"How to Wait Like Jesus" (James 5:7-11)

Welcome to the Reformed University Fellowship at UNCW Podcast! Each week, we will post the messages from our RUF Large Group meetings at UNCW. This semester, we are looking at how the Spirit of God transforms our relationships. This week, we’re looking at patience. The essence of patience is the willingness to endure suffering. Waiting is painful. And patience is the aspect of Jesus’s heart that God provides to us waiting in pain. James wants us to know that in these painful seasons of waiting, what we really need is not a change of circumstances outside us but a change inside our hearts. He reminds us that seeing God clearly helps us to wait for God faithfully. “Slow down. Don't be in a hurry. Life is long. Work hard, and the rewards will come. The dreams you have— some of them —will come true; those that don't will be replaced by others, maybe even better ones.… Being patient is what we aim for (or fail at) when sitting in traffic, standing in line, or waiting for a table. But the virtue of patience entails much more than merely waiting. The essence of patience is the willingness to endure suffering.” -- Karen Swallow Prior “All patience or impatience is ultimately patience or impatience with someone." — James Speigel “To stand in Heaven and look back on earth, and weigh them together in the balance, must transport the soul and make it cry out ... “O soul, are you not ashamed that you ever doubted the love that brought you here? Are you not ashamed of your hard thoughts of God and his providences, [lamenting] the ways that have led to such an end? Are you not sufficiently convinced that the ways you called hard and the cup you called bitter were necessary? The Lord had a sweeter purpose and meant better than you would believe. Your Redeemer was saving you as much when he crossed your desires as when he granted them, and he was saving you when he broke your heart as much as when he bound it up." -- Richard Baxter