I love to do word studies and though I don’t actually pick apart every single verse I read, I do find an occasional Hebrew or Greek that appears in the feminine form. Like I said, I don’t always check to see what is used in the masculine or feminine context of the word but I do run across some, and they amaze and they apply.
One of those word is patience, and the verse corroborates it.
But let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing. James 1:4 KJV
Now, other translations will say it’s but we can also find in Proverbs that wisdom is referred to as a woman. One of the words I researched for rest even has a feminine for. Not only is God male with the heart of love of a woman, He created both men and women to both balance and compliment each other.
Jesus says the we are saved completely and that He completes us, a couple who can walk together in Christ is certainly what He had in mind when He instituted holy matrimony. Patience is a fruit of the Spirit, so as a believer, we are walk in all nine. They work together, and I like to think in tandem or in threes. I tell people to stop counting to ten but run through them a few times, to quash anger. Though they are gifts, like all the other gifts of God, that have to be received, opened and enjoyed, not put aside.
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. Against such things there is no law. Galatians 5:22, 23
Just before this you can read the list of bad character traits, and while patience can be translated as endurance, I think it is more than that, we often see patience at work in one person and not another and I don’t believe we are to just accept or tolerate whatever comes along, we let patience work with the other fruits, prayer and persistence, waiting and rest for His guidance.
Love, joy and peace are the three main fruits we all desire. They activate patience, goodness, kindness, and get us to faithfulness to God as He is faithful to us, gentleness, something so many believers either let slip by them or when they are the are open to hurt and accusation, but operating in self control and letting patience work we can go from doormat to overcomer. Turning the other cheeks is a far cry from abuse or persecution. The Spirit will stand with you. He is firm and loving never forcing love or opinions on those who refuse to receive.
But for women of faith and favor, His grace allows us to grow in Him, and patience will work for us, to perfect and entire, and wanting nothing. Meaning perfect in God’s way, none of us are perfect but we no who is and it is He we follow as our example, Jesus operated in all spiritual gifts, and He is patient.
I was reading a commentary describing patience as God allowing thorns, rather than paving our path with rose petals. I disagree, He is using the thorns that buffet us, that come from the enemy, and the Rose of Sharon is with us and in us, making our path, clear and peaceful even in the midst of trouble, we follow the light that is Jesus.
And men can be patient, but somehow patience looks like a maternal sort of word, either way it us, all believers will benefit from ingesting and digesting the fruit of the Spirit and letting patience work. It starts with love and ends in self control.