The Perfect Work Of Patience
Posted: Mon Apr 29, 2019 3:56 pmWhen anyone reborn in Christ is asked how they are doing, they can always reply (should they desire, even if in tears) “I couldn’t be doing better!” “How’s that so you may ask?” The blessed answer is that regardless of your situation, you are never without the Father (Jhn 14:23)—in the “life” of the Lord Jesus (Col 3:4)—via Their Holy Spirit (Jhn 14:16). The more God works this in our hearts and minds, the greater we will possess Their peace and love with all around us, which ever leads us to remember to wait on God in complete trust and patience at all times!
NC
The Perfect Work Of Patience
“Strengthened with all might, according to His glorious power, unto all patience” (Col 1:11). I shall find plenty of difficulties in the way, and temptations of all kinds—possibly death, as has often been the case in some countries; but we are strengthened with all might. There is the strength! I have been brought into close relationship and fellowship with my Father, and there I get this power. Unto what? “Unto all patience” (myself, I find that patience is the primary indicator concerning the degree of maturity in our faith, because “patience” is the place where we “possess” our “soul” - Luk 21:19—NC).
This sounds a poor thing, but you will find it is just what tries you. “Let patience have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing” (Jam 1:4). Are you always patient? Do you not want divine power for it? I many want right setting in the church, or in the Lord’s work, or in a thousand things; but I must have patience (not so much to show we are exercising it but that God is working it in our souls, ever increasing our trust, i.e. faith—NC). I must wait on God.
I can take things meekly and quietly with others; and then if that is the case, my life is in full display before the Father, and there is enjoyment in Him. I enter into all this blessedness and not merely “made meet,” but “giving thanks” (Col 1:12), because I am ever in the positive blessed enjoyment of it all. When I am walking in patience of heart and longsuffering, my soul is with the Father. I get the blessed enjoyment of what He is, and I grow in the knowledge of Him. “To him that hath shall be given” (Mat 13:12).
If I am honest, I say, “I do not know what His will is”; perhaps there is something in myself that I have not yet detected. Here I have all these exercises; but it is in the sense of the divine favor resting upon me with the consciousness of a child of God. The more a child is with his father, and delights in him, of course the better he will grow up understanding what his father likes. It is so with us before our heavenly Father.
“Strengthened with all patience.” You will find there is nothing that tests the strength of your soul like waiting for your Father. We think we must do things that we think right; we must learn rather to wait. Take Saul, for example in 1Sam 13 (cf. 11-14—NC). He ought to have waited, and said I can do nothing. We have but a little while to go through the wilderness, but it is always with the Father!
Now, beloved, I only ask—and earnestly ask you—is your soul free with your Father, reconciled to Him? Are you in His presence in virtue of the Cross? There I have perfect righteousness against sin; and I find peace and rest, not merely rest but God’s rest. For He rests in His Son, and in the blessedness of all those He has brought nigh in His Beloved.
The Lord give you to see the position where He has brought you (union now and forever—NC), and in the consciousness of your fellowship with the Father, to set forth, and to “walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God” (Col 1:10). If you look to your Father and get into His holy presence, do you realize perfect liberty with Him? Poor unworthy creatures we certainly are in ourselves (and in the light I see more how worthless I am in myself); But my Father “spared not His own Son” on my behalf (Rom 8:32). There is no doubt or cloud as to that which He is for our souls, because it has been perfectly revealed to us in the Word of God, as it has been proven in the Lord Jesus Christ Himself on the Cross.
- F G Patterson
Viewers who like these type of materials will find Miles J Stanford’s daily devotional an integral part of these spiritual growth teachings, as they directly complement one another, being from like authors (circa 1700’s-1800’s). Below is the link to retain and an excerpt from his daily devotional “None But The Hungry Heart”:
“We are all of us prone to forget the weighty fact that ‘God trieth the righteous.’ ‘He withdraweth not His eyes from the righteous’ (Ps. 11:5; Job 36:7). We are in His hands, and under His eye continually. We are the objects of His deep, tender, and unchanging love; but we are also the subjects of His wise moral government. His dealings with us are varied. They are sometimes preventive; sometimes corrective; always instructive.” – C H Mackintosh (1820-1896)
http://www.abideabove.com/hungry-heart/
NC
The Perfect Work Of Patience
“Strengthened with all might, according to His glorious power, unto all patience” (Col 1:11). I shall find plenty of difficulties in the way, and temptations of all kinds—possibly death, as has often been the case in some countries; but we are strengthened with all might. There is the strength! I have been brought into close relationship and fellowship with my Father, and there I get this power. Unto what? “Unto all patience” (myself, I find that patience is the primary indicator concerning the degree of maturity in our faith, because “patience” is the place where we “possess” our “soul” - Luk 21:19—NC).
This sounds a poor thing, but you will find it is just what tries you. “Let patience have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing” (Jam 1:4). Are you always patient? Do you not want divine power for it? I many want right setting in the church, or in the Lord’s work, or in a thousand things; but I must have patience (not so much to show we are exercising it but that God is working it in our souls, ever increasing our trust, i.e. faith—NC). I must wait on God.
I can take things meekly and quietly with others; and then if that is the case, my life is in full display before the Father, and there is enjoyment in Him. I enter into all this blessedness and not merely “made meet,” but “giving thanks” (Col 1:12), because I am ever in the positive blessed enjoyment of it all. When I am walking in patience of heart and longsuffering, my soul is with the Father. I get the blessed enjoyment of what He is, and I grow in the knowledge of Him. “To him that hath shall be given” (Mat 13:12).
If I am honest, I say, “I do not know what His will is”; perhaps there is something in myself that I have not yet detected. Here I have all these exercises; but it is in the sense of the divine favor resting upon me with the consciousness of a child of God. The more a child is with his father, and delights in him, of course the better he will grow up understanding what his father likes. It is so with us before our heavenly Father.
“Strengthened with all patience.” You will find there is nothing that tests the strength of your soul like waiting for your Father. We think we must do things that we think right; we must learn rather to wait. Take Saul, for example in 1Sam 13 (cf. 11-14—NC). He ought to have waited, and said I can do nothing. We have but a little while to go through the wilderness, but it is always with the Father!
Now, beloved, I only ask—and earnestly ask you—is your soul free with your Father, reconciled to Him? Are you in His presence in virtue of the Cross? There I have perfect righteousness against sin; and I find peace and rest, not merely rest but God’s rest. For He rests in His Son, and in the blessedness of all those He has brought nigh in His Beloved.
The Lord give you to see the position where He has brought you (union now and forever—NC), and in the consciousness of your fellowship with the Father, to set forth, and to “walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God” (Col 1:10). If you look to your Father and get into His holy presence, do you realize perfect liberty with Him? Poor unworthy creatures we certainly are in ourselves (and in the light I see more how worthless I am in myself); But my Father “spared not His own Son” on my behalf (Rom 8:32). There is no doubt or cloud as to that which He is for our souls, because it has been perfectly revealed to us in the Word of God, as it has been proven in the Lord Jesus Christ Himself on the Cross.
- F G Patterson
Viewers who like these type of materials will find Miles J Stanford’s daily devotional an integral part of these spiritual growth teachings, as they directly complement one another, being from like authors (circa 1700’s-1800’s). Below is the link to retain and an excerpt from his daily devotional “None But The Hungry Heart”:
“We are all of us prone to forget the weighty fact that ‘God trieth the righteous.’ ‘He withdraweth not His eyes from the righteous’ (Ps. 11:5; Job 36:7). We are in His hands, and under His eye continually. We are the objects of His deep, tender, and unchanging love; but we are also the subjects of His wise moral government. His dealings with us are varied. They are sometimes preventive; sometimes corrective; always instructive.” – C H Mackintosh (1820-1896)
http://www.abideabove.com/hungry-heart/