There is a third consideration, not to be omitted in our study of Christian patience. The word, as said above, implies _suffering_ and _endurance_, but it includes another idea. It has reference to _time_. It is not barely willingness to _suffer_, but willingness to suffer _more_. Nature would not wait a moment; it would be delivered _now_. Grace leaves all to God, and says, "My times are in his hand!" Though the succour tarry, patience can wait. Hab. ii. 3. What grace is this, thus added to faith and love? Is it not HOPE, the sister grace, that abideth? 1 Cor. xiii. 13. Leaning on her anchor, hope looks out from her post of observation, casting the eye over a waste of billows, and sweeping that dim horizon where as yet no sail twinkles along the distant line that unites the sea and sky, but sure that though weeping may endure for a night, joy cometh in the morning. Psa. xxx. 5. He that hath been with her in six troubles, in the seventh will not forsake her. Job v. 19. Here is a blessed pillow for the languid aching head, a cool refreshment for the throbbing temple. Here is a secret cordial which has enabled many a child of sorrow to bear the heavy load; when tribulation worketh _patience_. Rom. v. 3. This hope is more than empty conjecture or vague expectation. It is firm; it is fixed. Its hold is above. It seizes on words of promise and of covenant. It is sustaining itself by the arm of the mighty Saviour. Its spiritual cable grapples that which is within the veil (Heb. vi. 19), and hence it maketh not ashamed. Rom. v. 5.