But let endurance have [its] perfect work, that ye may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.
Verse 3 said that testing produces steadfastness. Verse 4 adds a warning: we can cut the process short. What does it mean to let endurance finish its work, and what "perfect" does God promise to someone still in the middle of trouble?
Patience means refusing the shortcut
The older translation these writers use reads, "let patience have her perfect work." One writer defines that patience by what it refuses to do:
Patience holds a person steady, so that he waits in God's way for the outcome of the trial. It refuses the shortest way that the flesh teaches. Saul, for example, could not wait patiently.
Saul was Israel's first king.
Where the work breaks off
Endurance can begin well and still stop short. One writer names the point where it fails:
When the love of God is known, and the will broken, there is confidence in God. But patience must have her perfect work. Otherwise the will revives, and confidence in self comes back instead of confidence in God. We act without God, apart from His will; we do not wait on Him, or else impatience and the flesh show themselves in us. Job was submissive for a long time, but patience did not have her perfect work. Saul waited long for Samuel, but he could not wait quietly until Samuel came, and he lost the kingdom.
What "perfect and complete" means
"Perfect" here does not mean flawless. It means finished:
It is the testing of your faith that works endurance. God permits trials to come upon us so that we may be tested. Then, when patience has done her perfect work, we may be perfect — that is, carried to completion — and entire, wanting nothing.
Perfect in will, still learning
This completeness is about one thing: what we want. It does not mean there is nothing left to learn, as the next verse shows.
Affliction is God's dealing with us. It acts on us outwardly, and inwardly too by His grace, and it puts patience to the proof. When this work is finished, we are wholly subject to God and desire nothing apart from His will. Then we are perfect and entire, lacking nothing. This does not mean we have nothing more to learn about His will; verse 5, which follows, says the opposite. But the state of soul is perfect as to the will, and as to our relations with God. He can reveal His will to us, because it is the only thing we desire.
Not a ladder to acceptance with God
The word "perfect" can sound like a ladder we climb to earn standing before God. One writer rules that out:
Patience is a wonderful thing, and it is a great thing to have patience that does not give way. You must wait until God has worked things out in people's souls. James insists on it: "Let patience have her perfect work, that you may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing." But this does not touch the perfection of the work of grace. People imagine they reach holiness by weakening the work of grace. They talk about being justified and then made fit; but you will never find that in Scripture. Scripture says plenty about progress. But none of it is connected with our being made fit for the inheritance of the saints in light.
Where the pressure is really felt
When a trial chafes, one writer suggests where to look first:
Let patience, then, dear friends, have its perfect work. There is not one of our souls that does not need this. If trouble or conflict wears on us, let us ask whether it is because our own wills have been crossed. We have to be patient with circumstances, no doubt, but also patient with God's perfect work.
What the hard place can give us
One writer lists what these hard circumstances make possible:
We may prove the grace and sufficiency of God, by the Holy Spirit, in these difficult circumstances. We may discover the infinite resources in Christ in the middle of these circumstances. We may come to know Him closely, in a way we will never gain in heaven if we do not gain it on earth.
Summary
- Let — endurance only finishes if we allow it. We cut it short by taking the flesh's shortcut out of the trial.
- Wait — Saul waited long, but not long enough, and lost a kingdom. Job was submissive for a long time, and still patience did not finish its work.
- Will — the mark of the finished work is a broken will: wholly subject to God, desiring nothing apart from His will.
- Complete — "perfect" means carried to completion in what we want, not that there is nothing left to learn. Verse 5, which follows, shows there is more.
- Grace — none of this earns standing before God. Scripture speaks of progress, but never ties our fitness for the inheritance to it.