What is the Patience of God?
The Patience of God is His willingness and power to suffer the wrongs of sinners against Himself by temporarily withholding His righteous judgment.
To exercise patience is to suffer. In Genesis 6:6 we see it very clearly, that the wickedness of man “grieves” God to His heart. But why does He willingly endure such evil against Himself? Especially since He might righteously judge it at any time. In an instant and with a word He could erase every single wicked thing in existence. Every sinner is at His total mercy at every point in time. There is no advantage to be gained against Him, and there is no possible challenge to His almighty power. All the scorn and blasphemy that is heaped upon Him every day, every strike and act of violence against His image, every hateful defiling word that rises as a stench in His holy nostrils – there is nothing whatsoever stopping Him from arising in less than a moment and obliterating all in His righteous judgment. He could stop the befouling mouths of every sinner instantly and justly condemn them to eternal damnation. All of this God could have done at any point in history… but He doesn’t. Why? Because He is willing to suffer such wrongs against Himself for a higher purpose. That’s what the patience of God really is.
The patience of God is also an attitude in the heart of God, a willingness on His part to suffer the wrongs of sinners against Himself. The Puritan Swinnock puts it like this: “Patience is that attribute in God whereby He beareth with sinners, and forbears or defers their punishment, or that whereby He expecteth and waiteth long for their conversion” (Swinnock, The Incomparableness of God, p.51). Psalm 103:8, and a number of other passages, say that He is “slow to anger.” His patience is thus clearly a bearing with sin. We’ve already seen in Genesis 6:6 that God’s patience likewise brings the suffering of grief to the heart of God. Grief is a pain of mind and heart, an affliction of sorrow, and it is this sorrow and pain that God willingly endures in His patience.
In our definition I also refer to patience as God’s power to suffer – with emphasis on the word power. Romans 9:22 says: “What if God, desiring to show his wrath and to make known his power, has endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction.” In allowing the wicked to continue in their ways, this verse shows us that God has made known His power through His patience. But how does God’s patience make known His power? When people get angry, our anger is often quickly known. We are often mastered by our passions and emotions. Have you ever struggled to hold back your anger? By comparison we might say that God’s anger is immeasurably greater than our own, and what’s more it is entirely justified, righteous, and holy. And yet His power is displayed in His ability to maintain absolute control over His anger. He is not mastered by His anger, but gives full and righteous vent to it at the time of His choosing. How unfathomably difficult this is to comprehend, especially when we consider that the height of our offences against Him are beyond reckoning! In every moment every person is committing some vile desecration of the divine image in man, and yet God has the capacity to withhold His righteous anger, and not just for a day or a moment, but even for centuries! The power revealed in the patience of God is almost entirely alien to us, and yet as we begin to grasp it we dimly perceive its immensity – and a certain awe begins to dawn in our hearts.
As to God’s patience being a withholding of His righteous judgment, Numbers 14 shows this very clearly. As the children of Israel stood on the precipice of the promised land, they did not go in, but grumbled against God, and remained in unbelief. In response, God said to Moses: “How long will this people despise Me? And how long will they not believe in Me, in spite of all the signs that I have done among them? I will strike them with the pestilence and disinherit them, and I will make of you a nation greater and mightier than they” (Num 14:11). Moses then pleaded with the Lord for mercy, and his appeal for the deferment of this judgment was on the basis of God’s patience, for Moses knew that He was “slow to anger” (14:18). And so we see that the judgment that God would have executed was withheld – which is part of the essence of His patience. In Jonah 4:2 the prophet likewise recognizes God’s willingness to hold back judgment in the case of Nineveh. Nahum 1:2-3 similarly highlights that God is slow to anger, patiently bearing with the sins of men before bringing His judgment to bear.
The final important word to consider in our definition is the word temporary. God’s patience is a temporary withholding of his righteous judgment. Although “the LORD is slow to anger and great in power,” as a righteous judge He “will by no means clear the guilty” (Nahum 1:2). In other words, His patience has limits, the most significant of which is that it is limited to this life only. God’s patience is a temporal reality. In the next life there will be no patience withholding His judgment against the wicked. For the saints also, in the grace of God, we will (astoundingly!) no longer require God’s patience, for He will have perfected us in Christ! And yet His patience shall endure in the sense that praise for the wonders of His patience shall resound continually and throughout all eternity.
Soli Deo Gloria!