Office Of Readings | Advent Saturday Week 1 | A Reading From The Treatise Of Saint Cyprian On The Value Of Patience | We Hope For What We Do Not See

Christian Art | Crucifixion Of The Lord Jesus | Love Revealed By Jesus Christ

Office Of Readings | Advent Saturday Week 1 | A Reading From The Treatise Of Saint Cyprian On The Value Of Patience | We Hope For What We Do Not See

‘We hope for what we do not see.’

Saint Cyprian reflects on something very ordinary and very difficult: waiting. He insists that patience is not just a virtue floating on its own but is a necessary companion to faith and hope. Faith looks to God; hope leans toward what God has promised; but patience is what keeps both alive in the long spaces where nothing seems to be happening.

For Cyprian, the Christian life is slow work. It stretches across time. He reminds us that Christ’s own teaching places endurance at the heart of salvation: whoever endures to the end will be saved. This is not endurance as grim determination but as fidelity—staying within God’s word long enough for the truth to shape us.

The apostle Saint Paul becomes Cyprian’s guide. Paul says that we were saved ‘by hope’, meaning we live now by reaching toward something not yet seen. Hope, by nature, pushes beyond the present moment toward God’s future. But hope cannot survive without patience, because hope always includes waiting. Cyprian knows how easily we can become tired: tired in prayer, tired in doing good, tired in our discipleship, tired in our attempts to love. And tiredness, left unattended, becomes discouragement.

Cyprian warns that discouragement is dangerous because it stops movement. We can begin well, he says, only to abandon the road before its end. As he imagines it, the Christian life is a long pilgrimage where nothing counts unless it is carried through to completion. But Cyprian’s tone is not scolding; he speaks like someone who knows people need strengthening. He keeps repeating: do not grow weary; do not give up; keep going.

Cyprian then turns to charity—the greatest Christian virtue—and shows how deeply patience is woven into it. Charity, he says, is patient because real love stays. It does not withdraw when others fail or when peace is difficult. Patience does not mean passivity, but the steady willingness to bear with one another, to keep unity alive, and to hold relationships open even when they are strained.

In a quiet way, Cyprian describes patience as the daily work of love. Charity endures all things because it hopes all things, and it hopes all things because it trusts God. Patience is simply the shape that trust takes in time.

A Reading From The Treatise Of Saint Cyprian On The Value Of Patience | We Hope For What We Do Not See

Patience is a precept for salvation given us by our Lord our teacher: Whoever endures to the end will be saved. And again: If you persevere in my word, you will truly be my disciples; you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.

Dear brethren, we must endure and persevere if we are to attain the truth and freedom we have been allowed to hope for; faith and hope are the very meaning of our being Christians, but if faith and hope are to bear their fruit, patience is necessary.

We do not seek glory now, in the present, but we look for future glory, as Saint Paul instructs us when he says: By hope we were saved. Now hope which is seen is not hope; how can a man hope for what he sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it in patience. Patient waiting is necessary if we are to be perfected in what we have begun to be, and if we are to receive from God what we hope for and believe.

In another place the same Apostle instructs and teaches the just, and those active in good works, and those who store up for themselves treasures in heaven through the reward God gives them. They are to be patient also, for he says: Therefore while we have time, let us do good to all, but especially to those who are of the household of the faith. But let us not grow weary in doing good, for we shall reap our reward in due season.

Paul warns us not to grow weary in good works through impatience, not to be distracted or overcome by temptations and so give up in the midst of our pilgrimage of praise and glory, and allow our past good deeds to count for nothing because what was begun falls short of completion.

Finally the Apostle, speaking of charity, unites it with endurance and patience. Charity, he says, is always patient and kind; it is not jealous, is not boastful, is not given to anger, does not think evil, loves all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. He shows that charity can be steadfast and persevering because it has learned how to endure all things.

And in another place he says: Bear with one another lovingly, striving to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. He shows that neither unity nor peace can be maintained unless the brethren cherish each other with mutual forbearance and preserve the bond of harmony by means of patience.

Christian Prayer With Jesus

Lord, strengthen our hope when it feels thin,
and give us patience in the work you set before us.
Keep us faithful in doing good,
gentle with one another,
and steady in love.
May we not grow weary,
but walk on with you until we reach your peace.
Amen.

Glossary Of Christian Terms

Endure / endurance – Remaining faithful over time, especially through difficulty.
Persevere – Continuing steadily, not giving up even when progress seems slow.
Charity – Christian love; willing the good of others and acting for their good.
Unity of the Spirit – The harmony that comes from living in the one Spirit of God.
Bond of peace – The peace that holds a community together in mutual respect and patience.