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South Bay SDA Church

Jeremy Arnall

Growing Patience

I have to admit this whole thing of time is a curious thing, isn't it?

I mean when you're young it seems to crawl by at a snail's pace, especially when your birthday's around the corner.

Waiting for those birthdays when you're little, it took forever, but like a runaway car picking up momentum as it begins to roll down the hill so our lives seem to progress faster and faster with each passing year so that when we were little it seemed to crawl and when we are old it seems to fly.

The way I've come to understand this whole notion of time is that for a child they have very little to compare to.

I mean you understand this, maybe you young people never heard this.

But when you're little you don't have much to compare time with.

And so for a while, for a year, I mean for a five-year-old, a year only represents one-fifth of your life, right?

But if you're 70, a year only represents one-seventieth of your life.

You have to be careful here I remember when I was at Bowman Hills up in Cleveland I was 1 of my first it's my first sermon and I preached this is an aside I preached on Moses talked about how long 40 years was.

I just went on, I really accentuated this point.

And I went on about how long 40, well, little did I know, I think he was the head elder at the time, the head elder's wife was sitting in the balcony and was just celebrating her 40th birthday.

Well, needless to say, that made a deep impression on this lady and she let me know about it and then I went on and pastored in Crossville and then I was in Greenville and on my 40th birthday I got a card.

I just laughed and laughed and I went back and stopped by those folks' house and told her how much I appreciated the card.

Big difference perspective offers, right?

So it makes sense then, doesn't it, that when in Peter we read that for God, a day is as 1, 000 years and 1, 000 years as a day, well, we kind of get the idea, don't we?

Yet there's this almost contradictory idea of time crawling and flying at the same time.

For example, parents will sometimes say when it comes to raising their children, the days are long, but what?

I don't usually do this to them, but wave mom, dad, wave, mama.

But what about the elderly woman in the wheelchair at the nursing home?

She looks out the window, and as 1 author put it, she looks out with a blank stare as though death has lost her address.

You know that even though a day is like a thousand years for God, it doesn't mean that God isn't long-suffering as he anxiously waits to bring his children home.

1 of its primary demands is that of patience.

Repeatedly throughout Scripture we are encouraged to be patient.

It's noted as 1 of the qualities of the saints in Revelation 14 12.

Here are those who keep the commandments and have the faith of Jesus.

And God, in spite of the fact that a thousand years is a day for him, is still patient.

For 2 Peter 3, 9 says that he is patient towards you, not willing that any should perish.

The dictionary defines patience and I quote, the capacity to accept or tolerate delay, trouble, or suffering without getting angry or upset.

Perhaps 1 of the biggest ways in which we are led to experience patience in our lives is with growth.

For example, when a child is young, They want to grow so they might see life from the perspective of an adult.

They long to grow But sometimes growth seems elusive at best Some things are beyond our control We had a doorframe in the boys room at home at our last home where Tina would mark in their height with the passing of time.

And so we would date that particular line, and we would have Jordan's side and we would have Jason's side.

We would then look at the metrics and we would appreciate their growth.

We would realize that contrary to the fact that they seemed a little bigger, that when we looked at the door frame, you hearing this?

When we looked at the doorframe, when we looked at the metric, we could realize that growth had occurred much faster than we realized.

We had a way to see, a means by which we could measure growth.

But then periodically we would encounter what was called or some call a growth spurt.

It would be accompanied by an increase in appetite, perhaps more needed rest at the time of the growth spurt.

Growing pains would often accompany the growth spurt.

Some things are very similar to the spiritual walk.

And then, return to the doorframe to measure, and yes, you would soon discover that your suspicions were true.

The sleepiness in the evenings, the appetite being increased, and the pain in the ankles and the legs, what we thought it was a growth spurt.

Of course, this notion of growing and growth spurts occurs in the spiritual realm as well, but as with children wanting to grow tall, so spiritual growth requires patience.

This morning I'd like to encourage you to embrace it as God seeks to grow it in you.

To do this, I would like to have us look at the spiritual growth and hence patience required of Christ's disciples, especially those places where growth spurts occurred in their ministry.

Title of the message is Growing Patience.

Please Lord, would you help us to see clearly your will for us.

Would you would you help us to see the need for patience, patience with others, and yes even patience with ourselves.

Trusting in your timeline and trusting in your will, trusting in what we cannot see, but we can through faith.

Open your Bibles this morning to John chapter 1.

John chapter 1, we want to read a little bit about the disciples' encounter, first encounter with Jesus.

As you're turning there, I want to just sort of run through the timeline with you.

After 40 days of temptation in the wilderness, well first his baptism, and then going into the wilderness for 40 days, Jesus comes back to the area where John the Baptist had been preaching and there garnered a following of some of John's disciples.

Jesus was baptized in 27 AD as we noticed at the campout, exactly as the prophecy predicted on time, right?

He goes into the wilderness where he's tempted.

He then comes back, he receives his disciples.

There's the wedding at Cana, then he goes on to visit Capernaum, and then there's the first Passover which they celebrate, which begins his Judean ministry with the cleansing of the temple.

Then there's the end of his Judean ministry when he leaves Judea to Galilee, then there is the rejection that is experienced there at Nazareth, then there's a return to Capernaum, a call then of the disciples by the sea, which then followed by the first Galilean tour.

Now, that's quite a bit of stuff, and I just want to make it clear that that represents what I just described there, almost 2 years.

It went from the fall of 27 AD to late summer of 29 AD.

Keep that timeline in your mind and well, Yeah, keep that timeline in your mind.

Because there's also this paralytic Lord through the roof, there's the plucking of grain on the Sabbath, and man with a withered hand.

And then there's the appointment of the 12th.

That is the whole period of almost 2 years.

I want you to notice that the path the disciples took to where they first meet Jesus and then are appointed as the 12, if you will, was a process that took considerable amount of time.

Now let's consider the biblical narrative.

The account of this initial gathering of disciples is found in John chapter 1 verse 35.

Again, the next day John stood with 2 of his disciples and looking at Jesus as he walked he said, Behold the Lamb of God.

The 2 disciples heard him speak and they followed Jesus.

Then Jesus turned and what does the text say?

And seeing them, followed them and said to them, what do you seek?

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Growing Patience

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