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"But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering [patience] gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance..." (Gal. 5:22-23).

A missing ingredient to receiving from God is that little word patience. Few Christians realize the importance of having patience in their lives. Patience is what you need in order to be an overcomer.

I don't think believers understand that sometimes. We talk about being an overcomer, but we don't understand that it takes patience to get there. It's like the expression we often use: "Some things don't happen overnight."

Jesus said, "In your patience possess ye your souls" (Luke 21:19). Impatience is probably the foremost reason why prayers go unanswered. Get hold of that!

Many pray and believe God. But when things don't happen when they think they're supposed to, they get impatient and begin to wonder. They begin to say, "Well, why didn't it happen?"

As a result, you get yourself out of faith, and therefore your prayer will not be answered as long as you're in that vein of thinking. I think we all have made this mistake if we'll be honest with ourselves.

Some things we pray for happen instantly, and other things happen gradually. For example, there's no gradual salvation experience. No person was ever gradually filled with the Holy Spirit.

But when we pray for people and things such as our loved ones, finances, jobs, or things in that arena, we should keep expecting until we receive an answer. In other words, we need to have patience. The Bible says that "...the trying of your faith worketh patience" (James 1:2).

For instance, we might be praying that a loved one be saved. But God doesn't force people to get saved against their will. So we have to be patient while God works things around so that they'll be willing to get saved.

Don't ever pray, "God, save my family." God already has done all He's ever going to do about saving them. Jesus died on the Cross that they could be saved. He's already done it. The way to pray for a lost loved one is to pray, "Lord, send laborers across their path that they might believe in Your Word and come to know You."

Have you ever prayed for God to meet your need and then had to wait a day or two, or a week or even a month in faith? But if you keep patiently expecting and believing, God will see that it happens.

Sometimes it's hard to have that kind of patience and just keep believing the Bible, especially when you don't see anything happening. The devil will jump on your shoulder and say, "See, I told you that stuff wouldn't work." But, patiently, you have to keep saying, "The Bible says it, I believe it, and that settles it."

God never promised to instantly answer our prayers, and He never promised us instant healing or instant miracles. God said, "...they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover" (Mark 16:18). Now you could recover instantly, or you could recover over a period of time. Understand that as you believe God and hold on patiently to His Word with your faith, God will answer your prayer.

If you'll remember the story of Daniel, you'll remember that he prayed and prayed, but his answer didn't come immediately. Daniel prayed for 21 days. When the angel finally came with the answer, the angel said, "You were heard the first day you prayed. I was dispatched the first day you prayed." But the prince of Persia withstood him, or, in other words, fought against him (Dan. 10:12-13).

I want you to notice that in certain scriptures, it says, "You shall have whatever you ask or whatsoever you believe" (1 John 5:14-15; Mark 11:24). If you'll notice, this phrase "you shall have" is found in several promises throughout God's Word.

Did you notice the phrase "it shall be done" is also in many promises (Matt. 18:19; 21:21; John 15:7)? Is "shall be done" present tense or future tense? It's future! So what's going to happen? If you believe God, it shall take place.

When? Maybe right then, and maybe the next minute, the next day, or next year. But your part is to continually and patiently believe and quote the Word of God and let God take care of the "shall be done."

Too many of us want the "shall" to be right now. That's not our prerogative; it's God's. What we're to do is simply believe what the Bible says and let God take care of it when it happens.

Consider the area of healing, for example. Many people are prayed for, and the minute the symptoms don't leave, they become impatient and say, "Well, I didn't think that stuff would work, anyway." I've been around the ministry all my life, and I've seen hundreds of people give up on their healing before they ever left the church.

Many Christians want to try to dictate to God how something is supposed to be done. It doesn't work that way, because you don't dictate to God.

A lot of people want to start believing after they've received what they have asked for. But why do you want to believe something when you already have it? When you already have it, you don't have to believe for it.

According to the Word of God, we are to believe we receive in advance the things we want or need. Once we have it, we don't have to believe anymore, because it's already in existence in this realm.

For example, I don't have to believe for a Bible cover, because I already have one. Why should I believe for something that I already have?

Now I don't care how much you confess that God is going to do something on your timetable. We are to believe God to meet our specific needs. We are to tell Him what that need is, but He is the One who takes care of answering our prayers. All of your impatience, all of your tears, and all of your begging are not going to get God in a hurry.

So many times believers say, "Oh, if only the Lord would have moved sooner." No, praise God, just believe everything is going to be all right. We need to realize that faith is a force that is built into us by knowing what God's Word says. When you know what God's Word says, you don't get impatient.

You must learn not to give up on God, and He won't give up on you. Understand that God is faithful. Notice what Paul said in Romans 4: "And being not weak in faith, he [Abraham] considered not his own body now dead, when he was about an hundred years old, neither yet the deadness of Sara's womb: He staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief; but was strong in faith, giving glory to God; And being fully persuaded that, what he had promised, he was able also to perform" (Rom. 4:19-21).

Notice in verse 20 that Abraham staggered not at the promise of God. Many of us stagger at the promise of God because of circumstances and because someone told us something couldn't be done. A doctor might have given us a bad report.

Yet God's Word says something else. When we side against God's Word, we waver and stagger, not fully putting our trust in the Word.

I want you to notice that the miracle came to pass because Abraham considered not his own body. It was silly in the natural for Abraham and Sarah to think they were going to have any kids because it was medically impossible. But Abraham considered not that fact.

He staggered not at the promise of God. The Bible says, "...With men this is impossible; but with God all things are possible" (Matt. 19:26). You see, God can take care of us if we don't waver or stagger.

Abraham was also fully persuaded that God was going to do what He had promised. Fully persuaded means that you will die before you say it's not so. A lot of people are talking about how much they believe God, how persuaded they are, and that God will take care of them. But it's often another thing when they're facing a crisis.

You find out whether you are fully persuaded or whether you are just agreeing out of mental assent by what you do when the chips are down.

It's easy to talk about what God can do. Listen to the story of missionaries who have faced violent persecution. Some have actually had guns put to their head. It's in situations like that you find out if you really believe the power of God can take care of you.

If you will take hold of God's Word and patiently praise Him, you will see it happen. Patience is the missing ingredient for your prayers to be answered. Impatience is the ingredient that nullifies your faith and causes your prayers to be of no avail.

I want to encourage you to learn how to be patient and hold fast your profession of faith based on the Word of God. Get hold of God's Word and hold on to it. It doesn't matter what you see, feel, or think. Consider not, stagger not, and be fully persuaded, giving glory to God!

Copyright © RHEMA Bible Church
All rights reserved. Used by permission.

Author Biography

Kenneth W. Hagin
Web site: Kenneth Hagin Ministries
 
Kenneth W. Hagin, President of Kenneth Hagin Ministries and pastor of RHEMA Bible Church, ministers around the world. Known for calling the Body of Christ to steadfast faith, he seizes every ministry opportunity to impart an attitude of “I cannot be defeated, and I will not quit.”
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