[AI translation] The apostle James, a dear brother of our Lord Jesus, once wrote these words which are now spoken among us. The whole content of this excerpt from his letter can be contained in this two-word warning, "Be of good cheer." All the rest of it is an elaboration, an explanation, a justification of this warning. Five times in a row, the word forbearance, the word patience, is used. The apostle asserts that impatience is a sign of unbelief, because impatience is a sign that one does not expect Jesus to come in glory. Yet the Judge who is approaching to judge the world is already at the door, and faith that he will appear will save one from many impatient doubts. Our faith that the coming of Jesus is possible at any moment: especially in suffering and in our dealings with unpleasant people, is a great strength, help and consolation - the faith that Jesus, appearing in heavenly glory, is already at the door, teaches and enables us to adopt one of the most difficult attitudes: patience. This is what the apostle is talking about.Patience is what every living person needs. It is a particularly topical issue today, this Sunday, when the attention of our congregation turns to the elderly and the sick. For it is so difficult to bear with real patience a prolonged illness or the increasing burdens of advanced age! And so many problems are caused by the impatience of the old with the young, and the impatience of the young with the old - or so soon the patience of the healthy with the sick, and vice versa! And it is true that the more patience we lose, the more bitterness grows, poisoning our own hearts and those around us.
To be patient is like standing in front of a door that should open, but has not yet opened, it is still closed, and we have to wait. Waiting even when we feel we can't take it any longer. Many times in life we are faced with such closed doors. It may be a person with whom you are tied at work or in the family or in the house, from whom you have to put up with a lot, with whom you can't seem to find a tolerable communion, no matter how many times you have tried. It may be some kind of inhibition, a natural condition that you cannot change, no matter how hard you try. Or it could be a pain, a wound in the soul that weighs on his whole life, casting a shadow over all joy. Or unfortunate circumstances, seemingly insurmountable problems from which there is simply no way out! Or perhaps a disease, or a feeling of disability, of helplessness, of old age, in which one recognises the gloomy harbinger of impending death. There are many kinds of closed doors, our lives are full of situations where common sense dictates: patience! But it is in vain, because there is none, or if there was, it has run out, and one is upset, out of patience... Even the most impatient person sighs and complains: 'Well, I'm really patient, but I've been waiting for so long, the door won't open, I can't stand it any longer! All I ever hear is patience, patience, patience - but one day my patience will run out!
Yes: that is our patience, which reveals that it is not patience. It is then that it becomes clear that our patience is only a thin layer of ice over the deep waters of impatience, which only covers the anxiety and doubt that is surging in the depths of our soul - but it does not last, it breaks under the slightest strain, and then one begins to sink in the waves of one's own despair. Indeed, we do not yet have true peace of mind, we are incapable of true long-suffering. Our patience is conditioned, it is conditioned to believe that one day it will be the way I want it to be, that one day what I long for will come true, that one day the door I have been knocking at for so long will open. Our patience is nothing more than a false hope to fool our inner restlessness: we imagine our own desires coming true, and from this idea we impose calmness on ourselves, and with this idea we quiet our impatience. If it then turns out that this idea was not realistic, the whole patience we have imposed on ourselves collapses with it!
But the patience of which the apostle speaks is quite different. This patience is not set on imagined improvement in a difficult situation, but on the living God! And not on a hoped-for act of God that will finally open the door, but on God himself, the God who acts, the God who acts sovereignly, that is, even against my ideas. So for a patient, the source of patience is not that the expected healing will come through God's grace, but that he knows himself to be in the hands of God, who acts graciously in his illness, and waits patiently to see what will come out of God's acting in this way with him. Perhaps He wants to bring down some pride and selfishness, or perhaps He wants to bring him to a deeper knowledge of man and love of man, or perhaps He wants to use his patience to testify to others that it is possible to suffer in this way! I once saw a dear child of God lying sick in a hospital bed - he was blind and deaf. He was also in pain. But the superhuman patience with which he bore his fate without a word, without complaint, caused such deep consternation in the whole ward that it gave the other patients strength for their own suffering. Such patience never leads to darkness, hopelessness, hopelessness. This patience never fails, because even in the most desperate of situations, it knows that there is a certain help, a help that does not solve some problem of a troubled person's life, but something more: a help that is life-embracing, that embraces and saves the whole person: salvation! This patience knows that this door is always open to him, and it also knows that perhaps it is precisely because many other doors are closed that he is forced to enter, or to keep re-entering, this open door... And this tolerance also knows that behind the senselessness of all the darkness of life lies a divine intelligence that transcends all understanding, a God of mercy himself. This forbearance knows that there is a connection between sin and forgiveness, death and resurrection, and is therefore directed towards a God for whom all things are possible.
This patience also waits, but it waits for God. It is also patience that stands before the many closed doors of life that refuse to open to our wishing and our pushing. But it also knows why that door has not yet opened. It is because God has not opened it. But He can open it if He will. So, in the end, it is not the opening of the door that He is waiting for, but God. A very illustrative example of patience is given here by the apostle: "The ploughman waits for the precious fruit of the ground, he waits with patience until he receives the morning and evening rains." The sprouting and growth of the sown seed cannot be hurried. Only one thing can be done once the seed has been sown: entrust it to the One who gives the growth and the fruit. The sower waits, he knows he must wait, but he also knows what he is waiting for. Even if he sees no sign of the coming harvest, he knows that in his own time the spring rains will come, the seed will sprout, and the harvest will come. Knowing this, he can wait. That is his patience.
And such is the patience of which the apostle speaks. The great divine sowing has taken place. By the coming to earth and death of Jesus, God has sown in this world of ours the seed of a new world to come: the seed of eternal life has been planted in the earth. At Easter, the heavenly seed sprouted from the earth, and has been ripening for harvest ever since. The full ripening of the fruit of Jesus' redemptive death, the final unfolding of his triumph, is yet to come, and now all the events in the world, like the morning and evening rains, are ripening this world for harvest. Patience means: I know that something greater than the opening of the tiny doors of my individual desires and plans is at hand, the rebirth of the whole life, the ripening of the fruits of redemption for the whole world is at hand. This is not about my petty little affairs, but about Jesus, what He did on the cross and in the tomb, what He is doing now, what He will bring when He comes. To see life from this perspective: that is true patience! Let's face it: God cannot use me, in this great work, in this great concept of His whole redemption, to fit me as I am, as I am. That is why He closes certain doors to me - that is why He takes away from me perhaps things that would keep me busy - that is why the sky sometimes overcasts us, why the morning and evening rains only ripen the crops for harvest. This is what the apostle means when he exhorts us, "Be of good courage, therefore, brethren, and strengthen your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is near."
Precisely because this is the case, he adds, "Do not groan against one another; behold, the Judge stands at the door." He who sees his life in such a grand conception cannot be put out of his peace by the mischievous vexations, annoyances, injustices of men. If I truly believe in God, He is the only active factor in my life, not people, not circumstances. All people can only be His instrument: either as a kind warm hand with which He caresses my life, or as a scrubbing brush with which, again, He cleanses, shapes, forms me. So, if I am praised, no glory goes to my head - if I am hurt, if I am attacked, no bitterness can come to me. The scrubbing-brush is not to be offended if he scrubs, for that is his task. And it does not do it of itself, but in the hand of another, and He scrubs with it: a pierced, bloody hand! Oh, how much of our wasted energy is wasted in fighting with the brush because it might rub blood on us - or the hoe because it might cut our blood. The brush or hoe may be malicious in itself, but it cuts exactly where it should.
Do you know when we are truly free from people and when we have no inhibitions or prejudices against them? When we ourselves are dependent on Jesus and can see them in that dependence on Jesus. And we must be free from men, without groaning, in order to be free to serve them. For their good, for their benefit. Indiscriminately for everyone! To this the apostle says, do not sigh against one another, for woe is useless to bear with one another sometimes! In such situations I always think how terribly difficult it must be for God to bear with me! With what infinite patience He troubles me, what is this that I have to endure?! Thus it is written in the famous hymn of love, "Love is long-suffering" (1 Cor 13:4). And not only with me, but also with the one with whom my patience has run out. And behind the other person, Jesus himself is always asking: Do you love me?
There is no man behind whom Jesus does not ask this of us! That is why our Word warns us, "Do not groan one against another, brothers, lest you be condemned"! Behold, He who, from behind another man, asks, "Do you love me? Let us then be tolerant in all situations, with all kinds of people: old with young, young with old; healthy with the sick and vice versa; tenants with tenants - in view of the coming of the Lord! Our restless, impatient hearts will indeed be quieted, and will be able to wait with patience, if they express their sincere plea in this song:
I wait, Lord, with a heart of hope,
As watchful watches for the dawn in the night;
Bring me thy fair day in the morning,
That I may serve thee with a more earnest mind.
(Canto 226, verse 3)
Amen.
Date: 8 June 1969 (Old and Sick Sunday).
Lesson
Zsolt 13