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James 5:7-11
7 Be patient, therefore, brothers,1 until the coming of the Lord. See how the farmer waits for the precious fruit of the earth, being patient about it, until it receives the early and the late rains. 8 You also, be patient. Establish your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is at hand. 9 Do not grumble against one another, brothers, so that you may not be judged; behold, the Judge is standing at the door. 10 As an example of suffering and patience, brothers, take the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord. 11 Behold, we consider those blessed who remained steadfast. You have heard of the steadfastness of Job, and you have seen the purpose of the Lord, how the Lord is compassionate and merciful.
[1] 5:7
(ESV)
Redeemer exists to celebrate and declare the gospel of God as we grow in knowing and following Jesus Christ.
I invite you to open your Bibles to James chapter 5. We are back in our study of James. We'll finish James probably 1st February, and then we are going to, our next series is gonna be the gospel according to David, and we'll be looking at the life of King David. I'll begin reading tonight in James chapter 5 beginning in verse 7. Be patient therefore, brothers, until the coming of the lord.
Joel Brooks:See how the farmer waits for the precious fruit of the earth, being patient about it until it receives the early and late rains. You also be patient. Establish your hearts for the coming of the Lord is at hand. Do not grumble against one another, brothers, so that you may not be judged. Behold, the judge is standing at the door as an example of suffering and patience.
Joel Brooks:Brothers, take the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord. Behold, we consider those blessed who remain steadfast. You have heard of the steadfastness of Job and you have seen the purpose of the Lord, how the Lord is compassionate and merciful. Pray with me. Lord, I ask that you would bless the very reading of your word, that it alone through your spirit would already begin working its way into our hearts and our minds.
Joel Brooks:Lord, our eyes have crossed a lot of things this week, but nothing more important than your word. Your word demands all of our attention, all of our focus. And so I pray that you would give us that. Lord, my words are death, your words are life, and we need life. So in this moment, I pray that my words would fall to the ground and blow away, not be remembered anymore.
Joel Brooks:Lord, may your words remain and may they change us. We pray this in the strong name of Jesus. Amen. I've got 3 little girls, and everyday I tell them, a couple of things. I always tell them that I love them multiple times.
Joel Brooks:The other thing that I find myself saying possibly more than anything else is, you you just got to be patient. You know, daddy we're hungry, we're hungry. You you you need just can you just hold on a few minutes and just be patient with us as we finish cooking? Mama, mama, we wanna we wanna go out here, or dad, dad, dad, we wanna do this. I'm like, can you just hold on 2 seconds?
Joel Brooks:Just be patient with us. And I feel like we're always asking them, pleading with them, please be patient. Because patient does not come naturally. It's natural to get angry. That's that's usually your first instinct.
Joel Brooks:I want food now. Give me why haven't you been cooking yet, dad? Why haven't you been cooking yet, mom? You know, and that's the first instinct, and you have to be taught patience. You have to be taught to be slow to anger.
Joel Brooks:Patience means being slow to anger. It means standing firm despite everything that's going on around you. Not being brought into that. It is to long suffer. Some of some of you might have translations that actually use that, to long suffer instead of to patience.
Joel Brooks:Don't don't you love that suffer long? That's what patience means. It's not instinctual. It's not natural. Who in the world wants to put up with a lot?
Joel Brooks:That's another definition of patience. Putting up with a lot. Who wants that in their life? But that's what James is calling us to do. So much of the Bible is about waiting for the lord.
Joel Brooks:You know, Abraham gets a promise. You're gonna have a son. Well, he waits 20 years waiting patiently. Almost every other Psalm is about waiting for the lord. Here, James, he picks up the the theme of waiting, of being both patient with the Lord and also being patient with one another.
Joel Brooks:If you could think back way back in November when we were last in James, Jeff preached a few verses beforehand, which which was a departure from James. He would had been addressing the Christian brothers and sisters. And for 7 verses, he parts from that and he says, all right, I need to talk to some rich people outside of the church. And he blasts them. He says, hey.
Joel Brooks:You know, you've been taking advantage of these workers. You've been paying them really low wages, making them work really hard. You've been deceiving them, promising them one thing, and giving them another. And he does not hold back, in his words to them. It ends with this.
Joel Brooks:You have fattened your hearts in a day of slaughter. Wow. And so he he blast them with all this and then he comes back to the Christians here in the passage we're looking at and so he says, be patient therefore, brothers and sisters, until the coming of the Lord. And what he's saying is, alright, in light of all of this persecution, in light of being in this really difficult time, what I need all of you to do is not fight back, not go with your instinct, not want to bow up. But what I need you to do is to be patient through all of this.
Joel Brooks:I know it's hard being the low person on the totem pole at work. I know it's hard having an abusive boss. I know it's hard just having to scrape by every day to make ends meet. I know that's hard, but be patient. Alright?
Joel Brooks:Now, patience results in many things. I'm gonna talk about 2. 2 things that patiently waiting results in. First is an anticipation. It it builds a a hunger for what is to come.
Joel Brooks:You know, we we just celebrated Christmas, and if I had not told my girls anything about Christmas, and Christmas morning came, and just as we're sitting around having breakfast, I said, hey hey girls. By the way, today's Christmas. I mean, they'd be really excited at that point. We'd be like, Hey, we just put a bunch of, you know, presents out last night. We're going to celebrate Christmas today.
Joel Brooks:They would really be excited, but nothing compared to having an Advent calendar and seeing presents already under the tree. And every day opening up the little advent calendar, putting up the little star or the little sheep or every day, and that building excitement To where it's so hard to even contain. It's it's almost agony because our children are going, I wish Christmas here. I wish Christmas was here. But yet they wouldn't have it any other way.
Joel Brooks:Because it builds your anticipation. It builds your hunger for what is to come. And that's one of the things that waiting on the lord does. When we wait for him, when we wait for him to to deliver us, when we wait for these things, it builds in us an anticipation and a deep hunger and appreciation for what is to come. 2nd, waiting reminds us of who is in control.
Joel Brooks:Any of y'all ever go to the, Birmingham DMV? I've gone several times. I've walked away with a renewed license half the time. And when you're you're sitting there in line, you know who has the power as you're waiting and waiting in line. And it's not you.
Joel Brooks:You're gonna get up there and you might be asked, do you have, you know, form 1050 6? You didn't even know it existed. And you'd know you're gonna have to go find it and get back in line. You're gonna have to wait. And so it it shows who's in control when you have to wait, and it's not you.
Joel Brooks:You're at the complete mercy of the other person. Well, waiting for god and waiting for one another reminds you of who is in control, and it's not you. The times that you lose patience are when you think you're the one who's supposed to be in control. You're the one who's supposed to control the universe. You're the one who's supposed to tell how things are supposed to go, and waiting reminds you that you're not God.
Joel Brooks:The times in my life that I have been most frustrated at Lauren, is when she's done something wrong and she's been clearly in the wrong, and there's nothing that I can say or do to change her. Now Lauren would say the same thing. That's that's true of me. The time she has been most angry and frustrated at me is the times I have clearly been in the wrong. And and no matter what she says she can't change me, but I'm the one with the pulpit and I get to speak and I'll have experience.
Joel Brooks:So, and And I I explain things rationally, and every guy, of course, would just would just get it and they would agree with me. And and Lauren will refuse at times. And I can't change her just like she can't change me at times. And it reminds me who's in control. It reminds me of my limitations.
Joel Brooks:I can't change hearts. I am limited in my abilities. It drives me to the Lord. That's what waiting patiently does. James illustrates this point by using the language of a farmer waiting for his crop.
Joel Brooks:In verse 7, so see how the farmer waits for the precious fruit of the earth being patient about it It's what receives the early and late rains. This past summer well, every summer, Lauren and I, we've planted a garden. This past summer, we had squash, you know, tomatoes, green peppers, beans and, and I planted the squash just by seed in the backyard, put the mushroom compost in, put it in the right depth, watered it, got plenty of sunshine. And, a week later, if you were to look out at our garden, you would see no change. Now, I'd put in a whole lot of work.
Joel Brooks:I I had done a whole lot, but if you look out there, you are not seeing any change because what James is teaching us is you, you got to realize your limitations. You can't make things grow. You can't just snap your fingers and just cause it to grow as fast as you want. Man, you're limited. God is sovereign and you are not, And you have to wait and you have to trust that someday it will come.
Joel Brooks:This is what this is why Paul tells Timothy in 2nd Timothy 4 that he is to preach the word, to reprove, to rebuke, and to exhort with great patience. Patience is required to be a good teacher or a good pastor because I can get up here and I can just, you know, study all week long, do my best to try to put together a message, and I could preach it, and there might not be any change. I mean, I'm thinking after this revival needs to happen. I mean, the Holy Spirit is going to fall. The people are going to be falling out, you know, as it's just, it's going to be revival and there can be nothing.
Joel Brooks:And so I'm like, exhort with great patience And and you guys know the same thing. You could be in a marriage in which you have to encourage your spouse and you have to tell her scripture. You have to remind her of the gospel or or maybe the wife has to do that for the husband, and you're doing it over and over and over, and yet you see nothing. You have the same conversations over and over and over, and it's the same sin over and over and over. Paul says, exhort with patience.
Joel Brooks:You can't change their heart. Only God can. Don't give up though. Patiently exhort this person. I think we've all experienced to some degree that whether it's talking with a friend or some family member.
Joel Brooks:I bet a lot of us have family that no matter what we say, no matter what we do, they fall into the same patterns. Don't lose patience with them. Look at verse 9. I just wanna say real quick before I go there. I'm very thankful to a man who didn't lose patience with me.
Joel Brooks:When I was a college student, just super arrogant. And I remember I was in a college ministry, and I I went up to the pastor there. First time, we never actually met. This was my intro this is how I introduced myself to I'm I'm trying to humble myself here before you. It was a really great ministry.
Joel Brooks:He was a great preacher. I went up to him and I just said, hey, you know what? If you ever need anybody to preach, you know, I could I could talk on a number topics. You want me to do creation versus evolution, things like that, whatever. I could be your person.
Joel Brooks:I could do that. And I look back and I cringe. I was a little freshman. I had a brain the size of a pea. I didn't know what I was talking about.
Joel Brooks:And this man was so patient with me. So patient. And and so he he just came alongside me. All he did was encourage. He didn't say, who the heck do you think you are?
Joel Brooks:He didn't lash out. And for years of patience, he would give me teaching opportunities, and I would do terrible. And he put his arm around me, and he'd be like, you know what? It was better. And his patience over the years, I I would have easily given up.
Joel Brooks:The end result was fruit. He didn't try to change what he couldn't control. He knew that his only job was to show me, to exhort me, to rebuke me, to teach me in great patience. And I'm thankful for that man. Look at verse 9.
Joel Brooks:Says, and do not grumble against one another brothers, so that you may not be judged. Behold, the judge is standing at the door. Now, I grew up a in a church, a Baptist church, that's what we would call chronically in conflict. And, I probably had 4 or 5 different pastors growing up before we would vote them off. And, the church split so many times, and it never split over theology.
Joel Brooks:It split over, and I'm not making this up, color of the church carpet, which is really important, or or how you would decorate the church. It split over which hymnal should you use. It split over, you know, they didn't like the personality of the preacher. It split over the most mundane things. Who has access to our gym or not?
Joel Brooks:And people would just always grumble, and then the church would divide. And this is what I grew up in. It never split over heresy. It split over grumbling. James knows churches really well.
Joel Brooks:Alright? He was around when they first got started, and they haven't changed. There's always been grumblers in a church. And he says, you know what? Stop complaining.
Joel Brooks:Quit nitpicking at every little thing you don't like about the church or with each other. Stop it. He says, those small little things is what the Lord judges. Alright? It's indicative of what's going on in your heart.
Joel Brooks:James doesn't say, alright, everybody quit hitting one another or quit yelling at one another. He says, just quit grumbling because grumbling is toxic to your heart. I love CS Lewis. I don't know if you've ever, read his book, The Great Divorce. You can read the whole thing in maybe a couple of hours.
Joel Brooks:It's, it's about a bus ride from hell to heaven. All right. And, just the different people you would encounter on the way. And, there are the ghosts. Those are the people in hell.
Joel Brooks:They're just really transparent. You could kind of see through them. And then, there is the solid people from heaven, who have a weightiness to them, which is the word for glory. So, there is a a solid person and a ghost, and they're looking at a grumbler, an old woman who just couldn't stop grumbling. You know, nothing huge.
Joel Brooks:She just talking about, well, you know, the nursing home has terrible food, and I can't believe that they would put me in this place. And you know, so and so was supposed to come and visit me, but they didn't come and visit me and just just went on and on and on. And let me read you a part of this. So what troubles ye, son? Asked my teacher.
Joel Brooks:Well, I'm troubled, sir, because that unhappy creature doesn't seem to me to be the sort of soul that ought to be in danger of damnation. She's not wicked. She's only a silly, garrulous old woman who got into the habit of grumbling and feels that maybe a little kindness or a little rest would change her outright. Well, that's what she once was, and maybe she still is. If so, she certainly will be cured, but the whole question now is, is she a grumbler?
Joel Brooks:The ghost said, I should have thought there was no doubt about that. No, you misunderstand me. The question is, whether she is a grumbler or only a grumble. If there's a real woman, even the least trace of a real woman in there still inside of her, inside of the grumbling, then it can be brought to life again. If there was one wee spark under all of those ashes, we would blow up the whole pile until it is red and clear But if there's nothing but ashes, we'll go on blowing them in our own we won't go on blowing them in our own eyes forever.
Joel Brooks:They must be swept away. I'm confused. How can there be a grumble without a grumbler? Said the ghost. Solomon said, the whole difficulty of understanding hell is that the thing to be understood is so nearly nothing.
Joel Brooks:But you've had experiences that it begins with a grumbling mood. And at first, you yourself are distinct from it. Perhaps, you even criticize your grumbling mood. And yourself, in a dark hour, may will that mood or you can embrace that mood, but then you can repent of it and come out of it again. But there will come a day when you can do that no longer.
Joel Brooks:There will no longer be a you left to criticize the mood nor even to enjoy it, but just the grumble itself going on forever like a machine. It's what James is here is talking about. Grumbling is indicative of what is going on in the heart. Grumbling is absolutely opposed to grace. And if grumbling begins and it is left unchecked, it grows and it grows.
Joel Brooks:And soon you're no longer a grumbler. You're just a endless grumble going on like a machine. He says, don't let that happen. Grumbling is a toxic seed that will destroy your heart. It is an indication of pride, grumbling.
Joel Brooks:If you grumble, that just says that pride is the fuel of your heart and not humility. It's not a minor sin. That's why James adds the words so that you might not be judged. Look at verse 10. As an example of the suffering and patience brothers, take the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord.
Joel Brooks:Behold, we consider those blessed to remain steadfast. You've heard of the steadfastness of Job. You have seen the purpose of the lord, how the lord is full of compassion and merciful. James says, if you want a really good example of how to patiently wait, you you gotta go to the prophets. I mean, when you think of the term long suffering, think prophets.
Joel Brooks:You know, think Jeremiah. How would you like to be Jeremiah? God calls Jeremiah and says, this is what I want you to do. You're pretty much gonna spend most of your prophetic career weeping. He was known as the weeping prophet.
Joel Brooks:And what you're gonna do is to have to tell all of your friends, all of your neighbors, everyone around you that, the guy you hate, Nebuchadnezzar, he's gonna come in, kill a lot of your family, take a lot of you off captive. And he has to say that message over and over and over to a people who won't listen. They love the message so much that they threw him in a cistern, hoping he would die. You can look at Ezekiel. 1 of my favorites, When God calls Ezekiel to be a prophet, he says, Ezekiel, I could send you over to those people over there.
Joel Brooks:And if I did, they would listen to you. They would repent. They would respect you, think you're a wonderful prophet and preacher. So I'm not going to do that, okay? I'm gonna send you to this people over here where you will prophesy your whole life, and they will never listen to one thing you say.
Joel Brooks:You will never have a convert. Nobody's hearts is gonna be broken. Everybody's going to hold you and just like this, think of you like as a crazy person. And and he was borderline crazy because of what the Lord asked him to do. At one point, God said, lay down on your side for about a year.
Joel Brooks:Lay siege to a little brick while prophesying, okay? How how would you like that job? It it gets the lowest point of low when at one point, he says, God, you've asked me to s to cook my food only using human feces. Can I please use animal dung instead to cook my food? So if you think your life stinks, I want you to remember Ezekiel.
Joel Brooks:Alright? Remember his prayer of pleading with the Lord to be able to cook his food using animal dung instead of human feces, but he did it. He kept preaching to a people who would never once believe him. Look at Hosea. I'm sure Hosea was probably first excited when the Lord said, hey, I have a wife for you.
Joel Brooks:He's like, great, I've been praying for a wife. I've I've I want to be married. God says, okay. You're gonna marry a prostitute, and I want you to love her, and I want you to show kindness and grace to her, and just know it will never ever be reciprocated. You're gonna just dote on her.
Joel Brooks:You're going to provide for it. You're gonna give her everything, and she will never love you. She will go after other lovers. Any of y'all want their jobs? Any any of you, I mean, like, and and if you want to do that and that was their lives.
Joel Brooks:That is long suffering. The prophets, I mean, when you look at them, and those were just 3, you could go on and on and on. How were they able to do that? What was the secret to their success? How could they be so patient in the midst of this?
Joel Brooks:And there was one key, they were looking upward and not sideways. Alright. As a pastor, if I look sideways and I see, oh, somebody else preached something and revival fell. I'm like, oh my gosh. Or somebody's church exploded huge in growth and is making an enormous impact.
Joel Brooks:I look there, I think that's what I that's what I come to expect. And so that's what I need, and that hasn't been promised to me. I need to always look up and not look sideways. Some of you are looking at other marriages and are going, oh gosh, if I could just have a marriage like that. That marriage was never promised you.
Joel Brooks:Alright. You look up, you don't look sideways. And then God gives you the strength and the patience to endure that. He even gives you the joy of obeying him steadfastly. Some of you might hate your job and you're looking at others like, oh, my gosh.
Joel Brooks:They have the best job in the world. Why can I have that? They're so lucky. You're looking sideways instead of looking up. God might have a totally different purpose for you and why you're in this job.
Joel Brooks:He might not be that concerned about your happiness. He might be working in something far deeper. And so when we look sideways and we get our expectations there and it's not happening, we lose patience. But if we get our expectations from here, Ezekiel, no one's ever going to listen to you ever. Okay.
Joel Brooks:It's pretty easy to be patient at that point. Hosea, your wife will never ever love you. Okay. Give me the strength. I can be patient in this.
Joel Brooks:Consider the prophets, and I guarantee you, none of them would have traded their life for anybody others. Despite all the suffering and everything there, they got what they wanted, and that was the Lord. James finally goes to Job. It says consider the steadfastness of Job. You know the story of Job.
Joel Brooks:He had a large family, had lots of money, had the respect of the community, and, the Lord took it away. It's interesting when Lauren and I started this church, we started in our house and, just a lot of bad things happened to us. And some of you were around, a few of you were, and you remember this, like, our our house got borderline destroyed in a storm, about almost a $100,000 worth of damage in there and I had another surgery. We almost lost one of our children in childbirth. You know, Lauren's breaking a foot.
Joel Brooks:We, we're strapped for money. Like, all this stuff just hit us at once. And people are coming up to me and being, it's like the plagues of Job. I'm like, you haven't read Job, have you? No.
Joel Brooks:It's nothing like the plagues of Job. Alright? Listen to this from Job 1. Now there was a day when his sons and daughters were eating and drinking wine in their older brother's house, And there came a messenger to Job and said, the oxen were plowing and the donkeys feeding beside them, and the Sabeans fell upon them and took them and struck down the servants with the edge of the sword, and I alone have escaped to tell you. While he was yet speaking, there came another and said, the fire of God fell from heaven and burned up the sheep and the servants and consumed them.
Joel Brooks:And I alone have escaped to tell you. While he was yet speaking, there came another and said, the Chaldeans formed 3 groups and made a raid on the camels and took them and struck them down and struck down the servants with the edge of the sword. And I alone have escaped to tell you. While he was yet speaking, there came another and said, your sons and daughters were eating and drinking wine in their oldest brother's house. And behold, a great wind came across the wilderness and struck the 4 corners of the house and it fell upon the young people, and they are dead.
Joel Brooks:I alone have escaped to tell you. Then Job arose, tore his robe, shaved his head, fell on the ground, and worshiped. And he said, naked, I came from my mother's womb and naked shall I return. The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away. Blessed be the name of the lord.
Joel Brooks:Now now that's long suffering, and it only got worse for Job. After this, the Lord took away his health. He had boils all over him. He's trying to scrape the boils off. Inside, he's got kidney stones.
Joel Brooks:Worst of all, the one thing that was left was was a nagging wife. That was actually part of the punishment. The nagging wife was left there going, curse God and die. Will you just curse God and die? That's all she ever says.
Joel Brooks:Three friends come to Him. And this is probably the worst part of all is his friends try to comfort him. And I read through Job this week and I lost patience with his friends. One of his dear friends, Eliphaz, had the nerve to say this in chapter 4. This is Eliphaz speaking.
Joel Brooks:Remember Job, who that was innocent ever perished? Or where were the upright ever cut off? As I have seen, those who plow iniquity and sow trouble reap the same. By the breath of god, they perish, and by the blast of his anger, they are consumed. In translation, Job, your children are dead because they were icky, evil, wicked children, and God needed to kill them.
Joel Brooks:That's that's the comfort Job is receiving from his friends. Alright? At a time like this, I I couldn't imagine how I would react. And so no one has suffered like Job, But it's curious that James would mention Job in this because if you read through the whole book of Job, he does at times lose his temper. I mean, he doesn't do it in the first few chapters.
Joel Brooks:I would have done it real early. I would have probably punched Eliphaz right there, got it over with. He waits a little bit longer, but then he does start yelling at them. And he starts yelling at God. And he starts saying, what you're doing is wrong.
Joel Brooks:What you're doing is unjust. I haven't deserved any of this, and who are you to do this to me? And he does begin saying these things. So how is it that James here is saying that he's an example and that you have heard of the steadfastness of Job. Well, here's why Job is still an example of being patient or steadfast or a longsufferer.
Joel Brooks:Being patient doesn't mean you don't hurt, Doesn't mean you don't cry out. What it means is you never lose your faith in the middle of it. And even though he was crying out, he was still crying out to his God, to my Lord. There was always trust in this. He never lost his faith.
Joel Brooks:And if you remember, at the end of the book, God shuts his mouth. But then we come across Job 42:5, which is one of the most amazing verses. And when he says Job says this of the Lord. He goes, I have heard of you with my ears, but now my eyes have seen you. That's another way of saying, god, you have taken me through the darkest, darkest times, but now I know who you are.
Joel Brooks:It was worth it. Despite all that has happened, Job walks away with a greater understanding of who God is in a deeper friendship. Think of Job the next time you just wanna nitpick at somebody. Think of his perseverance and patience. James ends this section with just kind of a strange phrase right after he says, you've heard of the steadfastness of Job, and you have seen the purpose of the Lord.
Joel Brooks:How the Lord is compassionate and merciful. Now, seeing the purpose of the Lord is a curious phrase there. Not everybody is really certain what he's talking about. It he could be talking about Job and just that, you know, you you saw in the life of Job everything that happened and at the end, you could see the purpose of it. It was it was to bring Job closer to him.
Joel Brooks:It was actually to result in the salvation of his friends as Job is praying for his friends at the end of it. And so we do see the purpose of the lord, but I think more than that, James is saying, hey, you know what? Look at the greatest long suffering person. Look at Jesus, our Lord. We always look at the cross and the suffering that happened there, and we look of it in light of everything we have written in the New Testament, and we rejoice in it.
Joel Brooks:But you know what? Most people were not rejoicing when it happened. They didn't understand what was going on. And you look at the incredible patience of Jesus, who for 3 years is pouring himself into his disciples, and then he gets crucified. People would have asked him, now do you really think it was worth it?
Joel Brooks:Do do you really think it was worth giving your life to all these people being so patient with these idiots as they abandon you? People looked at Jesus as he's suffering, and they wouldn't have understand what what is God doing. Because Jesus, you know, he's healing pretty much half of Palestine. He's teaching all these people, and now he's dying. That doesn't make any sense.
Joel Brooks:And so when it was happening, I bet a lot of people walked away from Jesus and walked away from the faith. But James is saying, now we know the purpose of the Lord. In light of the resurrection, in light of all the teaching we have of have of it, we see that was through the patience of Jesus, through the long suffering of Jesus. We have our salvation. God uses the suffering.
Joel Brooks:He uses the pain to bring about redemption, and it is all worth it. It's all worth it. You have heard or you have seen the purpose of the Lord. And when we look at him, we see that he is compassionate and he is merciful. Pray with me.
Joel Brooks:Father, I ask that you would forgive us of all the times that we lose patience. Thank you that you never lose patience with us. You are slow to anger, like we just sang before. We thank you for Jesus who didn't lose patience. Jesus who waited.
Joel Brooks:Jesus who is around disciples who never understood, could never get it. Oh, and he was so compassionate, and kind, and patient with them. And after he suffered, we see it was all worth it. Jesus, we thank you for who you are and what you've done. You're calling us to be patient people.
Joel Brooks:We can't do it on our own. So we ask that in this moment, now you would send your holy spirit, and you would begin changing us. We pray this in the strong name of Jesus. Amen.