IT’S A PACKAGE DEAL
PATIENCE
Do you cringe at the thought? Have you ever asked for patience? Or perhaps you are one of those who says, “I’ll never ask for patience because then God will give me some big challenge to test my patience.”
Patience (or long-suffering) is part of the Fruit of the Spirit.
Gal. 5:22-23 says, “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering (patience), gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, and temperance: against such there is no law.” KJV
Notice that the word “fruit” is singular, meaning that all the elements are combined in ONE package just like a watermelon contains seeds, juice, rind, etc.
Therefore, patience is included in the package. So the next time you think about asking for patience, realize that if you possess the Fruit of the Spirit, you already have patience.
That leads to another perspective. Since you already have patience, what do you do with it?
EXERCISE IT!
When you need to wait for something—exercise patience. When you are frustrated about something, instead of resorting to anger—exercise patience.
Patience is also a work. Rom. 5:3-5 “There’s more to come: We continue to shout our praise even when we’re hemmed in with troubles, because we know how troubles can develop passionate patience in us, and how that patience in turn forges the tempered steel of virtue, keeping us alert for whatever God will do next. In alert expectancy such as this, we’re never left feeling shortchanged. Quite the contrary—we can’t round up enough containers to hold every thing God generously pours into our lives through the Holy Spirit!” MSG
Notice that patience needs trials or troubles to perform the needed transformation in us, but the outcome is well worth the effort.
Rom. 8:25 “But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently.” NIV
So the next time you need patience, don’t ask for it, but PRACTICE IT because "It's in the Package!"
After reading this post you may like to check out these links:
http://www.andyandrews.com/
http://www.greatday.com/
http://www.kendavis.com/
After reading this post you may like to check out these links:
http://www.andyandrews.com/
http://www.greatday.com/
http://www.kendavis.com/
2 comments:
Great blog! I need to exercise more patience.
Nice profile picture. Very good description. Pictures are vivid and relate to your topic.
The only suggestion I have is to put your links on separate lines. Also, use the name of the article as your hyperlink and put the author in parenthesis.
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