Saturday, August 12, 2017

God's Unlimited Patience Upon Limited Man


If you only read one thing, read this: For all of eternity God’s patience will NEVER run out because it has NO limits!

Now, please don’t misunderstand what I am saying. I promise I am not going Rob Bell on you by forsaking truth. However, throughout the generations of Church history, many faithful Bible-believing men and women have viewed God’s patience from an incorrect perspective. By simply typing “Does God’s patience have a limit?” into Google, you will find countless pages containing various articles written expounding on this incorrect perspective.

What do you think regarding God’s patience?

I was taught to believe that God is infinitely patient in character yet, practically speaking, there will come a time when His patience will run out for mankind. This terminology has been used in the field of evangelism for years. The word “infinite” is defined as limitless. How can we as the Church honestly claim that God is infinite while, at the same time, attributing limitations upon Him? If God is infinitely patient, then how is it possible for His patience to reach a limit? This seems contradictory.

The key truth to remember is that God’s patience never runs out. It is an eternal spring as He is the River of Life. It is not that God’s patience runs out on the sinner. The problem is not with God, but with us. (As is everything else – see my blogs for details.)

God built into each one of us a timer. Whether you are baking cookies or heating something up in the microwave, a timer’s purpose is to run out so that you will know not how to act, but when. There is coming a day when you will find yourself at death’s door. Whether immediate or slow, your life will come to an end. It is an absolute.

God is infinitely patient because He does not have a built-in timer as we do. No attribute of His will ever lessen or come to a close. We, on the other hand, are but a vapor in the wind. We are here one day and gone the next. We have a start and we have a finish (physically speaking).

I sat in a drive-thru at Steak ‘n Shake one time and waited fourteen minutes and there were still three cars ahead of me. I was fine waiting, but I had a commitment I needed to keep and ended up driving off before I received my order. Not because I was impatient, but there came a point when I needed to get moving so that I could meet the deadline. This is not impatience on my part. It is simply having an objective. The impatience comes when I lose track of my attitude and allow my sin nature to take control.

God works this way with man. He is involved in all human affairs and He has foreordained specific times and events to come about. The people of Noah’s day lived almost ten times as long as we do in today’s organically-grown, medically-achieved nutritiously-protein-packed era. Does that mean He was more patient with Noah’s people than us today? Not at all!

God gave the people of Noah’s day 120 years to repent yet they did not. God’s patience was not what ran out; the clock ran out. The people did not meet their deadline. No pun intended.


Final Statement: God’s patience NEVER runs out. We run out.

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