I have a confession to make. Patience is my favorite attribute of God because it’s personal to me. My sister and I were saved and baptized in the First Baptist Church in our hometown when I was 12 years old. Later I became a backslider for the next 40 years until I was finally restored to fellowship with God. That entire time a loving God relentlessly pursued me, not willing to let me go. God crossed my path so many time and in so many ways it was obvious even to my dull mind that I was being hunted. Without a doubt God was stalking me, seeking to restore me to fellowship with a loving Father. It was the story of the prodigal son but on a personal level. God is sometimes referred to as, “the Hound of Heaven,” and I can personally attest to that. Imagine that, the Creator of all things, loving me enough to chase me for 40years without losing His patience. In my life, God’s patience has made all the difference. The following Scripture is true; you have my testimony:
Hebrews 13:5 – I will never leave you nor forsake you.
The Old Testament prophets knew well the patience of Almighty God. How many times in the Bible did the Israelites provoke God to the point of wrath? More than I can count. But each time God pleaded over and over for their repentance and patiently waited for Israel to stop their sinning ways. God waited patiently for 40 years while the Israelites wandered in the wilderness because of their sin. Only as a last resort did God punish Israel. This cycle repeats itself throughout history. God’s patience is inexhaustible. Even today, over 2,000 years after the rejection and crucifixion of Jesus by the Jews, God is still patiently waiting for His chosen people to return to His bosom. This will finally happen at the Second Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ when the Jewish remnant will finally confess Jesus as Lord and be saved.
2 Peter 3:9 – The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some count slackness, but is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.
Nehemiah 9:19 – Yet in Your manifold mercies You did not forsake them in the wilderness. The pillar of the cloud did not depart from them by day, to lead them on the road; nor the pillar of fire by night, to show them light, and the way they should go.
Psalm 86:13 – For great is Your mercy toward me, and You have delivered my soul from the depths of Sheol.
Nahum 1:3 – The Lord is slow to anger and great in power, and will not at all acquit the wicked.