All right, the title of our lesson
this morning is Be Patient. Be patient. For those of you
who know me well, you might raise your eyebrows at this title. And I will confess to you that
I approach this subject very carefully and very prayerfully
because I will freely admit I don't have much personal experience
with the subject of patience. Any time I think, that I might've
learned a little bit about patience. Quickly, I see in myself how
little of it that I've learned, and I feel pretty confident most
of y'all feel the same way about yourselves. So I pray the Lord
will bless us as we look into his word this morning. Bless
us to our benefit and on the subject of patience. And my first
point is this, be patient, be patient, waiting for the Lord's
return, because he's coming soon. Look here at verse seven of James
chapter five, Be patient, therefore, brethren, under the coming of
the Lord. Now you may recall in the previous
verses, James talked about the wicked who thought they were
rich, spiritually rich in themselves. And what a devastation that they
caused. And he's telling us, now you
be patient. Be patient with them. Just leave them to the Lord.
The Lord is coming back soon. And he'll deal with the wicked
when he returns. He'll destroy them, those who
cause so much pain and suffering. Now, the Lord will deal with
them when he returns, and he's coming back soon. But be patient
waiting on this, too. When the Lord returns, all the
believers' sorrow and heartache and tears and pain will instantly
be over. Instantly. The very moment that
Christ returns, the believer's relationship with sin and with
the effects of sin is instantly going to be over. It'll happen
in the twinkling of an eye. Sin and its effects will be gone
from the believer forever. Now you just wait. He's coming.
You wait and wait and expecting his return. And when he returns,
the believer's not gonna have to deal with the wicked, with
those who are rich in themselves anymore. The Lord's gonna put
them in a place where they'll never harm, they'll never cause
fear to God's elect again. Now wait, he says, wait patiently
for this. And he gives us a very good illustration
of how and why we're to wait so patiently for the Lord's return.
In the example he uses is a farmer. He says in verse seven, be patient
therefore, brethren, under the coming of the Lord. Behold the
husbandman, the farmer, waiteth for the precious fruit of the
earth, and hath long patience for it, until he receive the
early and latter rain. Be ye also patient, establish
your hearts, for the coming of the Lord draweth nigh. Now wait
patiently for the Lord, James tells us, just like the farmer
patiently waits for the harvest. just like patience, I don't have
any experience with farming, but this pretty, I think I got
this down. This tells me we're not to sit
around doing nothing, waiting on the Lord to return. Because
the example he uses here is wait patiently like the farmer waits.
Well, nobody works more constantly in every season than a farmer. A farmer never has any idle time,
no matter the season. So this tells me that we are
to wait on the Lord's return Actively. Actively living on
faith. Let me see if I can show you
what I'm talking about from the example of the farmer. First,
we're to live actively by faith while we wait on the Lord's return.
The farmer acts in faith at the beginning of every year. He goes
to the bank and he borrows money. And he borrows it. Money he's
got to pay interest on. And he takes that money and he
buys seed. And you know what he does with that seed? He cast
it in the ground, waiting on it to die. Now that's faith,
isn't it? That's faith. That's living in
faith. It's casting everything we own
into the ground, trusting the Lord to give a harvest. See,
a farmer is not a fatalist at all. He works hard doing what
he's supposed to be doing, trusting the Lord to give the increase.
And that's what we're to do. That's how we're to wait patiently
on the Lord. Do what the Lord has put to your
hand to do today. People wonder, what could be
my area of service? What will I be doing later on
as I grow and learn? I don't know, I don't know. And
this is something only you know. You know what the Lord's given
you to do today. Do what the Lord's put to your hand to do
today with all of your might. Do it like the success of it
depends on what a good job you do. I mean, all the success of
it depends on you doing a good job and then trust the Lord to
give the increase. Trust the Lord to make it profitable.
Second, you're talking about the farmer. While we wait on
the Lord's return, live patiently waiting on God's providence.
Now it takes a long time for that seed that the farmer sows,
it takes a long time for that seed to spring up into a plant
and then grow to a stalk and then start bearing fruit. It
takes a long time. He's got to wait on the Lord
to make that happen. Now, he can plant the seed, he
can water it, he can fertilize it, he can do those things, but
the farmer is completely dependent upon the Lord to make that plant
grow and bear fruit. There's not one thing he can
do to make that happen. He's completely dependent upon the
Lord. He's got to wait on the Lord's prophet to send the rain
at the right time, the sunshine at the right time. He can't go
out and dig up that seed and say, well, you know, I'm not
seeing any sprouts. Wonder what's going on down there and dig up
the seed and see if it's starting to, if it started to die and
germinate. Well, if he does that, he's going
to kill the seed. He won't have any harvest. He's got to wait
on the Lord. He's got to wait on the Lord
to send everything that it takes to give that seed life. And we've
got to do the same thing. Wait on the Lord to give a harvest.
Wait on the Lord to give the fruit of the spirit. Wait on
the Lord to make, to do this things that only he can do to
make these things effectual to accomplish his will. So wait
on the Lord. Be patient. Wait on the providence
of the Lord to solve our problems. Now this is so ingrained in us,
a problem comes up. Something that this needs to
be dealt with. This thing can't go on like this.
It's got to be fixed. and it's ingrained in us, what
do we do? Start coming up with ideas of
how we're gonna solve the problem. Isn't that right? Joyce told
me she comes up with ideas all the time and the Lord's never
one time used one of them. Never. Wait patiently on the
providence of the Lord to take care of these things. Because
if we try to solve the problem ourselves, we're getting in over
our head and we're gonna make a mess of things. Just wait on
the Lord. That those crops need rain. Well,
there's not one thing we can do to make it rain. We've got
to wait on the providence of the Lord to send the rain just
exactly in the right time. Trusting that the Lord is doing
right, that he'll do the right thing. Wait patiently on the
Lord's providence because you really do in your heart believe
the Lord's way is the right way. If he left it up to me, I'd mess
it up. The Lord's way is the right way. I'm gonna wait patiently
on him to accomplish his purpose. Even if I don't understand what
he's doing right now, I believe it's best. I'm gonna wait on
his providence to accomplish his purpose. Then thirdly, look
at Matthew chapter 13. While you wait on the Lord's
return, be patient with the weeds, be patient with the tares, those
people who are enemies of the gospel. Wait, just be patient
with them. Matthew 13 verse 24. Another parable put he forth
unto them, saying the kingdom of heaven is likened unto a man
which sowed good seed in his field. And while men slept, his
enemy came and sowed tares among the wheat and went his way. And
when the blade sprung up and brought forth fruit, then appeared
the tares also. So the servants of the householder
came and said unto him, Sir, didst not thou sow good seed
in thy field? For whence then hath it tares?
And he said unto them, An enemy hath done this. The servant said
unto him, Wilt thou then that we go and gather them up? But
he said, Nay, lest while you gather up the tares, you root
up also the wheat with them. But let both grow together until
the harvest. In the time of harvest, I will
say to the reapers, Gather ye together first the tares, and
bind them in bundles to burn them, but gather the wheat into
my barn. Now look over at verse 36. After
the Lord had taught these different parables to the people, verse
36, then Jesus sent the multitude away and went into the house.
And his disciples came unto him saying, declare unto us the parable
of the tares of the field. He answered and said unto them,
he that soweth the good seed is the son of man. The field
is the world. The good seed are the children
of the kingdom, but the tears are the children of the wicked
one. The enemy that sowed them is the devil. The harvest is
the end of the world, and the reapers are the angels. As therefore
the tears are gathered and burned in the fire, so shall it be in
the end of this world. The son of man shall send forth
his angels, and they shall gather out of his kingdom all things
that offend, and them which do iniquity, and shall cast them
into a furnace of fire. There shall be wailing and gnashing
of teeth. Then shall the righteous shine forth as the sun in the
kingdom of their father, who had the ears to hear, let him
hear." We can all understand what our Lord was teaching right
there. Wait on the Lord. Wait patiently
on him to deal with the wicked. He'll deal with them correctly.
He'll do the right thing. Or could save some of them. Saint
Justin, he could save others. And after he deals with the wicked,
then the righteous are going to shine forth as the sun. Now
you wait on the Lord. He'll do it. He's going to do
it. Because if we go out and we try to pull up the tears,
we will, without a doubt, destroy some of God's people. We'll hurt
them. We'll destroy them. They can't lose their salvation,
but we'll just destroy them. So wait on the Lord. He's going
to produce a harvest. And it's going to be much more
glorious than we can even imagine. Just wait on the Lord. Oh, what
a harvest it's going to be. The Lord draws nigh, James says. James wrote this more than 2,000
years ago. The Lord's been drawing nigh
for 2,000 years. Wayne's getting close. He's getting
close. He's coming soon. What a harvest
that we'll have when he does. All right, fourthly, while you
wait on the Lord, wait patiently for Him, be faithful to the gospel. Patiently continue in the gospel. Look at verse 12 here in James
chapter five. But above all things, my brethren,
swear not, neither by heaven, neither by the earth, neither
by any other oath, but let your yea be yea and your nay, nay,
lest you fall into condemnation. Now James is not telling us here,
now don't go sign contracts. If you want to buy a house, you
don't have to sign a contract. You're going to lend me this
money, I'm going to this debt. You're signing contracts, now
I'm going to pay this back to you. He's not telling us don't do
that. This is what he's telling us. He's saying patiently continue
trusting Christ and don't be a hypocrite. That's what he's
telling us here, don't be a hypocrite. The word condemnation he uses
here means hypocrisy or being a hypocrite. He said, don't be
a hypocrite. I don't know why they translated it condemnation,
but the meaning of it is hypocrisy, guile. So don't swear an oath
by things that you think are greater than you, saying, I swear
by my mother's grave. Now, I never did know why people
do that, but that's a thing. Don't do that, James says. That's
blasphemy. And it's hypocritical for a believer
to say that. That's saying, that's like saying,
whoa, I trust the Lord to send rain, but I'm going to go out
and do a rain dance and swear to the clouds. That's exactly
what that is. It's being hypocritical. Here's
what he's teaching us. You who believe, God's children,
you made a promise to God. Now you keep it. You promised
to believe God. You promised to trust Christ.
Now you do it. Don't be a hypocrite. Remain
steadfast in the faith. Let your yea be yea. Now what
is our yea? What are the things we say yes
to? Give you an example. Yea, Lord, I believe. Help thou
my unbelief. Now continue depending on, let
your yea be yea, continue depending on the Lord. Yes, I believe,
help my unbelief. Yea, Lord, I believe that thou
art the Christ, the Son of God, that shall come into the world.
Now you keep believing him, you keep trusting him, depending
upon him. Remember those, I forget what
infirmity it was, someone came to the Lord's at Leper, somebody
came to him, he said, asking for healing. So you believe I'm
able to do this? They say, yay, Lord, I believe. I believe you're
able to heal me. Lord, if you will, you make me
whole. I believe that. Well, don't start
looking to other means. Keep depending on Him. Here's one. I know I don't look like it.
You look at the way I've been acting. I know it doesn't seem
like it, but yay, Lord. You know all things. You know
I love you. Now keep loving Him. Keep depending
upon Him. It's Christ that died, yea rather
that is risen again. It's even at the right hand of
God who also maketh intercession for us. Now let your yea be yea. Don't swear by things of the
earth, heaven or whatever. You just keep trusting Christ's
intercession for you. Let your yea be yea. Yea, Paul
said, doubtless, I count all things but loss for the excellency
of the knowledge of Christ Jesus, my Lord, for whom I've suffered
the loss of all things, and I do count them but done. I just cast
them away that I may win Christ and be found in him. Not having
my own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is
through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of
God by faith. Yea, doubtless. Now keep believing
him, keep trusting him, Keep not trusting your works. Keep
trusting everything that's counting everything that you've done is
done. And keep trusting Christ. Yea. Let God be true, but every
man a liar. Now you just let your yea be
yea. You keep believing that whatever God says is true. But
let every man be a liar. So that brings me to some no's.
Let your no be no too. No. I have no confidence in the
flesh. So I trust Christ to be all of
my salvation from beginning to end, from Alpha to Omega. It's
all in Him, because I have no confidence in the flesh. I know
this, that in my flesh dwelleth no good thing. Not some good
things, no good thing. Let your no be no, so you keep
trust in Christ. There's none that doeth righteousness. No, not one, not even me. So
I'm trusting Christ, I'm depending upon him. And to swear by anything
else is to be a hypocrite and not patiently wait on the Lord
to accomplish his will, which is the redemption of his people.
All right, secondly, while we trust in the Lord, be patient,
wait patiently for the Lord's return and be patient with each
other. Verse nine, he says, grudge not,
Grudge not one against another. Brethren, lest ye be condemned,
behold the judge standeth before the door. Now all of us are full,
full of sin and weakness. So we ought to be able to understand
sin and weakness in others, shouldn't we? We don't have a whole lot
of experience with personal experience, with patience. We ought a whole
lot of personal experience with sin and weakness. Is that right? We ought to be understanding.
and patient with other people who are full of the same thing
we're full of, sin and weakness. Now don't groan about everything
that your brethren are doing. That's what the word grudge means.
It means groan. Don't groan. Oh, what are they
doing now? Look what they're doing. Don't
groan about that. Don't hold a grudge about it.
Don't hope they get what they got coming to them. Oh, can you
believe what they're doing now? They're going to get what they
got. Don't grudge against your brethren. Don't do that. Be patient
with them. Pray for them. Pray the Lord
to be merciful to them. Pray the Lord to help them. And
while we're praying, do this. Pray for our own selves that
we don't make matters worse by our harsh, judgmental, self-righteous
attitude. That's what we ought to be doing.
Let's not set ourselves up as judges over our brethren. You
know, we can't judge what the Lord's doing with us. Which list
them? And if we set ourselves up to
make a judgment, oh, I know him. You know, this one's a tear.
This one's a week. Oh, he don't know the Lord. He don't love
the Lord. If we set ourselves up to make that judgment, we
will make the wrong judgment every single time. We just don't
know what means God's using to accomplish his purpose. A single snapshot. is never a
good representation of the whole person. If we were making the
judgments, every one of us here, we'd have churched Abraham for
denying Sarah was his wife. Oh, we'd have been so mad at
him. We wouldn't have had a fellowship with that guy. David committed
adultery and then killed that poor woman's husband? Oh no,
he don't know the Lord. He's not coming in this place
with us. Solomon helping his wives in idolatry. That guy's
out. Have we made that judgment? Oh, we've grown that law going
down to Solomon. God called him righteous law. We looked at Jacob and said,
that man, his dishonest business practices, he can't know the
Lord. Peter denied knowing the Lord at all. He don't know the
Lord. and we'd have been wrong every time. We just don't know
what God's using, what means He's using to bring His people
where He's bringing them, to accomplish His purpose. So let's
not set ourselves up as judges over our brethren. You just let
the Lord do that. He's the judge. He's standing
nearby the door. And if you want to judge somebody,
you want to groan about somebody, let's groan about our own selves.
Let's be worried. The judge is standing by the
door. Yeah, he sees what our brethren are doing. He sees David
and Lot and Abraham and Peter. Yeah, he sees them. But he sees
my bad attitude, too. My self-righteous, judgmental,
harsh attitude. Look down and notice my brother.
The Lord sees that, too. I ought to be a whole lot worried
about my bad attitude and what somebody else is doing. Isn't
that right? Let's just be patient with our brethren. Then thirdly,
while we wait for the Lord, I tell you how we can patiently do it.
This will help us now. If our hearts established in
God's word. Verse 10, take my brethren the
prophets who has spoken in the name of the Lord for an example
of suffering affliction and of patience. Now take the prophets,
take what the prophets wrote is the foundation of your faith
and reason for your patience and waiting on the Lord. James
says in verse eight, be also patient, establish your hearts.
Now, how am I supposed to establish my heart? Well, you know, God's
word tells us the answer. It's with the word of God. Look
back a page or two at Hebrews chapter 13. You want to know
how your heart be established, that you be patient, that you
continue faithfully and not leave the Lord? Here's how your heart's
established. Hebrews 13 verse 9. Be not carried
about with diverse and strange doctrines, I don't want some
man come by with some strange doctrine and carry me away to
you. What? How do I avoid that? For it's
a good thing that the heart be established with grace, not with
means which is not profited then that have been occupied therein.
Let your heart be established with grace. Let your heart be
established with the word of God. Use the means that God's
given you. God's given us his word. He's
given us his word that that declares grace, that declares grace. Let
your heart be fixed on Christ. And you use the example of people
in scripture. The prophets were faithful. These
were faithful men. They were faithful to declare
the message of God given them and they suffered for it. They
were mocked. Some of them were put to death,
but they did not back down. They didn't quit. And Hebrews
11 tells us they died infected and they received the reward
of their faith. Now, God hadn't changed. I know
people say, oh, well, the world's a whole different place, you
know, from the time Elijah rode or David rode or, you know, in
a way technology's changed. You know, things we do change,
but now listen, God hadn't changed. Man hadn't changed. The gospel
hadn't changed. Grace hadn't changed. The word
hadn't changed. then patiently continue in those
things. Patiently continue in faith, in the word. That's how
our heart will be established, with the word of God. Then fourthly,
patiently wait. Let's patiently wait, actively
wait for the Lord to return. Let's be patient with each other.
Let's establish our hearts in faith and patiently wait for
the Lord, because it's a blessing to endure in the faith. Verse
11. Behold, we count them happy,
which endure. You've heard of the patience
of Job and have seen the end of the Lord, that the Lord is
very pitiful and of tender mercy. We count them happy. That word
happy is blessed. We count them blessed, who continue,
which endure. The person who continues in the
faith and does not quit is blessed of God. That's a blessed person. They're not blessed because they
continue in the faith. They continue in the faith because
God's blessing them. See that? Let me show you that
from scripture. Look at Romans chapter two. Continuing in the
faith is the evidence that God's given us faith. That we didn't
save ourselves, but that God did. Romans chapter two, verse
seven. to them who by patient continuance
and well-doing seek for glory and honor and immortality, they're
gonna receive eternal life. See, they've been blessed of
God. Look at Colossians chapter one. Colossians one, verse 21. And
you. They were sometime alienated
and enemies in your mind by wicked works. Yet now have he reconciled
and the body of his flesh through death to present you wholly and
unblameable and unapprovable in his sight. If you continue
in the faith grounded and settled and be not moved away from the
hope of the gospel, which you have heard and which was preached
to every creature, which is under heaven, where have I Paul and
made a minister. Now that's if you continue in
the faith, grounded and settled. That's not a condition of salvation.
That's the evidence that Christ has reconciled, that he reconciled
you through his sacrifice and made you holy and unblameable
and unapprovable in his sight. If Christ has made you holy,
if he's made you unblameable, if he's accepted, made you accepted
in him, then you're going to continue in those things. He
won't let you not continue. See, this is the evidence that
you've been blessed. But now look at Galatians 3.
Here's a warning for those who are not faithful, who do not
continue, who turn back. Galatians 3, verse 10. For as
many as are of the works of the law are under the curse, for
it is written, cursed is everyone that continueeth not in all things
which are written in the book of the law to do this. Now, that
person who does not continue in these things, who does not
continue in the gospel, does not continue in God's word, they're
cursed. And it's not that they're cursed
because they don't continue. It's that they don't continue
because they're cursed, because God has not blessed them. So
wait patiently for the Lord, enduring in the faith. Don't
let the circumstances of this life make you turn your back
on the faith, on Christ, on the gospel. And James closes here
with a very good example of what he's been teaching us here. Our
brother, Job. I don't know anybody who suffered
more greatly than Job. Do you? Oh my goodness. In one
day, he lost every single one of his children. In one day, he lost every one
of his servants, his whole household. In one day, he lost all of his
wealth, all of his cattle. He lost it all in one day. And in that very same day, his
wife turned on him. Why don't you just curse God
and die? Why are you holding to this? Just curse God and die. And the next day, Job's friends
come over. What good friend Job got, they
didn't make the situation better, they made it worse. Oh, the suffering,
the physical suffering, the boils, the pain, oh, I just can't even
imagine. There he sits with a piece of
broken pottery, he doesn't even have an old piece of pottery,
scraping the boils, covered from head to toe. You know what scripture
says about our brother? He patiently endured. In all
that, he patiently waited on God. The Word of God says in
all this, Job sinned not, nor charged God for his sin. And
in the midst of the worst trial we can imagine, you know what our brother Job did?
They came to him and told him, Job, you lost everything. Everything
you loved, everything that matters to you, everything that made
you wealthy, secure in this world, you lost it all. Our brother, Job, stopped and
worshiped. He bowed down and worshiped.
The Lord gave and the Lord taken away. Blessed be the name of
the Lord. And in the end, we saw God's
pity and mercy, his care for his children. He blessed Job
with more than he lost. So now let's consider these examples.
Let's not be rash. in times of trial and think,
this is the worst thing ever. You know, this is the end. Instead,
let's be thankful, knowing tribulation works with patience. When horrible,
painful things happen to us, let's not be rash and think,
well, God's punishing me. God's casting me off. If I hadn't,
I must have done something wrong. God's doing all this to me. You
know, it could be, it could be God's blessing me. I just don't
understand it yet. We have a loved one who dies
and, oh, we're so sad. And we think this is not a blessing.
This is not a blessing. This is not good for me. They'll
be patient. Be patient. We just don't know
what God's doing, what his purpose is in this. Who knows what horrible
things the Lord saved our loved one from. I'll use a personal
example. It's something I think of frequently.
If it was left up to me, my dad would have spent a whole lot
more years on this earth. If it was left up to me, that's what
would happen. And I can't tell you how often
I think, I'm glad he didn't live to see a lot of things I've seen
in the past 15 years. Bless him. Who knows what the
Lord's doing? We can't figure it out. So let's
just patiently wait on him. Let's patiently wait on him to
accomplish his purpose. And when his purpose of redemption
for his people is accomplished, he's going to wrap this thing
up. He's going to return. And then we're going to see things
in a totally different light. Totally different. We're going
to see, you know what? Everything he did really was
best. I wouldn't have changed it if
I could. We say that now, don't we? The Lord's doing best. I wouldn't change it if I could.
I don't know how fully we mean that. But then, that day, when
the Lord has a glorious harvest, he makes the righteous shine
forth as a sun, we're going to say, oh my, I wouldn't change
anything if I could. What the Lord did is right and
best. Well, God give us the patience
to wait on him. God bless you.