Imperfect Patience
Do you think God expects you to be perfectly patient?
Verse of the Day
“Then Abraham waited patiently, and he received what God had promised.”
Today’s Devotional
Abraham was a founding father of our faith. He is mentioned many times in the New Testament in terms of lineage and as an example of faith and obedience. Today’s verse specifically mentions his patience. This verse makes me smile, because it shows me that God does not expect perfection.
Abraham received a promise from God that his offspring would become a great nation. We see the beginning of Abraham’s story in Genesis 12. God tells him “I will make you into a great nation.” Years later, still with no children of his own, God reminds him that He will protect him and that his reward will be great. Abraham’s response is “What good are all your blessings when I don’t even have a son?” (Genesis 15:2) God’s response to Abraham is incredibly kind and patient. He has Abraham look at the stars and declares that Abraham’s descendants will be as numerous as the stars. “And Abram believed the Lord, and the Lord counted him as righteous because of his faith.” (Genesis 15:6)
Sometimes God asks us to believe in Him even when our circumstances try to convince us not to.
Later, Abraham and Sarah take matters into their own hands. Since it was taking longer than they expected for God to deliver on His promise of a child, Sarah suggests that Abraham take Hagar (Sarah’s slave) as a wife and conceive his heir through her, which he does. This creates a whole host of problems, which tends to happen when we take things into our own hands instead of waiting for God to act. (As a side note: I have a term I use in my life from this story. When I don’t want to force something, or when I’m afraid I am trying to force my will and my timeline, I tell my husband that I don’t want to “Hagar” the situation.)
YEARS later, God delivered a son to Abraham and Sarah. Not days. Not months. Years. In fact, I think it was 25 years from the time God originally told Abraham that He would make him into a great nation until Isaac was born. That’s a long time to wait for concrete evidence of God fulfilling His promise.
But here’s the lesson for me today: The New Testament holds Abraham up as a standard of faith, obedience, and patience. Yet he was not perfect. That tells me that God does not expect or require perfection from us today. He simply wants us to keep seeking Him. Keep learning what it means to follow Him with our thoughts, words, and actions. Keep coming back to Him when we get it wrong. Keep believing in Him even when we wrestle with doubt. The example of Abraham is one of persistence, not perfection. So as we seek to invite the Lord’s patience to flow in, through, and out of us, let’s not expect of ourselves what the Lord did not expect of Abraham.
Journal Prompts
Answer only the questions that seem relevant to you today.
Do you think God expects you to be perfectly patient? Why?
How are you impatient with your own imperfections? What do you think God wants to tell you about that?
How does the imperfection of Abraham encourage you today?
How can you embrace imperfect patience with God today? With yourself? With others?