her pain was so great. and I went to visit her many times, and in those final few weeks, she lapsed in and out of a coma. Sometimes she was alert, sometimes she was not. I went to see her one time very near to the time she died, and she was very conscious and alert on this occasion. I asked her if she was ready to see the Lord, and she smiled and she said, Jim, I’m, ready to go,” but you know, she said, “I’m willing to stay.” She said, “I’m in the hands of God for the purposes of God.” It occurs to me that that’s the very essence of patience. Patience towards God is simply the contentment that comes when you’re willing to say, “I’m in the hands of God for the purposes of God.”
Now, there’s a second kind of patience spoken of in the Bible. It’s not patience toward God, but it’s patience toward people. God wants us all to learn patience towards each other. In the Jewish Talmud, a collection of writings, which in modern-day Judaism and throughout the history of Judaism ranked second only to the Bible in its authority. In the Talmud, there’s a story, probably apocryphal, of, something which occurred in the life of Abraham. We’re told that one late afternoon, as Abraham came out of, came out of his tent, he was visited by a stranger, an old man. Abraham had never seen him before, but Abraham showed him hospitality and offered him good food to eat and offered him something to drink, and invited him to come into his tent and spend the night, and have a place to stay.
This older man came into the tent, and Abraham and the man began to converse. Before they ate, Abraham said, “Let’s pray to Yahweh. Elohim, the one true God.” This older man refused. He was a polytheist, and he was particularly partial to what he called the God of fire. The more Abraham thought about this, the more it angered him that he had such a man, a heathen in his tent, so Abraham kicked him out and he withdrew his hospitality. A little bit later, the angel of the Lord came and appeared in Abraham’s tent. He said, “Thus sayeth the Lord. I had borne with that man for more than 70 years, that he might one day come to love me. Could you not have patiently endured him for one night that he might see My love through you?” You see, there’s really no ministry without patience. There are no meaningful relationships without patience. There are no deep and lasting relationships without patience. God wants us to be patient with our husbands and with our wives, with our children, with our friends, with our neighbors, with our business associates, and God sees something great waiting to be revealed in each person through the patient power of Jesus Christ.
In 1894, a man named Jake Hoover was prospecting in the Yogo Creek in Montana. He was prospecting for gold. The Yogo Creek area is very near a little cow town called Utica, 40 miles southwest of the town of Lewistown. Jake Hoover was looking for gold, but he saw a small little blue pebble. He didn’t know what it was, and he put it in a cigar box. In the days, weeks, and months that followed, whenever he found another little blue pebble, he would pick it up and put it in that cigar box. When the box was full, Jake Hoover sent it to the East Coast to have it examined by specialists in gems and precious stones. Eventually that box and those blue stones came to Tiffany & Co. in New York City. Tiffany & Co. never returned the box of stones to Jake Hoover, but they did send him a check for $3,750, which was a lot of money in 1894. And they also sent him a note informing him that he had discovered blue gold, better known as sapphires, and they were sapphires of extremely good quality. Now, they had discovered sapphires in Montana before. They’d found yellow sapphires and pink sapphires, and green sapphires, but there was no world market for those sapphires. The world market was for blue sapphires, and particularly the deep blue sapphires as found at Yogo Creek by Jake Hoover.
So, Jake Hoover bought that land, and he opened the Yogo Mine, and he ran along a geological, six feet wide and five miles long. And Jake Hoover began to mine for sapphires, and he did that until 1897, for three years, but he found that mining for sapphires was hard work. He decided he wasn’t cut out for it. He said, “I just don’t have the patience.” He also said he wasn’t sure it was ever really going to mount anything. So, he sold a Yogo mine for $5,000. In 1897. Three months later, the Yogo Mine sold for $100,000 to a British conglomerate—that was a little bit later in the year 1897—and these British people began to market the Yogo sapphires all over the world. Yogo sapphires became part of the collections of Princess Mary and Queen Victoria and the Duchess of York and Germany’s Kaiser Wilhelm. Through the years, Yogo sapphires have continued to be mined, but it wasn’t until just recently that geologists and experts have begun to comprehend the incredible worth of the Yogo Mine. In 1982, they prove that the geological rich in sapphires runs 500 feet deep and contains 40 million carats of precious gyms worth more than $1 billion. And even more incredibly, there is strong geological evidence that that is not only 500 feet deep, but perhaps as deep as 7,000 feet, more than a mile deep, and it is now believed that there are perhaps more sapphires in the Yogo mine in Montana than in all the sapphire minds of the world put together. When people think of sapphires, they think of Burma and Thailand. They think of Sri Lanka. They think of India and Kashmir. Perhaps they even think of Australia, but maybe in the future, they’ll think of Montana and the Yogo Mine. But you see, Jake Hoover gave it all up in 1894 because he just didn’t have the patience. $5,000, he gave up more than a billion dollars worth of treasure.
God wants you to know your wife is a treasure. God wants you to know your husband is a treasure. Your children are treasures in God’s sight, waiting to be released through the patient power of the love of Christ. God wants us to view all people in this way, that through the patience of love, they might be transformed into all that God meant for them to be.
Abraham Lincoln and with this we’ll close had many political adversaries. Perhaps when you think of Lincoln’s greatest political adversary, you think of Stephen Douglas and the Lincoln-Douglas debates. Many historians believe that Abraham Lincoln’s greatest political adversary was a man named Edwin McMaster Stanton. Stanton was the Attorney General of the United States, and he came to be the United States Secretary of War. Before he died, he was appointed to the United States Supreme Court. For all the years, Stanton was critical of Lincoln. He criticized Lincoln’s foreign policy. He criticized domestic policy. He didn’t believe in Lincoln’s philosophy, and he thought Lincoln was ugly. He was quoted in the newspapers as calling Lincoln an idiot, He called Lincoln a clown, and he called Lincoln a gorilla throughout the nation’s press. When a zoological team went to Africa to capture a gorilla, Edwin McMaster Stanton was quoted in all the newspapers as saying, “They really didn’t need to go any further than Springfield, Illinois, where they could capture the original Abraham Lincoln.” But you know, through all the years, Lincoln never retaliated. He never stooped to name-calling. He was very, very patient with Stanton. In fact, he showed Stanton respect through all the years and even showed Stanton the love of God. When Edwin Stanton became the United States Secretary of War, it was actually Abraham Lincoln who appointed him to that office in 1862.
The incredible thing was, even after Stanton joined Lincoln’s administration, he continued to criticize Lincoln in all the newspapers, but Lincoln was patient and he was tolerant, and he forbore him, and he showed him love and respect, and finally, on April 14th, 1865, when Abraham Lincoln was assassinated by John Wilkes Booth in the Ford Theater, and his body was taken to a nearby adjoining room, and the people were gathered around, Edwin McMaster Stanton was there, and in front of everybody, including all the press, Edwin Stanton wept. He just cried openly. And everyone heard him say, “Here lies the greatest leader of men this world has ever known.” In the final analysis, Edwin McMaster Stanton was won over by the patient love of God revealed through Abraham Lincoln. In the remaining years of Stanton’s life with all the energy that was in him, he served the policies and philosophies that he had seen in Abraham Lincoln.
The Bible says, do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good. The Bible says, “Love is patient.” The Bible says, “Forebear one another in love.” The patient love of Christ is powerful, and it literally unleashes the treasure that is within people around you. This is the will of God for you, that you be patient with the Lord waiting for his blessings and for his deliverance because you believe in Him, and you know that he is your provider. And this is also his will, that you be patient with each other, knowing that by the power of God, there is something beautiful by the power of Christ waiting to be released, knowing also that we are all flawed. We’re all in need of mercy, and we’re all called to show mercy. Let’s close with the word of prayer.