Rhoadie's Place

The Bible speaks of having patience/longsuffering but often times we have a “Western” mindset when it comes to the definitions of those words. We think of something passive such as sitting and “waiting” on the Lord to move. However, since the Bible is a Hebrew book we must look up the Hebrew definition of longsuffering. The Hebrew word for longsuffering is rav sevel. The root word is sevel which means endurance or the ability to exert yourself for a long period of time. Endurance is also connect to the word permanence which means steady in purpose.

Let’s apply this to life. Maybe you just graduated from college and desire a job as a management consultant. However, you find the job market to be very competitive and your first few months of job searching have been sour. You gave 110% in your interviews but still were denied the job. What do you do? Do you give up and quit? Do you say ‘Well maybe God doesn’t want me to go into management, should I try marketing instead’? Or do you just keep plugging along until you get it. I strongly believe that you should continue at it until you get the management consulting position. Now you may need to use wisdom and start off as a consultant assistant but you don’t throw in the tower, or assume that God is “closing the door” just because of a few rejection letters. You endure by exerting yourself even if it is for a long period of time. You exercise permanence by being steady in purpose (stay focus on the goal of being a management consultant and seek a position that will cause you to grow in that area). Don’t get side-tracked.

Remember that James 2:20 “faith without works is dead”