In this week’s lesson, Small Groups Director Sarah de Jong invites us to practice the long-fused, mercy-soaked patience of 1 Corinthians 13. Drawing on Moses’ story in Exodus and Jesus with the woman caught in adultery (John 8), Sarah shows that God’s patience isn’t passivity—it’s holy restraint: “merciful and gracious, slow to anger,” yet committed to justice in His time. Patience, she explains, is the endurance to love through suffering, the marathon mindset that keeps us steady when emotions boil. To grow here, Sarah offers four simple guards: guard your response (pause, pray, give it time), guard your relationships (don’t apprentice yourself to anger), guard your thoughts (take rumination captive and think on what is true and lovely), and guard your rest (remember the H.A.T. check—hungry, angry, tired). As we run this race with endurance, we’re not called to point out every flaw or win every argument, but to trust that God will bring perfect justice while we extend the same patience He has lavished on us. Let this session help your group slow down, breathe, and love with a longer fuse—so that in conflicts big and small, Christ’s composure and compassion become your reflex.

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