II PETER 3:8-9 But do not forget this one thing, dear friends: With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day.  The Lord is not slow in keeping His promise, as some understand slowness. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.

Life is made up of periods of waiting. The child must wait until she is old enough to have a bicycle. The young girl must wait until she is old enough to drive a car. The medical student must wait for her diploma, the young employee waits for a promotion. An expectant mother waits for the child to be born. A young couple waits for the day they can afford to buy a new home. Life is full of waiting. It comes easier to some than to others. The art of waiting is not learned all at once.

I think people were more patient 100 and 200 years ago. They had to be more patient — they had no choice. If a man missed his stage coach, he shrugged his shoulders and said, “Oh well. Another one will be along in a couple of weeks.” Compare that to the young executive who curses and causes a scene at the airport when his flight is delayed by 30 minutes. Back then, if you ordered something through the mail, you might wait months for it to arrive. Now we expect overnight shipping. We live in a world of instant everything. We have become accustomed to having everything fast, from fast food to the Ten Minute Oil change. Perhaps communications is the place where our need for instant gratification is most obvious. We send a text and expect an immediate response. We ask Siri or Google a question and expect and instantaneous answer.

Obtaining so many things in our world today without the wait has made us more impatient than we were. Isn’t it amazing how we can get so wrapped up in ourselves and our own importance that we fail to see those around us as people, too? We act as though our schedules and appointments are the only things that matter. Patience is for other people. We want them to be patient with us, but they better not expect us to be patient in return. And they certainly better not be slow in doing what we want done!

This was the attitude Peter addressed in the passage above. The people were confusing slowness and patience. What they saw as God’s slowness to act was actually His patience. Part of our focus during Advent is on the return of Jesus to this world, coming as the Righteous Judge who will take the faithful to be with Him. You and I live in the confidence that because Jesus died on the cross and rose again, we will be with Him as His sheep when He returns. God promises that our faith obtains this blessing. But when will that be? Why hasn’t He come yet? Those questions were being asked already just a few years after Jesus ascended into heaven. They knew of His promise to come again, and were anxiously awaiting that return. The non-believers also knew of this promise, and they jeered and joked about it: “Where is this coming He promised?”  This made those who were faithful even more anxious for Jesus to return. They began to think that maybe God was being slow in keeping His promise. They were becoming impatient.

Peter explains here that there is a difference between slowness and patience. Yes, the Redeemer is going to reappear. But you have to understand that God is not in time. What we see as an unbearably long time is but an instant to our God. And it is not just the fact that God is outside the realm of time that has brought this delay. He is patiently giving more and more people the chance to repent and believe in Jesus. The longer He delays His return, the more chances we are given to share the Gospel message with those who have not heard and those who do not believe. And you know as well as I do that there are plenty of those folk. All around us. People who need to be brought to faith. So God is being patient.