the Fourth Week after Easter
Click here to learn more!
Daily Devotionals
John Gossner's Treasury
Here is the patience and the faith of the saints. Revelation 13:10. Be followers of them who through faith and patience inherit the promises. Hebrews 6:12. Knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience; but let patience have her perfect work. James 1:3-4.
When gold is cast into the fire, it can be seen whether it is gold or only slag, false splendor and glitter. You say that you have faith? Has your faith been tried? Has it been in the fire of tribulation? Have you "patience" also? Faith without patience is not a faith pleasing to God. Therefore St. Paul says, "All men have not faith" (2 Thessalonians 3:2). Why? Patience is something seldom found. You can easily memorize the language of faith and repeat the words fluently but the patience of true faith often lags behind on the mountainside, when the trail is uneven and crooked. Some give evidence of patience in the beginning; but they do not endure; their patience does not bring forth any perfect work; it stands on such weak legs because it does not rely on the Man of Patience, who alone is able to sustain it. Such a person has built his house on sand and babbling words from which no power ever enters the heart. When the floods and the storms of temptation come, the straw-shed of weak faith tumbles down, or the fire of tribulation consumes it. Such a result does not require persecutions, fire and sword, in which trials the first Christians held their ground so gloriously. All that is necessary, is that illness or other bodily need befall; no patience is found in such a chattering Christian even though you search for it with a lantern. If a person, when death is near, be terror stricken, he endures that in a way; but if the danger of death be past, there is no more faith and patience. Let him who feels that he is in such a condition, pray that his faith be increased; let him whose faith has not yet been tried, take heed, lest he fall.
When we seek relief
From a long felt grief;
When temptations come alluring,
Make us patient and enduring;
Show us that bright shore
Where we weep no more.
