As I thought about what I might bring to you for the second hour, I kept coming back to what seems to be a favorite topic among all believers, patience. This is where you chuckle or nod your head in agreement. How many of you would say you're patient? Good, at least you're honest, right? After traveling, I think, what did it take us to get here? 22 hours? 21 hours of driving nonstop. I have to admit, I was a little short on patience by the time we got about three quarters of the way here, right? Just gonna be transparent and say that. So turn with me, if you will, to James chapter five. Read with me as I read only two verses, verses seven and eight. Here, James writes, therefore, be patient, brethren, until the coming of the Lord. The farmer waits for the precious produce of the soil, being patient about it until it gets the early and late rains. You too, be patient. Strengthen your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is near. First things first, notice that James begins here in verse seven with the word therefore. And as most of you already know, this word is most often used to denote a conclusion of what has been previously said, either in terms of the immediate or the broader context. In this case, the immediate context is in view. James wants his readers, many of whom had experienced more than their fair share of persecution, and mistreatment at the hands of the unscrupulous, he wants them to be patient. He's saying, look, I understand you've been through a lot. I understand that persecution is very real among you, and I'm calling you even now to be patient in the midst of it all. Now, I want to talk about this conceptually for just a few minutes. If there's One common denominator linking all kinds of people the world over, including most Christians, I think it can be summed up in a single word. I think it's fair to say that we are all, by nature, impatient. Now, I tend to be more impatient than others. And again, in the interest of complete transparency, I say that. I covet your prayers in regard to that. But I know some of you struggle with that as I do. We don't like to wait for anything. This has certainly always been a problem. But unfortunately, technology, as helpful as it is most of the time. Technology has actually done nothing but exacerbate the problem. In my own lifetime, I've seen some remarkable changes made by companies in the interest of providing instant gratification to consumers. I was alive when Jiffy Pop popcorn became a thing. How did we used to make popcorn? You'd have to heat up the oil on the stove, pour in the kernels, put the lid on, and you'd have to wait. And then they made Jiffy Pop popcorn. Now we have microwave popcorn that takes only a fraction of the time to cook as opposed to the old way of doing it. We have 10-minute oil changes, high-speed internet, Jimmy John's. is said to be freaky fast at getting our sandwiches to us lest we starve to death. Online shopping, DoorDash, same-day delivery, all these things have been created to cater to the universal problem of impatience. There was a survey done several years ago and they do this survey, I think, every year. But how many of you remember having internet that was dial-up? You dial the number and then you hear this weird alien type sound and then your AOL comes up on the screen and before long, you know, the screen begins to scroll. You click on a link and you wait for how long until that webpage shows up. I mean, it could be minutes. Do you know that today, technologists have determined that if it takes more than one second for a web page to pop up, people will click away from that. People are unwilling to wait a second for the page to pop up before they hit the back button or go to a different link in hopes that they'll get instant gratification. Something's wrong. Something's wrong with us. when we're so impatient that we can't wait for anything. You know, the younger generation coming up today are more impatient than anyone because they expect to leave mom and dad's home, get married. They expect to have immediately what it took mom and dad 20 years to provide them. They're just that impatient. That's why there's so much debt in this country right now, because young people get onto credit cards and they're charged exorbitant interest rates because they just have to have the things that they want immediately. Working for something, saving for something, those are relics of a bygone era. Today, impatience dominates. And it dominates all over. Now, it's a tall order to actually heed what Peter, or what James writes here. It's a tall order to consider that I might be in the wrong, and I need to learn to be more patient. And yet, this is exactly the kind of thing that James is calling us to understand here. The particular word that James uses is also really interesting. It's a compound word. It's the word macrothumos. And of course, as you can kind of hear, the word makros means distant or far off. We get our word macro for that. The word thumos refers to burning with intense anger. And so when we put the word together, we would call this having a long temper. or somebody that possesses the ability to endure a great deal of persecution, a great deal of frustration before losing his or her temper. We sometimes refer to this as having a long fuse. At this point, I would ask you to think, do you have a long fuse or are you short fused? If you have a short fuse, you need to begin asking the Lord now to increase the length of your fuse so that you're not as easily upset or put out by impatience. As one commentator noted, the picture that James paints for us here is of a bomb. with a very long fuse. In essence, James is encouraging his readers to patiently endure as opposed to immediately blowing up about everything. Now, why are we to be long-fused as opposed to short-fused? Well, because again, the longer our fuse, the more like God we become. Have you ever stopped to consider just how long God's fuse is? Note carefully how many times it's said to be the case among God's perfections. In Exodus 34, six, the Lord tells Moses that he's compassionate and gracious, slow to anger. which in the Greek translation of the Hebrew text, the Septuagint, this word makrothumos is used there as well. In Numbers 14, 18, Moses repeats this back to the Lord. In his prayer, he says, the Lord is slow to anger, same word, and abundant in loving kindness. Psalm 86, 15, the psalmist prays similarly, saying, but you, O Lord, are a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger. abundant in loving-kindness and truth. Again in Psalm 103 8 we read, the Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in loving-kindness. Based on God's possession of this particular perfection. In several of his Proverbs, Solomon actually explains the benefit of our being imitators of the Lord. In Proverbs 14, 29, he says, he who is slow to anger has great understanding, but he who is quick-tempered exalts folly. In Proverbs 15, 18, a hot-tempered man stirs up strife, but the slow to anger calms a dispute. Proverbs 16, 32, Solomon says, he who is slow to anger is better than the mighty, and he who rules his spirit than he who captures a city. So we're to be patient. How often are we to be patient? All the time. How long must we endure? How long do we need to be patient? Well, I hate to break it to you, you need to be patient until the coming of the Lord. Just as the farmer waits for the precious produce of the soil, James says, being patient about it until it gets early in late rains. We're to patiently endure all things until the Lord himself returns. How do we achieve this level of patience that James speaks of here? Well, here's the fascinating part in all of this. We will enjoy this patience only to the extent that we strengthen our hearts, or better, we allow the work of the Holy Spirit to strengthen our hearts. Now, what does that mean exactly? Well, there are a few things I want to point out here. First of all, this is a command, which means that patience is not an option for the believer. Not only that, but it's in the aorist tense and the active voice, which means that this is something that needs to be done now. Don't just think about how you would love to be more patient one day. Don't just think that, well, tomorrow I'll turn over a new leaf and I'll be a little more patient tomorrow than I am today. No, the command is structured here in very precise language, which means if you're not patient now, you had better be. Do this now and continue doing it. Make this your settled habit. Whenever you encounter those moments where you're not as patient as you need to be, immediately correct yourself. and begin to be patient at that very moment. James is not suggesting, of course, that we can strengthen our hearts by going to some kind of self-help seminar. You're not gonna get this kind of strengthening of your heart by any book that's written on the subject. Again, this is only possible as we yield to the Holy Spirit who resides in us. It's another thing that's worthy of thought. How many times are you guilty in the average day of quenching the Holy Spirit? How many times do we choose to go our own way, and hopefully the Lord chastises us, you know, whom the Lord loves, he chastens, but we still insist many times on going our own way. My wife is a partner to the Holy Spirit all along our trip, at least the last half of the trip. Tim, you need to be more patient. And I'm so grateful for that because immediately it causes me to think, she's right. I need to be more patient. And then, you know, I'm patient for the next 30 miles, right? Until something else happens to display my impatience. But there she is, Tim, you need to be more patient. And so I'm a work in progress, like many of you are, but the Holy Spirit residing in us is the only one who can actually make the change necessary to cause us to be more patient. So why are we being commanded to comply here if it's the Holy Spirit who's doing all the work? Well, notice I didn't say the Holy Spirit's doing all the work. As believers, when we're compelled to obey by the Holy Spirit, we should respond appropriately. And again, that goes back to quenching the Holy Spirit. How many times do you feel that leading of the Lord, that prodding of the Lord to be better in whatever area, and you just rebuff that counsel? Again, in your anger, in your frustration, in your impatience, you say, well, okay, I'll work on that later, but right now I deserve, I have the right to be angry. I have the right to be impatient. That's never the case. It's never the case. When we're commanded to do something, whether we feel like obeying or not, we're duty bound to obey. Why? Because he's worthy. He's worthy to be obeyed. This is where Our part in it all comes into sharper focus. James is calling us to be obedient to the leading and the convicting of the Holy Spirit who's at work in us. And how does that work exactly? Well, that brings me to my second point, which is that we need to understand precisely what's meant by the word strengthen here. Normally, when we think about strengthening something, the emphasis is on taking something that's weak and making it strong, right? We take something that's weak, and we do whatever's necessary to make that weak thing strong. Some of you might be thinking, well, that's actually what the word strengthen means. But hear me out on this, because it's really important. Scripturally speaking, the preferred way of becoming strong is to become weak. You get that? I talked this morning about, or earlier this afternoon, about the importance of making much of Christ and making much less about ourselves. This goes to that very point. The only way we can truly be strengthened is to recognize how weak we really are. Remember what Paul said to the Corinthians in 2 Corinthians 12, 9 and 10. This, of course, was regarding his thorn in the flesh. Here Paul says, the Lord has said to me, my grace is sufficient for you for power is perfected in weakness. Most gladly therefore, Paul says, I will rather boast about my weaknesses with insults, with distresses, with persecutions, with difficulties for Christ's sake, for when I am weak, then I am strong. This just overturns everything the world tries to teach us about the importance of being strong, about being those who overcome our problems by sheer determination and will. No, the way we overcome every problem we have is to become humbled by the things that we face. to recognize our own weakness, to recognize that through our weakness, God is most able to display His strength and power. We don't like thinking in those terms because, you know, we're taught, especially in this country, to be rugged individualists. We're taught that if we're gonna be something, we're gonna make something of ourselves. The scriptures speak just the opposite of that. We are who we are by the grace of God. And if we're to become anything that we're not already, it will only be as God works His power through us and in us. What Paul says here seems to be oxymoronic, but that's only because we've adopted the world's definition of strength. as opposed to the Lord's definition. And because of that, we've come to believe that physical and spiritual strength are the same. They're not. They're just not. Maximum spiritual strength, which is what James is talking about here, can only be achieved when we empty ourselves of ourselves and submit to the Lord's power to transform us from the inside out. Turn to Ephesians chapter 3. Again, I'll wait. Ephesians chapter 3. Here in this chapter you'll recall that Paul has just explained how he was called to minister the gospel to the Gentiles. And in verses 11 to 13 he says this, He says, this was in accordance with the eternal purpose which He, God the Father, carried out in Christ Jesus our Lord, in whom we have boldness and confident access through faith in Him. Therefore, I ask you not to lose heart at my tribulations on your behalf, for they are your glory. And note, again, how he prays for them in verses 14 to 19. He says, for this reason, Recognizing this in all of us, I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name, that he would grant you according to the riches of his glory to be strengthened with power through his Spirit. in the inner man, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, and that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ, which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled up to all the fullness of God. As believers, having our hearts strengthened requires us to be less full of ourselves and more filled with Christ. And only when Christ strengthens us in this way will we ever be truly strong in heart. Only then will we be able to say with Paul, as he said in Philippians 4.13, I can do all things through him who strengthens me. I've had to remind some of our youth. I was asked about this in one of our Ask the Pastor sessions that I have with the young people in our church. They said, when Paul says this, does this mean we become superhuman? When Paul says, I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me, does this mean that I can stop a bullet? Does that mean that I can stop a speeding locomotive? No, that's not what that means. He's not saying that in Christ we become superhuman. He's simply saying that when we empty ourselves and when we humbly submit to Christ, his power will enable us to endure with patience whatever the world cares to hurl in our direction. Do you realize if you're patient about everything because you have a strengthened heart, you're impervious to anything that might come your way? Some of us need to remember that when we're in traffic, right? I never forget what my son-in-law, Chad, once told me. I think I was late somewhere, and I told Chad, I said, sorry I'm late, but I got stuck in traffic. He said, Dad, don't forget, you don't get stuck in traffic, you are traffic. Right? So you're part of the problem if you're stuck in traffic. So just sit there and endure with patience whatever's happening at the moment. And oh, by the way, don't neglect to reflect on the providence of God. It may be that you're stuck there for whatever time you're stuck there because if you were to speed along, something might happen to you. Remember, every moment of every day of your life is by divine appointment. You're never gonna be anywhere where the Lord doesn't want you. Now, with the exception of sin. But God's providence is such that he directs everything. If God ordains sovereignly whatsoever shall come to pass, that includes the traffic jam that you're in. For his glory, and ultimately for your good. What if you're being stuck in traffic, or as Chad says, what if you being traffic is God's way of teaching you patience? What should our reaction to that be? Thank you, Lord. Now, I don't recommend that we pray for patience. Anybody ever pray for patience? You pray for patience, God's gonna put you in situations that you probably weren't bargaining for. But nevertheless, when you are forced to be patient in those situations, you should thank the Lord for that opportunity. Now, my third point is this. Since becoming more patient involves the strengthening of our hearts, any and every attempt that we make at becoming more patient must also be accompanied by a settled determination to love. To love whom? Everybody. To love those whom we are commanded to love. And at this point you might be thinking, well, you know, there's an old song back in the eighties or nineties, what's love got to do with it, right? We don't really associate patience with love that often, do we? I mean, again, you might be sitting there thinking, well, what? I'm failing to make the connection between patience and love. And get this, I don't know if you noticed this, we just read several passages where the two are intimately connected. Let me read them again and listen to them from this perspective. Exodus 34, six. The Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in loving kindness. Numbers 14, 18, the Lord is slow to anger and abundant in loving kindness. Psalm 86, 15, the Lord is merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abundant in loving kindness and truth. Psalm 103, eight, the Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in loving kindness. And this is not just something that happens in the Old Testament. It's not just that among God's perfections is this joining of patience or long-suffering and loving-kindness. Paul also makes the same connection. Where? 1 Corinthians 13, known as the love chapter. The Apostle Paul notes in verse four that among love's most important defining characteristics. What does he say? What's the first characteristic of love that he lists there? Love is patient. And at that point, I did a series on this years ago, and when I started studying for it, I knew I was in for the ride of my life because the first thing that Paul lists here, he says love is patient. I actually prefer the New King James translation here which says, love suffers the law. Why do I prefer that definition? I prefer that because it describes just how the Lord deals with us every day of our lives. Think about it. And I really want you to think about this. How many times during the average day Do you give God more than enough reason to remove you from the realm of the living? How many times have you failed God? Let's put it that way. Giving Him every reason in the world to take you out of the world. We do it all the time. We do it all the time. But why doesn't He take us out? Because He's long-suffering. because he's patient. One of the perfections of God that you and I should be most grateful for is his patience, his loving kindness. And it's the same kind of long-suffering and patience that should characterize our love for others. As one commentator noted, he said, the world is full of evil men and even in our brethren much evil meets us. When this evil strikes us and our natural reaction would be resentment, indignation, anger, bitter words, blows perhaps, then love steps in. It suffers long, keeps calm, endures, and it does this continually no matter how long the offense may persist. How you doing? Do people give you reason for resentment, indignation, anger, bitter words? You ever just want to throat punch somebody? Because they annoy you that much. Let me just, once again, challenge you to pray every day, Lord, when these situations arise, and they will, inject your love. Give me your love. The same love that you routinely demonstrate for me, even when I disappoint you, give me that same love for everyone around me. You'd be amazed at how transformative that will really be. Because you have it. If you're a child of God, you have the indwelling Holy Spirit who will compel you and enable you to react this way. Do it. Make it a settled determination, even now, the next time someone annoys me or causes me to be impatient, I'm going to instead exercise love. Some of you are probably thinking, well, I can't do that. It's just not my nature. I'm just not that kind of person. You need to become that kind of person. Why? Because again, you're commanded to be patient. As I thought about this, I thought of Peter in Matthew 18. Matthew 18.21, you'll recall that Matthew 18.15 and following is, of course, that blueprint for church discipline, right? But Peter, being Peter, thought that he would once again impress the Lord, right? In verse 21, he says, Lord, if my brother sins against me, how many times do I forgive him? Peter obviously considered himself to be suggesting something truly commendable when he said, is seven times sufficient? And what was Jesus' response? He said, I do not say to you up to seven times, but up to 70 times seven. Now I have no doubt Peter probably thought, okay, so 490 times, that's not what the Lord means. 70 times seven means you are to forgive each and every time, even if the person keeps doing it. Now certainly, if it's brother to brother, brother and sister, sister to sister, again, the remedy's back in Matthew 18, 15 and following for how we're to address those things. But every time someone sins against you, you're to be quick to forgive each and every time. Sadly, we don't do that. And again, I would have you just ask the question, how many times, when wronged only once, And if we're being honest, it's usually in some meaningless or superficial way, right? But even in the times where we're wronged only once, how often are we willing to ostracize or alienate those who have offended us? True love never does this. And that's the connection between patience and love. True love doesn't do this. The love that we've been commanded to show one another, even to our enemies, The love that's been shed abroad in our hearts never does this. True love, Paul says, continues to suffer and endure. True love is that which submits to Christ, is humbled by the Holy Spirit as he works in us, and gives us the patience that so often eludes us. In short, the solution to being more patient can be boiled down to three important components. Three things. Number one, get over yourself. I mean, face it. We don't like it when people insult us. We don't like it when people mistreat us because at that point we end up getting in a terminal case of the woe is me's and it's all about us again. Get over it. If they're doing things that are unsettling to you, first of all, don't be a knucklehead. Don't bring it on yourself. But if people are being unkind to you simply because of your witness for Christ, this is nothing that we shouldn't expect. Didn't Peter say that? Don't consider it a strange thing when you're undergoing this fiery ordeal. You know this is gonna happen. Christ said this would happen. Endure it with joy. Endure it with patience. So that's the first thing. Get over yourself. Two, humbly submit to the Holy Spirit's leading. Get over yourself and immediately ask the Holy Spirit to give you that patience and love that you know you need to get through every day. Number three, simply resolve to love others. Not only as you've been commanded to love them, but love others as you've been loved by Christ. Again, I know it's a tall order, but with the Holy Spirit's assistance, His enabling, His compulsion, we're able to do these things. Well, finally, we come to the primary reason that James gives us for striving for more patience. He says, be patient. He says, strengthen your hearts, which is, again, another way of saying, be patient and demonstrate love for one another. Why? For the coming of the Lord is near. And I know that that's one of the things that those who are against the gospel, they love to say, yeah, you say the coming of the Lord is near, but it's been, you know, nearly 2000 years and he hasn't returned yet. And that's true. But that really has nothing to do with it, does it? We're taught to expect Christ's return at any moment. And I don't care how that squares with your eschatology. Guess what? Whatever eschatological position you hold, and there's probably two or three in this room right now, one of us is going to be wrong. Chances are we're all going to be wrong because we're going to get different parts of it wrong. We should anticipate the Lord's coming at any moment, at any moment. Now, with that in mind, what does James mean when he's writing in the first century? He says, the coming of the Lord is near. Well, near is a relative term, is it not? I mean, there are people all the time who ask me, where are you from? I'm from New Braunfels, Texas. Small, well, used to be a small German community outside of a major metropolitan area. A lot of times when people ask us, not knowing where New Braunfels is, we'll just say, I'm from San Antonio. Right? And people are like, oh, that's near Austin, isn't it? Not really, but I suppose, relatively speaking, Austin is nearer to San Antonio than New York City. Right? So it's relative. Mercury is our nearest planet. Right? Is it really near? No. No. But it's much nearer than Pluto. And yes, Pluto's a planet. I don't know who decided that Pluto couldn't be a planet anymore. I feel sorry for Pluto. Pluto's a planet, but it's far away. But even Pluto's near when we consider the galaxies that are beyond. So again, near is a relative term. And this is exactly what James and everyone else who speaks about the nearness of Christ's return, that's what they mean. I'll say this, you and I are nearer the return of Christ today than we were yesterday. Right? Even if we don't live to see the physical bodily return of Christ, chances are we're gonna meet Him much sooner today than yesterday. Since we don't have any idea when it's actually gonna happen, again, the scriptures say we need to be on the alert, ready and waiting for His arrival. Jesus said this to his disciples in Luke 12, 35 through 40. He said, be dressed in readiness and keep your lamps lit. Be like men who are waiting for their master when he returns from the wedding feast so that they may immediately open the door to him when he comes and knocks. Blessed are those slaves whom the master will find on the alert when he comes. Truly I say to you that he will gird himself to serve and have them reclined at the table and will come up and wait on them whether he comes in the second watch or even in the third and finds them so. Blessed are those slaves. But be sure of this, that if the head of the house had known at what hour the thief was coming, he would not have allowed his house to be broken into. You too be ready, for the son of man is coming at an hour that you do not expect." I prefer to live as Spurgeon described it. Spurgeon said, soon you will hear the silver trumpets which announce the coming of your king. Be not in the least afraid. Hold the fort, for he is coming. Yea, he may appear this very day. I'll never forget our son, Chris. We were in Germany at the time, and we're carrying groceries into the house. And that was back during our dispensational days. We were all ready for the rapture, right? But Dan is carrying an arm load of groceries in the house, and Chris just stops right in his tracks. What did he say, Danny? Mom, it's Jesus. You don't say that to a dispensationalist, by the way, right? I think Dan had dropped the groceries and immediately was just ready to go. Ready to go. I don't remember what the situation was. I think it was a cloud that looked like Jesus to him or something like that. But we should all be as childlike in our faith. We should all anticipate with reckless abandon the coming of our Lord. But here's the thing, while we wait, we need to be patient and we need to be loving. Why? Because again, those are two of the perfections of God that we should emulate. in the here and now. If you want to be a good representative for Christ in the here and now, start with patience and loving kindness. You can't go wrong. You can't go wrong. And my prayer is that each of us will not only look forward with great anticipation to the return of our Lord, but again, while we wait, might we all grow in patience. Lord knows we need it. And might we certainly all grow relative to our love one for another. Let's go ahead and close in a word of prayer. Father, once again, we appeal to you as a needy people, as those who recognize that we do not exhibit this kind of patience nor this kind of love. And so, Father, I pray that you might instill in each one of us here today a renewed sense of what it means to reflect these, your perfections, before a lost and dying world. Lord, make us more patient. Give us the love for one another, even for those outside the household of faith that is commendable in your sight. Help us to live every day of our lives reflecting your glory. your long-suffering, your love. Father, might we recognize that we're all deficient in these areas. And again, might you graciously grow us accordingly. We pray these things in Christ's name. Amen.