On Patience 6

Patience, indeed, is what both follows faith and goes before it. Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness; but patience proved his faith when, commanded to sacrifice his son (not, I would say, as a temptation of his faith but as a typical attestation of it; for God knew whom he had reckoned righteous), he both heard patiently so heavy a command, which even the Lord was not pleased to see carried out, and would have fulfilled it if God had willed. Rightly, then, was he blessed, because he was faithful; rightly faithful, because he was patient. So faith, illumined by patience, when it was being sown among the nations through the seed of Abraham, which is Christ, and was bringing grace in over the law, set patience, its helper, over the enlarging and fulfilling of the law, because patience alone had been lacking in the teaching of righteousness before. For formerly they exacted both an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth, and lent out evil at interest for evil. For there was not yet patience on earth, because there was not yet faith. Meanwhile, of course, impatience enjoyed the opportunities of the law. That was easy while the Lord and master of patience was absent. But after he came and joined the grace of faith with patience, it is no longer lawful to provoke even with a word, nor even to say “fool,” without danger of judgment. Anger is forbidden, the mind restrained, the petulance of the hand checked, the poison of the tongue removed. The law has found more than it lost, as Christ says: “Love your enemies, and bless those who curse you, and pray for your persecutors, that you may be sons of your heavenly Father.” You see what Father patience wins for us.