The Kindness and Patience of God

Let’s pray as we come to God’s Word.

O God, it is terribly true what we have just sung. Our sins are so many. There is not one of us here who would be happy to have all that we have said, all that we have thought, everywhere our eyes have gone, every way we have spoken to a spouse, a parent, a child – not one of us would be happy to have all of that broadcast on these screens. Not for a day, not for an hour, let alone a lifetime. And these are only the sins of which we are aware. Our sins are so many. And so, we rejoice that though our sins are many, your mercy is more. Give us the eyes of faith, a mind to understand, that we might hear your Word and receive it as good news and be led to faith and repentance. We ask in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Our text this morning comes from Romans chapter 2, verses 4 and 5. Paul has been laying out this indictment against the whole human race – first, the sins focus particularly upon the Gentiles, the outsiders, in chapter 1. But lest the Jews or any religious insiders get comfortable, he has made the case that they do the very same things – that the only difference, as Paul laid it out from chapter 1 to chapter 2, between the Gentile and the Jew is that the Gentiles know what is right and wrong, and they do what is wrong, and they affirm those who do what is wrong, where the Jews know what is right and wrong, they do what is wrong, and they condemn the person who does what is wrong. And having laid out his case to you, O man, without excuse, that they will not escape the judgment of God, he continues in verses 4 and 5:

“Or do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God’s kindness is meant to lead you to repentance? But because of your hard and impenitent heart, you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath, when God’s righteous judgment will be revealed.”

We have a long way to go in Romans. We’re just in chapter 2. There’s 16 chapters, and there are so many things to learn, so many ways to be challenged. This may be what is most important about the book of Romans – that the book of Romans teaches you about God. If you were to ask the question, what is wrong with our world today? You ever step back and follow the news on your phone, even the frightening events from last night? What’s wrong with the world? Here’s what’s wrong with the world: people do not know God. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. People in other countries don’t know God. People in this country, which is awash in Christian history and books and churches – so many do not know God. People in our churches do not know God. Even Christians have moments of temptation and forgetfulness, where they don’t recall and know who God is. That’s what’s wrong with the world. And Romans is going to tell us chapter by chapter. And the most challenging and, if you have ears to hear, the richest parts of this book will be when your mind is expanded to know God better. We’ll get to that chapter 8, chapter 9. But it’s all throughout this book that God is bigger than you think. He’s more glorious than you think. He’s more loving than you think. He’s more sovereign than you think. He’s more just. He’s more avenging. He’s more sanctifying. He’s all these things. You think of God too lightly, and we are going to meditate this morning about God – that’s mainly what this sermon is about – and one of his attributes in particular, one of his most overlooked perfections.

This text, you can see pretty simply, is about three things. Let’s work backwards from verse 5 up to verse 4. One, this text is about the danger of storing up wrath for the day of judgment. You see the second half of verse 5, “You are storing up wrath for yourself.” There are people in the world, maybe you, you may think you can get away with the sort of life described in chapter 1 – a life of idolatry, a life of suppressing the truth of God, a life of sexual immorality, or this blistering paragraph 28-32, envy, murder, life, deceit, maliciousness, gossip, slanderers, haters of God, haughty, boastful, foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless, the whole thing. You may think you can live a life and get away with that, because it often seems as if the wicked prosper. It may seem as if you and I will never encounter a revelation of God’s wrath, and Paul, by the Holy Spirit, is here to tell us, you do not realize you are storing up wrath, and when that wrath is revealed, yes, God will be active in it. You cannot blame God, because you will be the one who had put away in a storehouse wrath as if you were foolish enough to stack, day after day, sticks of dynamite in your basement. Someone says, “What are you doing?” “Just storing those up.” That’s a bad idea. Sticks of dynamite in your basement. Or as if you were in a battle, and day by day you laid out a series of hand grenades, and you pulled the pin, and you stacked them until there were dozens and scores and hundreds there in your bunker, absolutely littered and overflowing with hand grenades. The pin has been pulled, and nothing has happened, and you have convinced yourself you’re safe. Why not lay another grenade and another and another and another, not knowing that grenades, when pins are pulled, eventually explode. You are storing up for yourself wrath to be revealed on the day of wrath. And it will be clear to all you put that there. You put that tidy box of sin and unrighteousness, and you stored it up, thinking that no one would ever see it. It would never be opened, and it will be on the last day. That’s the first thing these two verses are about here.

Here’s the second: this text, working up, is about the necessity of repentance. There is no Christian life apart from faith in repentance – that is, turning from sin (it’s the simplest way to think of repentance) and turning to Christ. That’s faith. When you see the gospel proclaimed in the New Testament, you may notice the response that’s initiated is sometimes “believe,” sometimes “repent,” and sometimes “repent and believe,” because one always implies the other. Two sides of the same coin. You can’t have real faith without repentance. You don’t have real gospel repentance unless it leads to faith. Some people, our text tells us, have hard hearts. You see in verse 5, “because of your hard and impenitent heart” – that means the opposite of repentance. A hard heart, like trying to do surgery on a turtle. They got that hard shell. You know, their ribs are actually connected. It’s not like a snail that leaves its shell or a crab. It’s part of it. If you wanted to go and get into the flesh of a turtle, you got to have that hard shell which says to everyone, “Don’t touch me.” Some of you have a hard shell around your life. Or it’s like sowing seed on this hard, dry ground. So good to get a little rain last night. Because my oldest son works in turf grass, we have 20 bags of grass seed just unopened in our yard. They’ve been there for months. Might even be happy for you to come take one of them. One of them has spilled open, because our chickens – lo, the chickens – have eaten apart the bag, and so they can nibble on the seed when they’re walking around. So, there’s just turf grass, just seed, just spilled out, and nothing has happened, because the ground is hard, and no one has broken up the soil. No one has planted the seed. We haven’t had rain. It’s just there on the hardness of the ground. Might as well be upon the pavement. A hard, impenitent heart. The sort of heart that never says I’m sorry, never turns. You ought to think, when is the last time you’ve said I’m sorry? If you haven’t said sorry for a long time, then – the only people that shouldn’t be saying it are the ones who are already in heaven or Jesus, because you have things, I have things, to be sorry for, to say to God, “I’m sorry,” to say to one another, “I’m sorry.” Do you have a hard, impenitent heart?

And then the third thing this text is about, and this is where we’ll focus. It is about presuming upon the benevolence of God to think, because life seems often pretty good, that God is not overly concerned about sin, that there is nothing to be concerned about. Sure, he’d prefer that we’re good people. He’d like us to try and do our best, but as long as we give it our best shot, and we don’t have major, major sins, as we see them, then we’re fine. That is presuming upon God’s kindness. So, if you follow the logic and work backwards from 5 to 4, you are storing up wrath for yourself. Why? Because you will not repent. Why? Because you have taken God’s mercy for granted. That’s the argument Paul is making.

So, I want you to look at verse 4, and I wonder how you would answer this question: do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience? You don’t have to think too long, because I’ll give you the answer. You do. I do. We all do. The word translated in the ESV “presume” is translated in the King James as “despise.” That’s an acceptable translation, too. The same Greek word is translated in 1 Corinthians 11:22, “Or do you despise the church of God?” So, you could say you despise, or you presume upon. Here’s the question Paul is asking: have you shown contempt for God’s kindness? Have you thought too little about his forbearance? Have you esteemed too lightly God’s patience? And the answer, I have to think, for every one of us on this side of the pulpit and that side of the pulpit, to all of those questions is yes. In fact, more than that, I bet there is not one Christian in a thousand, or maybe even not one Christian in a thousand, who has ever really stopped to think about and to marvel at the abundance of God’s patience towards sinners.

When the Lord showed himself to Moses – remember Exodus 34, Moses says, “I want to see your glory,” and God says, “I’ll show you my glory, but you see my glory with your ears. I will show you my glory by speaking my character to you,” and he says his name – the Lord, the Lord – and then he gives a description of his character: a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. That’s how God says, “You want to know? You want to see my glory? There’s part of it. I’m slow to anger.” Literally, the Hebrew expression – you’ll like this – is “long of nose.” Some of you have just a cute, little button nose. Others of us have a good size nose. I do. The idea is that fury comes out of the nostrils. You can even think about how cartoons might show someone who’s really angry, or an animal, sort of snorting out fumes. A horse neighing in battle. Smoke and fire come out of God’s nostrils (2 Samuel 22). So, the idea is if your nose is short, you poor little-nosed people, you break forth in rage quickly, because you have nowhere to vent your anger. It just comes out. If, however, your nose is long, you’re slow to anger. It’s exactly the same idea – we would say you have a long fuse. So, a long nose, a long fuse, translated here “slow.” God is not like a petulant horse, ready to burst forth from his nostrils with fury, but rather full of longsuffering and forbearance and patience. That phrase “slow to anger” – it’s a familiar phrase to all of us who’ve been around the Bible. You may not realize how many times that phrase is there in the Old Testament. Numbers 14:18, Psalm 86:16, Psalm 103:8, Psalm 145:8, Joel 2:13, Nahum 1:3 – there are probably others. Slow to anger.

What I want us to do for, say, the next 25 minutes is simply to meditate on the patience of God. I was greatly helped in my study this week by the 70 pages on this topic from the Puritan Stephen Charnock, 17th century. Crossway republished in two nice volumes a couple of years ago The Existence and Attributes of God. I don’t know anyone who has written more comprehensively and insightfully and devotionally on the existence and attributes of God. There’s lots of good books since then, but Stephen Charnock is a master. I was helped by his 70 pages.

I want you to think with me for these moments and consider five things about the patience of God. Number one, consider the nature of God’s patience. Patience as an attribute of God, or a perfection of God, is related to his mercy – you can think of it as a subset of his mercy – but it’s not identical to his mercy. God’s mercy makes him ready to embrace sinners when they return to him. Patience makes him willing to bear with sinners and to wait for them. That’s what patience is. Mercy is his willingness. Patience is his waiting. The exercise of patience for God depends upon the offer of mercy. Here’s one of the insights that Charnock pulls out, almost in passing. Have you ever thought, why are the fallen angels consigned to eternal punishment so immediately? God has no patience with fallen angels. There’s no hope of faith and repentance for fallen angels. When they had that rebellion, and we’re just given hints of that angelic rebellion – Satan or Lucifer, an angel of light, leads this rebellion, and they’re set aside. They’re cast in gloomy chains of darkness for their ultimate and final destruction. There was no offer of mercy for the angels. Have you considered it? God was not patient with the angels as he is with us. And we’ll come back to why that is in just a moment. But I just want you to think here about the nature of God’s patience, that God treats you better than he treats the angels. He waits. And his patience is not born from an inability to detect sin. No, he’s omniscient, and his omniscience precludes any ignorance. He’s not ignorant of any sin. So, you think about us – you may appear to be patient. I may appear to be patient, simply because you’re unaware. You don’t know all the facts. You can’t see into every human heart. You don’t know what happens, thankfully, in every room or every boardroom or every conversation, but God knows all of it. He knows every sin we commit, every errant thought, every evil desire. So, it’s not that he’s incapable of anger or that he’s unable to discern what deserves punishment. Rather, the Bible says he’s slow to anger. Have you considered what good news this is? He does not jump upon us at every provocation, though we deserve it. He overlooks so many of your offenses and mine. He is not hasty to take the arrows out of his quiver and fire the arrows of his judgment. Even as his eyes look upon and cannot help but see, as an omniscient being, the sins of all of his creatures – at the same time, as his eyes see that, his arms are extended wide open, waiting for sinners to return in penitence. His patience is not like ours. It’s not the product of ignorance, and it’s not the product of incompetence. Again, you and I may seem patient, and you may just be a lazy parent. I’ve resembled that remark sometimes. You may have a belligerent employee, and he or she needs to be fired and say, “My, you’re so patient.” No, you just don’t want to deal with a difficult situation. Or you have an enemy that you don’t want to confront. You simply are tired, or maybe you’re afraid, or you lack the strength to act. We can appear patient, but it’s really just inability. God, however, is never feeble, never faint-hearted, which makes his patience all the more remarkable. Unlike our so-called patience, which is often a reflection of our weakness, God’s patience is one of the mightiest displays of his power. Think about power. We think of power when some enemy is met with swift and terrible retribution. We say, “What power! There’s force and strength and vengeance. We don’t often think of the great power that is necessary for self-restraint – often a far greater power. I remember reading, one time, this very simple definition of manhood – maybe this will stick with you, men – strength under control. God’s power. Yes, it’s displayed in his wrath, and that’s a just outpouring of his wrath. It’s never an out-of-control wrath. Consider this, however. There is just as much power displayed, and perhaps even more displayed, in his patience – the restraint upon his righteous anger. Now, why is this patience made possible? It is made possible by the death of Christ, which comes back to the point about the angels. Why did God not extend mercy to the angels? Why are there no second chances for the angels? Why were they set aside immediately, cast down for judgment, without any hope of repentance or forgiveness? Because the mediator did not come as an angel. He came as a man. The Son of God came to earth and took on human flesh. The divine joined to a human nature, and so, it is because of the person and the work of Jesus Christ that we can even have the hope of pardon. It’s why God can be patient with the sins of the world, why he can look upon each of his human creatures, made in his image, and know that though Son of God died as a propitiation only for the elect, yet that death of the Son of God does have some benefits for all, in that God is now patient. He has a reason to be patient. There is mercy. God will show his power for all eternity. He will show his mercy for all eternity – Charnock makes the point – but it’s upon earth alone that we have opportunity to see God’s patience. Heaven will show us mercy, hell will show us justice, and this life on earth is the occasion for the operation of God’s patience, his waiting. Consider the nature of God’s patience.

Second, consider the many examples of God’s patience. He did not completely wipe out Adam and Eve – “On the day that you eat of it, you shall surely die” – and they did experience immediately a separation and a spiritual death. And yet, God treated them so much better than they deserved because of the promise of the mediator to come. Acts 17:30, Paul says that God overlooked the times of ignorance for a long time with the Gentiles. He bore with them in great patience, and to consider in the Bible with the judgments upon his people, every significant act of judgment was foretold by the prophets or by the Messiah himself. The flood – as they had opportunity for year after year after decade to watch Noah pound out the ark as a warning of the flood of judgment that was to come. God warned his people with the famine in Egypt, with the earthquake in Amos’ day, with captivity into Babylon, with the removal of the 10 tribes in the north, with the destruction of the temple. He gave warnings, that he might spare his wrath. He delayed his wrath even when there were no signs of softening. It’s one thing if you said, “Look at that. Those people, they’re really close to getting it,” but they were not close to getting it, and yet he delayed. We’re told he waited until the cry of the sins of Sodom grew strong before he destroyed the city. Such a wicked city, and he waited. And even then – remember as he talks with Abraham – he was willing to delay his judgment further if he could find but the small remnant of godly persons in the city. We’re told in Genesis 15, he waited 400 years for the sins of the Amorites to accumulate – that means the Canaanites in the land – before he gave to Joshua and the people the land of the Canaanites. That was an act of justice, and he waited. A pagan, idolatrous people. He waited 400 years. We’re just 250 years as an independent country. Who’s to say what the allotted time is for this country or any country on the earth? He waited 40 years after the crucifixion of the Son of God before he destroyed with the Romans the temple and Jerusalem. Surely he would have been just at that very moment, as Jesus was crucified with the hands of the Romans and the cries of the Jewish leaders in Jerusalem – he would have been justified in that very instant for an army of angels or a lightning bolt to obliterate the temple. 40 years he waited.

Consider, third, that when God executes judgment, we are often told that he does so unwillingly and with restraint. Now, this gets into some of the mystery of understanding, how God in his will of decree can decree one thing that is fixed and immovable from all eternity, and yet we have a reflection – theologians might call his will – of desire, so that God is not schizophrenic. He’s not of two minds, and yet as his actions are carried out, Scripture will sometimes describe the actions of judgment as those that God carries out unwillingly. You think about the prodigal son, the joy in heaven. We’re not given the same language of rejoicing in heaven when a sinner meets his destruction. Lamentations 3:33 says, “God does not afflict from his heart,” meaning he takes no pleasure in the death of the wicked. The church father Chrysostom remarked – and this is perhaps not quite exegetically right on the money, but it’s a good theological truth – he reflected that God created the world in six days, and he took seven days to overthrow the one city of Jericho as they marched around the city. Six days to create everything. Seven days to tear down Jericho. And he makes the observation it is because God is so much quicker to build up than he is to tear down. Even after bearing with the sins of the people for centuries, he says in Hosea, “How can I give you up, O Ephraim? How can I hand you over, O Israel?” Some of you with wayward children, you know this very feeling. You know there’s a deserving of discipline. You know that there must be consequences, and yet the passion wells up within you. How can I hand you over, my beloved child? So it is with God and his people. He stands more ready to forgive than his people are to repent. Charnock mentions this saying among the Jews. He says that the angel Michael, as a minister of justice, flies with one wing, but Gabriel, the minister of mercy, always flies with two. Not really a verse to prove that, but it’s a good idea. Minister of justice with one, the minister of mercy with two. God shows his patience in that when he sends forth his judgment, he does so in waves, not with one giant avalanche. In Joel’s day, he sent out the worm and then another insect and then the locust before there was famine. In Ezekiel’s day, he destroyed one part of the city and then another part of the city. In Revelation, if you notice, a series of judgments, and seven seals and seven trumpets and seven bowls were just a portion, a portion, a portion. Every one of those acts of judgment is another opportunity for God’s people to repent. His patience is seen in how often he lessens his judgment. He punishes us less than our sins deserve (Ezra 9). He does not reward us according to our iniquities (Psalm 103). And he shows mercy to his people even after the greatest ingratitude and provocation. Think of his people at the banks of the Red Sea, all that God had done for them. Not a long time ago, just recently, protecting them by cloud and fire, giving them Moses. They’d seen the signs, the miracles, 10 mighty plagues to deliver them, just spared with the blood of the lamb at Passover, their firstborn son. All of these things he did for the people, and even there, before they cross through the Red Sea, you know that they’re complaining, they’re grumbling, they’re doubting. You’ve let us out of Egypt that we might have watery graves here in the sea. And God was patient, and he opened the sea, and they walked through on dry ground, and even when they came over, and they continued to complain, he gave them manna from heaven. He gave them quail. He gave them water from the rock. He miraculously sustained their clothes and their sandals that they did not wear out.

Consider, fourth, how patient God is compared to the patience of his creatures. We would not bear with the sins of the world for a single day, if any one of us were God. There would be no hope for anyone. Do not fancy yourself somehow kinder, with more forbearance, or more patience than God. Not if you could see all and know all, and you had, with your own creatures made in your own image, such unrelenting acts of rebellion and sin, the world would not last an hour. We had some water accidentally left on in our upstairs yesterday. Poured its way through the drywall and through some of the lights and down into the kitchen, and I promise that God is more patient with our sins than I was with that water damage. Even the glorified saints in heaven cry out under the throne, “How long? (Revelation 6) How long till you avenge our blood?” Now, it may be a cry for justice. They’re ready for vengeance now. The disciples, you remember, were ready to call down fire upon Samaria when they would not accept the Son of God. God could send the most tenderhearted angel, and still we would be a lost people. When you think about how great our offenses are against God and how long and how many, surely Genesis 6:5 is true of the fallen human heart now as it was then. Every intention of their hearts was only evil all the time, continually. That’s the fallen world, and we’re still here. You think of all the sins of omission, which you should have done, and you didn’t do. Commission, which you shouldn’t have done, and you did. Of all the thoughts and words and deeds of blasphemies and idolatries, of all the false religions in the world, and then all of the false professers of religion within the Christian church, of every act of ingratitude, of every breach of the Ten Commandments. And if you were to consider that in your own heart, in my own heart, and then multiply to your family, and even this church – this good, wonderful church – yet we wouldn’t want to be given what we deserve. And you think of our city, our country, our world. How many are, as chapter 1 tells us, haters of God? And yet, sunrise, sunset. People all over the world, 7 billion of them, are still given – even though there’s much suffering in the world – they’re given the opportunity to have relationships and food, clothing, and can experience the beauty of art or nature or the exhilaration of sports or success or working with your hands. And most people will have some blessing of family and friends. All of it because God is patient when these sins from all of his creatures have accumulated for thousands of years. If you defiled your neighbor’s bed, you slept with your neighbor’s husband or wife, and then if you tarnished and slandered his reputation, and then you stole from his garage, and then you violently assaulted his children, we would not think that that neighbor would hold his vengeance long, not if he had power to carry it out. He would certainly bring to bear the full extent of the law against you, and rightfully, he could. And yet, God waits. You think of the length of his forbearance. We would consider a man or woman to have heroic patience – you’d say, “Oh, you have the patience of Job” – if they waited but days or weeks to exact vengeance. If a nation is attacked, and it does not immediately retaliate, we think, “Well, that is unheard of.” And yet the God of the universe waits.

Consider, finally, how we ought to admire and stand astonished at the patience of God when we remember this is not just you offending another human being. When we consider what puny creatures we are, and that we have provoked him, our creator, our sustainer, the thrice holy God of the universe who knows all and sees all, and though he knows every bit of our sin, and we are his tiny creatures, and he is the supreme creator, yet judgment has not come. We ought to marvel at his patience. He knows every nook and cranny of human existence. One author says, “The hatred of human sinfulness is infinite, and the knowledge of human malice is exact.” Exact. God knows all of it. There is no iniquity in your heart or mind that has escaped the knowledge of God. We have so often abused the patience of God. We have misinterpreted. That’s what Romans is about, verse 4. We have misinterpreted his patience as an indifference to sin. We have, then, continued in our sin. We have sometimes gotten harder or dared to commit even greater sins. We have taken his patience and kindness as an incentive to more sin. And think about the mercy that many have had shorter lifespans than you. We all know loved ones who have already gone on to their eternal reward, and yet you are here. You still have time. We ought to admire God’s patience.

Why? Why is God so patient with sinners? Well, we can say for his glory. He delays his punishment that he might be glorified through the display of patience. If he punished in an instant, as we deserved, we would see his holiness and his justice – that would be amplified – but we could not see the power of restraint. So, he is given even more glory because he waits. Also, he’s patient with sinners for the display of his justice. He exercises patience now so that when the final judgment comes, the fairness of that final judgment will be obvious. As the saying goes, the slower the judgment of God, the more just it is. When God finally breaks forth in judgment, and all is revealed, your heart may still be hard toward God, but it will be obvious to everyone else. No one will be able to rightly say, “Well, God didn’t treat him fairly. God didn’t treat her rightly. He did poorly by them.” When every thought and every intention and every inkling of your heart and mind is, in some mysterious moment, revealed before God and the angels, we’ll marvel that God waited so long. So, so long.

So, he does it for his glory. He waits for the display of his justice. But here’s the point in verse 4 that I want to impress upon you. His patience is for our repentance. Think of 2 Peter 3. The last days scoffers will come and say, “Where’s the promise of his coming?” You Christians, you talk about the day of judgement, you’ve been reciting this Apostles’ Creed about “he comes again to judge the living and the dead.” You’ve been doing this for thousands of years. It ain’t never going to happen. And Peter says he is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness. Rather, he is patient, not wishing that any should perish. Now, in the inscrutable reaches of his will, of course, he knows and has decreed through that means and proclamation of the gospel, he’ll be saved. But as we look upon God, we are meant to conclude that he’s waiting and waiting so that more can come to repentance. The fact that judgment has been delayed tells us that our God is appeasable. It means that there is the possibility of pardon. It means that the cure for our spiritual cancer has not yet been exhausted. It’s available. It means that God, in his disposition, his leaning in to you, is amiable, is affable. His disposition is not implacable. He is willing, in fact he is eager, to relent. He is, as it were, leaning in, cupping his hand to his ears. Would another sinner repent? I’m ready. I’m so ready to rejoice. Like the father, you know the story with the prodigal, when he was yet had a long way off, the father, losing all sense of decorum, ran because the son had returned home. Presume not upon his patience. Do not think too lightly upon the forbearance of God. He is placable. He can be placated, but if you are not walking with him in faith and repentance, you ought not have confidence that he is appeased. He is waiting, waiting, waiting that we might turn toward him. When we think of all the kindness and the forbearance that God has shown us, when we consider the mildness of the present wrath displayed in the world – it’s mild, the wrath that we now see. When we contemplate how long he has preserved us and waited for his creatures, it should lead us by the hand to repentance. When we think how he has borne with our iniquities, and yet he has showered us with undeserved blessings, how could you – how could I – not turn and run to such a sweet, kind, patient savior? Let’s pray.

Father in heaven, we give thanks for your Word, for your great, undeserved, merciful forbearance of our sins. If you should mark iniquity, who could stand? And yet, with you there is plenteous of grace. Lead us with cords of loving kindness. Take us by the hand with your kind patience, that we may turn from our sin, from our folly, and run to your open arms and know your love. In Jesus we pray. Amen.