Christ’s Bearing With Others

Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love.

Ephesians 4:2

What does it mean to bear with one another in love?  It means that we are willing to put up with each other’s idiosyncrasies out of love for one another.  This is a Christlike quality.  Christ was willing to bear with the glitches and twitches of a great number of people.  The disciples come to mind.  One of them was a political radical.  Another was a foul-mouthed fisherman.  Two of them were hot-heads.  Christ bore with these and others.  What was wonderful was that Christ could see the end from the beginning. He could bear with the idiosyncrasies of the disciples knowing what they would become in due course of time as He sanctified them.  What we know of bearing with one another we will learn from Christ.  No one else has loved as He has loved.  No one else could have less reason to put up with our twitches and yet show more forbearance.  If we are going to learn, we must look to Christ to teach us how to bear with one another in love as He sanctifies us all.  He has done all things well.  As we daily look to Christ, as the Great Example of forbearance, we can discern how to bear with one another in love. 

Our Good and Gracious God,
we rejoice that You set Christ before us.
We praise You that as we look to Him,
we learn to imitate Him
and bear with one another in love.

Tomm Tice
Where the Bush is Burning