How patient are you? The closer you get to the end of the New Testament, the more the word ‘patience’ and its bedfellow ‘perseverance’ begin to dominate.
If you live your life purely in the book of Acts, reading about church planting, city riots, earthquakes smashing open prison bars, and the gospel racing from Jerusalem to Rome at breakneck speed, you might get the wrong impression of what faithful gospel ministry looks like.
Yes, there are moments of both glorious, Spirit-inspired breakthrough and other seasons of crisis, when you can almost feel Satan’s breath on your shoulder. But for a whole lot of Christian ministry there is that need for quiet, faithful endurance, when nothing particularly exciting seems to be happening, either good or bad. And that’s when the words ‘patience’ and ‘perseverance’ come to the fore.
