LONGSUFFERING OF GOD
The New Testament urges Christians to be longsuffering.
Please listen to some of the passages that stress that characteristic of the
Christian life. "But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace,
longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance: against such
there is no law" (Gal. 5:22-23). In his great treatise on love, Paul
insisted: "Love suffers long" (literally, love is longsuffering) (1
Cor. 13:4). Paul told the Ephesians: "I therefore, the prisoner of the
Lord, beseech you that you walk worthy of the vocation wherewith you were
called, with all lowliness and meekness, with longsuffering, forbearing one
another in love" (Eph. 4:1-2). The King James Version renders the Greek
"patience" in the following verse: "Take, my brethren, the
prophets, who have spoken unto you in the name of the Lord, for an example of
suffering affliction, and of patience" (Jas. 5:10). Incidentally, a
different Greek word (hupomone)
is used in the next verse of Job. That
word should be translated "endurance" - not patience or longsuffering
- because Job was not longsuffering.
As vital as it is for Christians to cultivate the virtue of
longsuffering, my topic today is not man's, but God's longsuffering. The Hebrew
word translated "longsuffering" literally means long of face or
anger. The Greek word means of a long mind. The Old Testament uses the word
very infrequently. The book of Exodus reports: "And the Lord passed by
before him (Moses), and proclaimed, The Lord, the Lord God, merciful and
gracious, longsuffering, and abundant in goodness and truth" (Ex. 34:6).
King David prayed: "But thou, 0 Lord, art a God full of compassion, and
gracious, longsuffering, and plenteous in mercy and truth" (Psa. 86: 15).
Jeremiah pled with the Lord: "Take me not away in thy longsuffering: know
that for thy sake I have suffered rebuke" (Jer. 15:15).
There were people in the first century who doubted the
return of Jesus Christ. The Apostle Peter referred to such people as scoffers
or mockers and said they were asking: "Where is the promise of his coming?
For since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the
beginning of creation." The apostle accused the scoffers of being
willingly ignorant. He corrected them: "Be not ignorant of this one thing,
that one day is with the Lord as a
thousand years, and a thousand years as one day." Please listen to the
next verse. "The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men
count slackness; but is longsuffering to us, not willing that any should
perish, but that all should come to repentance" (2 Pet. 3:3-4, 8-9). Verse
9 will serve as the basis for our study today.
It should be obvious from the Apostle Peter's words that
God's timetable and man's timetable are not exactly the same. When men like
John Hagee, Jack Van Impe, Hal Lindsey and similar false prophets argue we are
living during the time when the Lord will likely come, they are trying to
insert themselves into the very mind of God. Are they trying to tell God when
to send Jesus back to claim his own? But do those men actually make such
unfounded predictions? What do you suppose Hal Lindsey had in mind by writing
the books, The 1980s: Countdown to Armageddon (New York:
Bantam Books, 1980) and The Terminal Generation (Old
Tappan: Fleming H. Revell Company, 1976)? Jack Van Impe's books, The
Final Mysteries Unsealed (Nashville: Word Publishing, 1998) and 2001:
On the Edge of Eternity (Dallas: Word Publishing, 1996), promote the
same wild speculations. In one of his latest books, Jerusalem Countdown:
A Warning to the World (Lake Mary, FL: FrontLine, 2006), Hagee
foolishly says: "I believe my generation will live to see Him sitting on
David's throne on the Temple Mount in the city of Jerusalem, bringing a Golden
Age of Peace to the world. It's coming much sooner than you think" (p.
192)! Hagee is probably in his sixties. Is he saying that Christ will be
sitting on David's throne in the next fifteen or twenty years? I have news for
John Hagee: Christ is already sitting on David's throne, according to Luke
(Acts 2:29-36). It ought to be obvious that no one knows the time of the Lord's
return. Is that not what Jesus specifically and emphatically taught? "But
of that day and hour no man knows, no, not the angels in heaven, but my Father
only" (Mt. 24:36). Do these men know the meaning of the word
"only?"
The scoffers were arguing, in effect, since he has not come
as he promised, he is not coming. Did those scoffers need a course in logic?
Peter told them: "The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some
men count slackness." The word translated "slack" means to be
slow, to delay or to fall short of. The word is translated "tarry" in
Paul's letter to Timothy. "These things I write unto you, hoping to come
unto you shortly. But if I tarry long, that you might know how you ought to
behave yourself in the house of God, which is the church of the living God, the
pillar and ground of the truth" (1 Tim. 3: 14-15). The scoffers were
accusing the Lord of not fulfilling his promises. But not one time does the
Bible ever tell men when Christ will return. In fact, the Lord does not even
give a hint regarding the time of Christ's second coming.
God made many promises - both in the Old Testament and in
the New. God promised the Israelites he would deliver them from Egyptian
bondage. It took over four hundred years for that promise to be realized.
Through Jeremiah, God told the Israelites they would spend seventy years in
Do you remember the promises God made through Moses to the
Israelites? I shall read a few from Deuteronomy. Please notice that the
promises begin with the word "if." "And it shall come to pass,
if you shall hearken diligently unto the voice of the Lord your God, to observe
and to do all his commandments which I command you this day, that the Lord your
God will set you on high above all nations of the earth: and all these
blessings shall come upon you, and overtake you, if you shall hearken unto the
voice of the Lord your God. Blessed shall you be in the city, and blessed shall
you be in the field. Blessed shall be the fruit of your body, and the fruit of
your ground, and the fruit of your cattle, the increase of your cattle, and the
flocks of your sheep" (Dt. 28:1-4). If you have doubts about whether these
blessings were conditioned on the obedience of the Israelites, read the rest of
that chapter.
The Apostle Peter affirmed: "The Lord ... is
longsuffering toward us." The Apostle Paul asked the Romans: "Do you
despise the riches of his (God's) goodness and forbearance and longsuffering:
not knowing that the goodness of God leads you to repentance" (Rom. 2:4)?
Peter tells us that Christ went and preached to the spirits in prison;
"which sometime were disobedient, when once the longsuffering of God
waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was a preparing, wherein few, that
is, eight souls were saved by water" (I Pet. 3:19-20). The same apostle
told his readers: "And account that the longsuffering of our Lord is
salvation; even as our beloved brother Paul also according to the wisdom given
unto him has written unto you" (2 Pet. 3:15). Were it not for the
longsuffering of God no one would be saved.
There is a passage in the book of Genesis that demonstrates
God's longsuffering. God told Abraham: "Know of a surety that your seed
shall be a stranger in a land that is not theirs, and shall serve them; and
they shall afflict them four hundred years. And also that nation, whom they
shall serve, I will judge: and afterward they shall come out with great
substance. And you shall go to your fathers in peace; you shall be buried in
good old age. But in the fourth generation they shall come hither again: for
the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet full" (Gen. 15:13-16). In his
commentary, Exposition o/Genesis (Grand Rapids: Baker Book
House, 1975, a Reprint), Dr. H. C. Leupold makes this observation: "So God
will allow the children of
Peter teaches very plainly: "God is longsuffering to
us, not willing that any should perish." The Bible makes it plain that God
does not want anyone to be lost. The word "perish" is the same Greek
word Jesus used in his discussion with Nicodemus. "As Moses lifted up the
serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up: that
whosoever believes in him should not perish; but have eternal life. For God so
loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son that whosoever believes in
him should not perish, but have everlasting life. For God sent not in his Son
into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through him might be
saved" (John 3: 14-17). Is that not also the idea Paul taught Timothy?
"For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior; who will
have all men to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth" (1
Tim. 2:3-4).
God desires all men to come to repentance. The word
"repentance" signifies a change of mind. In this context, the word
means the whole process of conversion. In connection with the conversion of
Cornelius, the Apostle Peter used the word "repentance" in the same
way it is used in our text. The Apostle Peter defended his visit to the house
of Cornelius, a Gentile. He concluded his defense: "Forasmuch then as God
gave them (the Gentiles) the like gift as he did unto us, who believed on the
Lord Jesus Christ; who was I, that I could withstand God?" When the other
apostles and Christians "heard these things, they held their peace, and
glorified God, saying, Then has God also to the Gentiles granted repentance
unto life" (Acts 11:17-18). In very simple language: God had made it
possible through the death and resurrection of our Lord for the Gentiles to
turn from sin to salvation, from Satan to our Savior.
Robert Shank has written two great books on Calvinism. His
first book, Life in the Son: A Study of the Doctrine of Perseverance (Springfield, MO:
Westcott Publishers, 1961), is the most devastating critique of the doctrine of
once in grace, always in grace, I have ever found. His second book, Elect
in the Son: A Study of the Doctrine of Election (Springfield, MO:
Westcott Publishers, 1970), is equally devastating to the Calvinistic doctrine
of unconditional election. Dr. William Adams, a theology professor at Southern
Baptist Theological Seminary in
Robert Shank calls Calvin's treatment of 2 Peter 3:9
"artificial." He quotes Calvin's comments on the expression,
"not willing that any should perish": "So wonderful is his love
towards mankind that he would have them all saved, and is of his own self
prepared to bestow salvation on the lost. ... But it may be asked, If God
wishes none to perish, why is it that so many do perish? To this my answer is
that no mention is here made of the hidden purpose of God, according to which
the reprobate are doomed to their own ruin, but only of his will as made known
in the gospel. For God there stretches forth his hand without a difference to
all, but lays hold only of those, to lead them to himself, whom he has
chosen before the foundation of the world." Please listen to Robert
Shank's response to Calvin. "Thus the will of God that no man perish, as
affirmed by Peter, is nullified by 'the hidden purpose of God, according to
which the reprobate are doomed to their own ruin.' Here again is Calvin's
fundamental fallacy, the assumption that the will of God is monothetic. (The word
"monothetic" means posing just one essential element). His false
assumption requires Calvin to assert that in the Gospel 'God stretches forth
his hand without a difference to all,' but with the hidden design of laying
hold of only those 'whom he has chosen before the foundation of the world"
(p. 95).
Before I make further comments on 2 Peter 3:9, I must
answer Calvin's question, "If God wishes none to perish, why is it that so
many do perish?" In words so simple no one should miss their import, the
apostle Paul told the Romans: "They have not all obeyed the gospel"
(Rom. 10: 16). Even though "the gospel is the power of God unto
salvation" (Rom. 1: 16), it will not save anyone who does not obey it. Is
that not also the lesson Paul taught the Thessalonians? God will take
''vengeance on them who know not God and that obey not the gospel of our Lord
Jesus Christ: who shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the
presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power" (2 Thess. 1:8-9).
Jesus himself said: "He who believes and is baptized shall be saved; but
he who does not believe shall be condemned" (Mk. 16: 16). All who believe
the gospel and obey it from the heart will be saved. Those who do not believe
and obey the gospel will be lost. And God is no respecter of persons (Acts
10:32-34).
John Calvin taught and radical Calvinists teach that God
predestined certain people to be saved and certain people to be lost. Is that
really what John Calvin taught? In his book, Elect in the Son,
Robert Shank quotes these words from John Calvin: "By predestination
we mean the eternal decree of God by which he determined with himself whatever
he wished to happen with regard to every man. All are not created on equal
terms, but some are preordained to eternal life, others to eternal damnation;
and, accordingly as each has been created for one or other of these ends, we
say that he has been predestinated to life to or to death" (p. 47).
If what John Calvin taught in this brief excerpt is true,
what is the meaning of the longsuffering of God? If men are predestined to
either heaven or hell, they will surely be consigned to those destinies
regardless of the longsuffering of God. And if God is willing that all should
come to repentance, how can we speak of predestination? Tragically, the
doctrine of predestination is an abominable doctrine. It completely eliminates
the free will of man. But every serious Bible student knows that God has given
men and women free will. If we do not have free will, why does the last chapter
of the great book of Revelation teach: "And the Spirit and the bride say,
Come. And let him who hears say, Come. And let him who is athirst come. And
whosoever will, let him take of the water of life freely" (Rev. 22:17)?
If we do not have free will, why is the Bible from beginning to end filled with commands? Did not Paul tell the Philippian jailer: "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and you shall be saved, and your house" (Acts 16:31)? The tense of the verb "believe" indicates urgency. In other words, Paul commanded the jailer to believe at once. Peter commanded the Jews on Pentecost to repent and to be baptized (Acts 2:38). Both verbs, "repent" and "be baptized" are aorist imperative and demand immediate action. Could the Philippian jailer and the people on Pentecost choose to obey the gospel or to reject it? If they chose to obey it but they were not among the elect, what good would it do them? If they chose not to obey the gospel but were among the elect, would they not be saved anyway?
If Calvinism were a legitimate approach to the scriptures,
I cannot understand what the longsuffering of God has to do with our salvation.
But you know what the longsuffering of God means to fallen men and women. It
means that God would be justified in sending us to hell without a second
thought. But because of his great love for us, he patiently waits for us to
leave the life of sin and turn to him for salvation. We must remember that
God's grace is wonderful beyond our comprehension, but God's grace will not
believe, confess, repent and be baptized for us. Paul told the Romans:
"But God be thanked that you were the servants of sin, but you have obeyed
from the heart that form of doctrine that was delivered unto you. Being then
made free from sin, you became the servants of righteousness" (Rom.
6:17-18).
Winford Claiborne
The International Gospel Hour