Home
12th October 2025
SundayReflection
************************
'Jon Bloom'
Cofounder, Desiring God.org
'Love Suffers Long'
Ask the apostle Paul what the fruits of the Spirit are, and the first thing he says is 'love' (Galatians 5:22).
Paul would say love is the greatest of the fruit of the Spirit, just as he said love was the greatest gift of the Spirit.
Then ask Paul what love is, and what does he say first? "Love is patient".
Now, I don't assume this necessarily means Paul believed patience is the greatest quality of love.
What did Paul have in mind when he wrote, "Love is patient"?
The answer may not be as obvious as it seems.
We use the term patience for a wide variety of things: for instance, putting up with a generally difficult person; not losing our temper in rush hour traffic; or not thinking (or uttering) a profanity when the software program stalls, requiring a hard shutdown and losing our unsaved work.
But Paul had a specific meaning in mind when he said this.
Looking at the Greek word Paul chose is a version of the word makrothymia.
Makrothymia almost always refers to a forbearing, persevering, patient love toward a person.
It is a form of self-sacrificial love we extend to someone else.
As a Jew, he understood "longsuffering love" - as one of God's most fundamental character traits.
For when God revealed his glory to Moses on the mountain, he proclaimed,
"The Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness."
This description of God is repeated over and over in the Old Testament.
This word is powerful because it describes God's incredibly patient love toward sinners.
God was lovingly slow to anger with the continual sin of the antediluvian peoples for many centuries.
He was lovingly slow to anger with horrible and grotesque sins of the Canaanite peoples for many centuries.
He was lovingly slow to anger with the idolatrous rebellion of Israel during the period of the judges, and then during the period of the kings for many centuries.
And he has been lovingly slow to anger with the wicked world for many centuries since Christ came, "not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance".
God, who is love, suffers long with sinners.
And that's why those who are born of God and know God also lovingly suffer long with sinners.
This is why the first thing Paul said about love in the great Love Chapter of the Bible is that it is patient.
He's not referring to patience with inconveniences (those perhaps fit better under the "love is not irritable" category.)
He's not even referring to longsuffering patience in the midst of affliction.
He's referring to patience toward persons.
And this is a longsuffering patience.
God is calling you and me to love the people he has placed in our lives, even though some of them have done or are doing great evil.
We are to love them with longsuffering love.
Makrothymia love is not permissive; it doesn't tolerate sin, abuse, or injustice in the sense of enabling those things.
We are to confront them.
But we do so in the power of the Spirit of
1 Corinthians 13, remembering that love "bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things" and that "love never ends".
A love that never ends is a love that suffers long.
This is an edited version.
The full article and Bible references are avaiable on request
Jon Bloom
is a cofounder of Desiring God.org,
wrote more than 750 articles,
and continues to serve as a board member.
During the Interregnum
March 2025 to ....
Contact the Benefice Office
E-mail:
thebeneficeofbhkandr at gmail dot com
Contact the Benefice Office
Sunday School Rooms, Church Lane,
BUGBROOKE, Northampton, NN7 3PB
Land Line: 01604 830373
E-mail:
thebeneficeofbhkandr at gmail dot com
Mon., Tues., Wed., Thur.
9:00am to 11:30am
For Baptism bookings (Christenings)
to arrange an appointment please contact
the Benefice Office.
For Wedding bookings:
please contact the Benefice Office to arrange
an appointment.
Who Made This?
Seeing as you asked, if you can give helpful
advice or report factual corrections and
'deliberate mistakes',email:-
regparker3 at gmail dot com
Email addresses shown using words in an
attempt to avoid 'spam',
Type the email address replacing 'at' with '@',
and 'dot' with '.'