Joyful Patient Faithful

DEVOTION

ROMANS

JOYFUL PATIENT FAITHFUL

Rom 12:9-13

9 Love must be sincere. Hate what is evil; cling to what is good. 10 Be devoted to one another in brotherly love. Honor one another above yourselves. 11 Never be lacking in zeal, but keep your spiritual fervor, serving the Lord. 12 Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer. 13 Share with God's people who are in need. Practice hospitality.

NIV

Joyful, patient and faithful are the subject of the moment, or we could focus on hope, affliction and prayer. Is it possible to lose hope, or to loss our joy because our hope is waning? How can our hope wane? That would seem unrealistic to even think our hope would diminish in the least bit, but the joy part is another thing. Of course we are always bombarded with supposed evidence that there is no one in whom we should have hope. We are also witnesses to believers who experience difficult situations. That age old saying about why do bad things happen to good people, is presented in that question, “why does God allow……”? Because we do not have the answer, we might allow that to steal our joy. What about those times when we feel things are not going the way we think they should? When we get upset, or get our feelings hurt, or experience the aches and pains that accompany age? Do we allow those things to steal our joy? Well, we have an excuse because it is someone else’s fault. No, it’s our fault, we give up the joy, we want to feel miserable, and it is our choice to remain joyful in hope or not. We should always have the joy that comes from expectation of what is to come, our eternal life. This affliction or tribulation, what other translations say, is more than likely referring to difficult times, rather than the period known as the tribulation. That is why affliction seems to explain the experience better. But even to be afflicted isn’t really what this Greek word means. To be under pressure, to be pressed or experience anguish. But why would we want to have anguish? Why would we want to allow ourselves to be burdened? Sometimes things just happen outside our control, but then it is time to be patient. Those times will pass, things will get better. We just have to wade through it. There is always an exit to a tunnel, but not a cave. Yet there is a way out of any situation and sometimes it is just a matter of being patient until we find that exit. Impatience only makes the matter worse, we get all wound up about what is happening in our life that we lose our patience. No, we have to remain steadfast and calm even in the storm, for we know Jesus will calm the storm in our life. That is another reason to remain hopeful as well and faithful in prayer. If we give up on prayer we have lost contact with our reason for hope. Although it seems that most prayer is about asking for God to do something for us, heal us, help us, or give us something and then we say thank you and leave. But prayer is nothing more then conversation with God, two way conversation, so we need to just shut up and listen. God has something to say. We always hear people say, God will either say, “yes, no, or not at this time”. But that is really limiting God to a short one word answer. Surely God is capable of longer sentences. We just have to be patient, listening and he will speak his truth into our heart. It is so difficult to get a word in edgewise with a person who just keeps talking and talking, babbling on and on. That defines most of our prayer time. We just keep babbling on and on about our needs, our wants, our troubles. Yes, God said to cast all our cares on him. Jesus said come on to me all you that are weary, or heavily burdened, I will give you rest. Well if we cast our cares why bother to reel them back in? It is alright to cast them, but then we need to see what God has to say about them. Listening is the best part of prayer and that we need to be faithful in. Let us remember to be joyfully patient in our faithfulness.