Forbearance

…being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God set forth as a propitiation by His blood, through faith, to demonstrate His righteousness, because in His forbearance God had passed over the sins that were previously committed…. 

Romans 3:24-25 

God takes His time in dealing with wrongdoing. We often wonder at this. We see various situations in which people are doing evil and we ask, ‘How long is God going to allow this to continue?’ This brings us to a discussion of His forbearance Forbearance  is the patient self-control and restraint He demonstrates in not immediately destroying someone, or a group of people who deserve it. We are often not so inclined. We want to see God deal swiftly and thoroughly with those we deem to be bad actors. God is not in such haste. The other part of this discussion within the context of our text is that God sent forth Christ to be, by His blood sacrifice, an appeasement of the wrath of God against sin as a demonstration of just how forbearing He had already been in human history. Had God been less forbearing, He would have wiped out all of humanity and started over. That He has tolerated the bad behavior of humanity for as long as He has demonstrates His remarkable forbearance. Christ’s sacrifice at the last stage of human history shows that God is good, not only in being forbearing, but in providing the cure for sin at His Own expense. He spared not His only Son.  

Our Great and Gracious God, 
we rejoice at how forbearing You have been with us. 
We praise You that You been both  
merciful and gracious. 

Tomm Tice
Where the Bush is Burning