What Is Patience?

Not merely endurance of the inevitable, for Christ could have relieved himself of his sufferings (Heb. 12:2, 3; compare Matt. 26:53); but the heroic, brave patience with which a Christian not only bears but contends. Speaking of Christ’s patience, Barrow
remarks, “...it was not out of stupid...or stubborn resolution that he...behaved himself; for he had a most vigorous sense of all those grievances, and a strong (natural) aversation from under going them; … but from a perfect submission to the divine will, and entire command over his passions, a great love toward mankind....” The same writer defines patience as follows: “That virtue which enables us to bear all circumstances and all events, by God’s power working in us, both mentally and emotionally, as God requres and good reason guides." (Sermon XLII., “On Patience”). Vincent, Marvin Richardson: Word Studies in the New Testament

Biblical patience is a God-exercised, or God-given, restraint in face of opposition or oppression. It is not passivity. The initiative lies with God’s love, or the Christian’s, in meeting wrong in this way. In the OT, the concept is denoted by Heb. ’ārēḵ, meaning ‘long’. God is said to be ‘long’ or ‘slow’ to anger ’erek ’appayim- (see Ex. 34:6; Nu. 14:18; Ne. 9:17; Pss. 86:15; 103:8; 145:8; Joel 2:13; Jon. 4:2). This idea is exactly represented in the Gk. makrothymia, often translated as longsuffering’, and defined by Trench as ‘a long holding out of the mind’ before it gives room to anger. Wood, D. R. W. ; Marshall, I. Howard: New Bible Dictionary. 3rd ed. Leicester, England; Downers Grove, Ill. : InterVarsity Press, 1996, S. 873

In Proverbs the practical value of patience is stressed; it avoids strife, and
promotes the wise ordering of human affairs especially where provocation is
involved.

The patience of God is a ‘purposeful concession of space and
time’ (Barth). Wood, D. R. W. ; Marshall, I. Howard: New Bible Dictionary. 3rd d. Leicester, England; Downers Grove, Ill. : InterVarsity Press, 1996, S. 873