Whoever works his land will have plenty of bread,
but he who follows worthless pursuits will have plenty of poverty.
A faithful man will abound with blessings,
but whoever hastens to be rich will not go unpunished. (Proverbs 28:19–20)
Patient urgency.
At first blush, those two words don’t seem to fit well together. Patient captures the ability to suffer long, to be steady and consistent, to have a settled stability, to be able to sit with your hands folded. Urgency connotes motion; the urgent are driven, compelled by an impulse, pressed into action. You probably imagine patience and urgency more like oil and water than peanut butter and jelly. And yet, we find again and again throughout Scripture that faithful, prudent men and women are characterized by the happy conjunction of these two traits. The fruitful life is marked by patient urgency, by a kind of satisfied discontentment.
Patient urgency is like running a marathon. The goal is compelling: 26 miles. The distance is ambitious. Only a sense of urgency can help you press on toward that prize. Without a sense of drive, the goal would paralyze. And yet, you can’t sprint that distance. The 26-mile urgency must be matched by a patient pace. Steady steps line the only path that can get you to that far finish line. You must be patient and urgent to win the race (1 Corinthians 9:24).
Faithful Plodding
Proverbs 28:19–20 shows us the fruitful person in profile. In verse 19, he works his land faithfully. As opposed to the pursuer of vanities, the fruitful person is at his work day in and day out, rain or shine, as the seasons demand. Dirt covers his hands, and sweat adorns his brow. He fears not long days. As a result of his steady work, he eats the fruit of his labor; his pantry is full of bread.
Verse 20 adds to the picture, telling us that the fruitful person is trustworthy, reliable in any circumstance. He has a kind of soul-stability, what the New Testament calls sober-mindedness. As the weeping prophet tells us, he is trust-worthy because his trust is in the Lord (Jeremiah 17:7). He is a slow-growing tree, “planted by water,” grounded in God, that “does not cease to bear fruit” (verse 8). In contrast to the person who hurries to get rich, the fruitful person plods along. He knows no shortcuts. He is steady as a sturdy ship upon a crystal sea. As a result of his faithfulness, he will have abundant blessings and be an abundant blessing.
The principle these two proverbs bring forward is this: Fruitfulness arises from steady, non-anxious activity. Faithful plodding is the normal path to blessing. Or to use my initial phrase, the fruitful life is marked by patient urgency.
Stable Not Stagnant
But, you may ask, how does a faithful farmer embody patient urgency? As we have seen, he is patient in the day-to-day work. He embraces the rhythms of fruitfulness. He is non-anxious enough to not be in a hurry. And yet there is also a long-term urgency to his work. He knows how much must get done before winter. He has a holy ambition for the harvest. He works toward the vision of a fruitful farm in the years and decades ahead. He is patient and urgent, steady and moving, satisfied and discontent.
That kind of patient urgency marks all those who run well, who are faithful and fruitful. It marks the man who gets up before the sun to meet with his God, who does his work with daily excellence, who plods along in faithfulness, who observes God’s rhythms of work and rest. But this man also has godly ambition for the future, not content to waste his life. Like the parable of the talents, he is eager to expand the corner of the kingdom his King put in his hands.
Patient urgency marks the student who consistently completes her assignments on time, who plods away at the required pages, who maintains healthy habits of body and soul. And at the same time, she is hungry to develop right reason, deep affections, and a disciplined imagination over years of schooling.
Patient urgency marks the Proverbs 31 woman, characterized by non-anxious activity, stable enough for her husband to rely on her, urgent enough to feed and clothe her family, to build her household, to make investments that will bear decades of fruit.
In short, the fruitful person is stable, not stagnant. Content enough in the present to embrace godly rhythms of work and rest, discontent enough to have holy ambition for the years and decades and even centuries ahead.
Anxious Inactivity
If you are anything like me, your life is often marked by anxious inactivity rather than patient urgency. Instead of being content to plod now and discontent to waste the future, we are discontent with the day of small things and therefore squander the future. We either sprint and faint or are too daunted to get off the couch.
Reader, where do you fit in the Proverbs 28 profile? Is your life marked by patient urgency? You do the hard things day in and day out. You work the little plot of kingdom God has given you. You steward your talents with excellence. Or do you chase down novelty, bury your talents in hours of idleness, waste your time on empty pursuits?
Would anyone call you trustworthy? Are you faithful enough to be a blessing to those around you? Or do you take shortcuts, ignoring God’s good designs in an effort to succeed quickly, always looking for the next quick fix or life hack?
Be assured: God will not be mocked. We reap what we sow. If you sow nothing, you reap nothing. If your life is marked by anxious inactivity, if you pursue vanities and take shortcuts, you will be impoverished. But if you embrace patient urgency, if you are trustworthy and stable, you will bear kingdom fruit that will outlast the world. You will be like a tree, planted by streams of water, yielding fruit in fitting seasons, consistently green (Psalm 1:3). You will attain the prize (Philippians 3:14). You will hear “Well done” from the King (Matthew 25:21).
Desiring God