How patiently he bore with our vile conduct! And now that grace has snatched us as brands from the burning, giving us a place in God’s family, and has begotten us unto an eternal inheritance in glory, how miserably we requite him. How shallow our gratitude, how tardy our obedience, how frequent our backslidings! One reason why God suffers the flesh to remain in the believer is that he may exhibit his “longsuffering to usward” (2 Peter 3:9). Since this Divine attribute is manifested only in this world, God takes advantage to display it toward “his own.”
