The Lutheran Hour
-
"Pictures of Patience"
- Download MP3 No bonus material MP3
-
Text: James 5:7-8
-
Lucy’s favorite game was hide-and-go-seek. Although, she was lousy at it. Repeatedly, she would ask her father, “Daddy, can we play hide-and-go seek again?”
“Sure,” he would say.
“Okay, I’ll hide first, and you try to find me.” Then she would go and hide—poorly—the moment her father finished counting, she would burst out of her hiding spot and say, “Here I am!” She wanted so badly to be found, that she couldn’t stay hidden for long.i Her father would tell her that she could learn to be more patient.
Patience.
Patience can be practiced, tested, and rewarded. It can be stretched, strained, worn thin, and lost. I don’t know about you, but when I lose my patience, I’m not a fun person to be around. I get cranky, irritated, angry, and worst of all, whiny. And when I get in this state, I’m grateful for the people around me who put up with me, patiently. It is only by patience that we can even begin to tolerate each other, perhaps even to like each other. You might get same-day delivery for everything else, but you still have to be patient with your fellow humans.
Even the simple act of holding a conversation with someone requires patience. You gotta wait! Wait for them to make up their mind. Wait for them to find the right word, wait for them to get to the point, which, you’ve so kindly been doing for me, to get to the point.
But I appeal to your patience. Rather than coming right to the point, I’d like to ask a question and talk through some possible answers with you. The question is, “What do you do about it, when you lose your patience?”
Notice it’s not if but when. When was the last time you lost yours? How long did it take? An hour in traffic? Ten minutes in the grocery store checkout line? Thirty seconds for buffering internet? When you lose your patience, what do you do about it? The answer our culture seems to give is, “eliminate waiting.” If you don’t have to wait, there’s nothing to lose. If everything actually does come same-day delivery with a swipe and a double tap, then there will be nothing to be patient about, problem solved. Just eliminate waiting.
Our culture can’t stand to wait. We have no place for waiting. Even when we go into a place called, “the waiting room,” it’s filled with so many distractions— tabloids, not to mention our smart phones, we do everything we can to forget that we’re waiting.
And yet, we haven’t managed to save ourselves from waiting. We’ve just made ourselves more impatient. And sometimes we look like that guy in a rush at the elevator, who jabs and smacks the buttons repeatedly because he thinks it will make the machine go faster. But it doesn’t help. Elevators cycle through at roughly the same rate they did 40 years ago. But in the meantime, we’ve become a culture of stressed-out, button-smackers.ii And so, seeing that we’ve lost our patience, what do we do about it?
When I try to answer this question, I do it as a follower of Jesus, as a Christian. I look to the Bible, which tells me that wisdom makes a person patient (Proverbs 19:11); that patience is better than pride (Ecclesiastes 7:8), that patience is a fruit of the Spirit of God who dwells within us (Galatians 5:22). You may not feel the same way I do about the Bible, but still, I think we can agree that, when we lose our patience, it’s something worth trying to find again, because you know what it feels like to lose your patience with someone you care about, the regret you feel. I know what it feels like. I’ve said and done things I wish I could take back. And if I only had a little more patience, I wouldn’t have so many regrets. And I would have played more hide-and-go-seek with my kids when they were young, even though they sometimes tested my patience.
Plus, you and I both know how we’ve benefited from the patience of others— parents, our siblings, friends, a piano teacher, a basketball coach, a mentor at work. They all put up with us. It was their patience that made it possible.
For the Christian, that’s what we’re called to do when we’ve lost our patience. We’re called to return to the patience we were shown, but more about that in a moment. Before we get there, let’s talk through another possible answer to our question, what do you do about it, when you lose your patience? One answer said, “eliminate waiting,” but another says, “eliminate your expectations.”
An ancient Chinese philosopher explained it this way: Imagine you’re in a boat on a river covered in fog and mist. “If another boat knocks against yours, you might yell at the other fellow to stay clear. But if you notice, then, it’s an empty boat, adrift, with nobody aboard, you stop yelling. When you discover that all others are drifting boats, there’s no one [left] to yell at. When you find out that you also are an empty boat, there’s no one [left] to yell.”iii
In other words, the problem of impatience is not with a world that moves too slowly and sometimes knocks into me. The problem is with me and my expectations. From this perspective, expectations and patience are like fire and water—they can’t exist in the same space, because expectations are my desires for how things should go, and how long they should take, whereas patience is acceptance that the world does not exist to serve my desires.
So, either expectations get snuffed out, or patience evaporates. One must win. The other must be consumed. The picture of perfect patience, then, would be an empty river, with an empty boat, and a once burning candle, snuffed out.iv
The Bible has much to say that’s in harmony with this picture of patience, patience that comes from the elimination of expectations. For example, when God’s people were wandering through the wilderness, it was their expectations that made them impatient on the way (see Number 21:4). And Jesus said if we would follow Him, we must deny themselves. We must surrender our self-serving expectations and follow Him (see Matthew 16:24-25).
From the Christian perspective, there’s some truth to this answer that the path toward patience involves eliminating our expectations. However, the picture the Bible gives us is not a snuffed-out candle, but a holy fire that bursts from hiding, and can’t wait to be found.
That’s what Moses saw when God met him on the mountain, in the bush. The bush was on fire, but not burning up, not being consumed; it was an unextinguishable fire, Exodus 3 tells us. The fire was lit by God’s own expectations for His good creation, God’s world, where He wants to be found.
In the Bible, the problem with the world is not expectations. It is the all-consuming self that tries to be God, and won’t make space for others. It is the fire we started when we rebelled against God, our Creator. And we started treating each other like fuel for our own desires.
But God met Moses as a holy fire that could not be snuffed out, so that we might find the God who can’t wait to be found. In all of God’s dealings with Moses, with the people of Israel, even with Pharoah and all the enemies of God, repeatedly, God shows Himself patient.
In the Hebrew language, patience doesn’t mean acceptance, but rather, “slow to anger.” God is slow to let His anger burn (see Exodus 34:6) Slow to anger, but not empty of expectation. God does not eliminate His expectations because He desires good for us. And when God, in rightful anger, sends the fire of His judgment, which He has done in the past, and will do, again, at the final judgment, He makes the flames of our all-consuming selves run their course. He gives us what we asked for. He lets us burn ourselves out, not so that we would be eliminated, but so that we would turn back to Him and find ourselves in Him, our true selves, not snuffed out but entrusted to the God who so patiently can’t wait to be found.
Some people mistake God’s patience for slowness. This week, Christians around the world are observing the third week of Advent. Advent is the season of waiting before we celebrate the birth of Christ. Whereas our culture would have us jump straight from Thanksgiving to Christmas, Christians, during Advent, practice patience.
We practice the same patience God’s people needed while they waited so long for the Messiah to arrive. And we’re practicing the same patience as we wait for Him to return. And we’ve had plenty of space to practice—2,000 years’ worth, which seems like a long time to wait.
And maybe God does seem slow in delivering on His promise. “But don’t forget this one thing, beloved,” the Bible tells us, remember that “with the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day. The Lord is not slow in keeping His promise, as some understand slowness. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance” (2 Peter 3:8-9).
God, in His patience, makes space for us to turn back to Him in faith before it’s too late. And so, the Bible says in another place, in James 5: “Be patient, therefore, brothers and sisters, until the coming of the Lord. You see the farmer, how he waits for the precious fruits of the earth, being patient about it, until it receives the autumn and the spring rains. So also, you be patient, and stand firm, because the coming of the Lord is at hand.”
And James continues: “Don’t grumble against each other, brothers and sisters, so that you will not be judged. Look, the Judge is standing at the door. Brothers and sisters, as an example of patience in the face of suffering, take the prophets, who spoke in the Name of the Lord. See, we consider them blessed, those who remained steadfast. You’ve heard of the endurance of Job, and you’ve seen the end goal of the Lord, that the Lord is full of compassion and mercy” (James 5:7-11).
This is where Christians look when we’ve lost our patience—in the distraction of instant gratification, nor in the elimination of expectation. We don’t find patience when our selves are snuffed out, but when we entrust ourselves to the God who is full of mercy and compassion. If you want patience, look for mercy and compassion.
There’s an old story about an argument between the North Wind and the Sun, about which one of them was stronger. The North Wind said it was him. But the Sun didn’t think so. To settle the matter, the Wind suggested a contest. “See that man walking down on the road, there?” the Wind said to the Sun. “Whichever one of us can take his coat from is the stronger. I’ll go first.” So, the Wind tried to outmatch the Sun. He blew and howled and raged with all his might to strip the man of his coat. But the harder he tried, the more stubbornly the man held on to his coat.
Now it was the Sun’s turn. Slowly, he warmed the sky to melt the clouds brought on by the wind. Patiently, he shined with the warmest smile on the man below, who, in turn, gladly shed his coat.v
When God works His patience in us, to shed our self-serving expectations, He doesn’t eliminate us, instead He shines on us with His mercy and compassion, and gives us our true selves.
When you lose your patience, you will find an inexhaustible, unextinguishable supply in the mercy and compassion of God, expressed in His kindness toward us in Jesus Christ. As Scripture says, it is God’s kindness that leads to our repentance (Romans 2:4). It’s His mercy that melts our hearts. God’s compassion brings us back to Him again. And the Bibles’ perfect picture of patience is at the cross of Jesus Christ. There, the flames of human sin did their worst. The infernal jealousy of religious leaders. The slow burn of social and political ambition. The flash in the pan of the disciples’ short-lived commitment. In the death of Jesus, it all burned out. And the soldiers ran a spear through His side to make sure He was extinguished. And the sun hid its face in shame. Yet, even there the holy fire of God’s compassion still burned. And from the wound in Jesus’ side, blood and water flowed, a river filled with life. When the sun rose the third day after, Jesus stood again, to show us the picture of God’s perfect patience.
One of the early followers of Jesus said it this way: “This is a saying worthy of full acceptance: Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom, I am the worst. But for this very reason, I was shown mercy, so that in me, the worst of sinners, Christ Jesus might show His perfect patience as an example for those who would trust in Him for eternal life” (1 Timothy 1:15-16).
Do you want more patience? Look for mercy and compassion, because wherever mercy and compassion are, there is patience.vi Look to the mercy and compassion God has shown you, first from Jesus, then also from others. How many people have put up with you, slowed down for you, waited on you, made space to include you? Even if they didn’t know it, they were, in part, fulfilling God’s expectations for the good of His creation and for His creatures.
See, patience is not idleness or empty acceptance. It is not crabby, joyless, spineless submission to whatever evil comes. No, it is steady, cheerful, clear-eyed pursuit of God’s good, even when there are difficulties and injuries, and delays, and it’s all taking longer than you expected.
So, now that you know what to do when you lose your patience, what do you do when it’s time to wait again? The Bible gives us three pictures in the passage we heard from James 5. First, there was the picture of the patient farmer, who does all he can in the proper seasons, then turns the rest over to God. Last, there was the picture of Job, who endured through suffering, often impatiently, but whose losses God restored, in His mercy and compassion. And in the middle, James showed us the prophets who spoke in the Name of the Lord. It’s this middle picture I’d like to leave with you. Because if you trust in Christ, then you also are called to speak in His Name while you wait.
Jesus is waiting to return, waiting for more to find Him, waiting for us to speak to them in His Name, to speak with our words and our deeds, so that more would turn back to Him who so patiently can’t wait to be found.
God’s patience is neither slowness nor indifference. It is His burning desire for us to find Him. For a time, Lucy’s father’s least favorite game was hide-and-go seek. But he played because she asked him. And his feeble searching was always outmatched by her burning desire to be found. So also, our impatience will always be outmatched by God’s love and compassion. In the Name of Jesus. Amen.
i Story adapted from a devotional by Skye Jethani, “Benevolent Predator,” With God Daily, November 2019.
ii The image comes from David Shenk, quoted in Matthew Pianalto, On Patience: Reclaiming a Foundational Virtue, New York: Lexington Books (2016), 2.
iii Chuang Tzu, quoted in David Farrelly, The Book of Bamboo. San Franciso: Sierra Club (1984), 87.
iv For example, Patacara, an early Buddhist priest, describes nirvana as an extinguished lamp (quoted in “The Buddhist Tradition,” in A Concise Introduction to World Religions, eds. Oxtoby and Segal, New York: Oxford University [2007], 387).
v The story comes from Aesop, “The Wind and The Sun,” in Aesop’s Fables. London: Cassell, Petter, & Galpin (1869), 19.
vi Thanks to Dr Glen Neilsen for this way of saying it, as he shared in a sermon preached at Concordia Seminary, St Louis, in December 17, 2007. Listen here: https://scholar.csl.edu/cs0708/55/
Reflections for December 14, 2025
Title: Pictures of PatienceNo reflection segment this week.
Music Selections for this program:
“A Mighty Fortress” arr. Peter Prochnow. Used by permission.
“Crucifer” by Sydney H. Nicholson, arr. Peter Prochnow. Used by permission.
“Come, O Long-Expected Jesus” arr. Henry Gerike. Used by permission.
“Once in Royal David’s City” from The Hymnal Project of the Michigan District LC-MS. Used by permission.
“Hark! A Thrilling Voice Is Sounding” From The Concordia Organist (© 2009 Concordia Publishing House) Used by permission.