Even in these challenging financial times, the greatest need of a Christian is not monetary. It is rather found in ColossiansΒ 1:11, where Paul prays that we might be
βStrengthened with all might, according to His glorious power, unto allβ¦β
Unto allΒ what? Whatever it is, Paul is convinced we are going to have to be βstrengthenedβ with βall mightβ according to βHis glorious powerβ to obtain it. As we read on, Paul tells us the goal of all this empowerment:
ββ¦unto all patience and longsuffering with joyfulness.β
Patience? The reason we need all this mighty empowering is so we can beΒ patient? While this mayΒ seemΒ anticlimactic, we submit thatΒ patienceΒ is our greatest need. We needΒ patienceto put up with the worldβs wickedness, the abortions, etc.,Β patienceΒ in knowing the Second Coming of Christ will right the worldβs wrongs. We needΒ patienceΒ as televangelists continue to dominate the airwaves with their dilutions and pollutions of the gospel, andΒ patienceΒ as Bible teachers muddle the minds of the saints by their failure to rightly divide the Word. And since no man today has the gift of healing, we need patience with our physical infirmities, and longsuffering as we wait for that wonderful change that will come to our bodies at the Rapture (Phil.Β 3:20,21).
Finally, we need patience withΒ one another, as we learn to not just put up with other believers, but to actually give them the same unconditional love and acceptance God extends to us. Moses was patient with unbelieving Pharaoh, but lost his patience with his brethren. How like us! But ask yourself, when did David show greater spiritual strength, when heΒ slewΒ Goliath, or when heΒ refusedΒ to slay Saul?
Paul says we are to be strengthened to all patience βaccording to His glorious power,β but what is Godβs glorious power? The destructive power He exhibited at the Red Sea is called βgloriousβ (Ex. 15:6), but we suggest that Godβs glorious powerΒ todayΒ is seen inΒ HisΒ patience. The fact that God could put an end to the abortions and religious confusion, but doesnβt, is His most glorious power in the dispensation of grace.
The apostle concludes by praying that we might be patient βwith joyfulness,β perhaps the hardest part of longsuffering. God doesnβt chafe under the vexations He receives from the world, religion, and the Body of Christ, and neither should we!
If this kind of power were not available to us, Paul would not be praying that we might have it. And so may his prayer also be the prayer of our hearts, as we enthusiastically study the onlyΒ sourceΒ of spiritual strength, Godβs Word rightly divided. source
