July 17, 2011:

Ponderings of a Pilgrim PASTOR

“Lord, give me patience and give it to me now!”

Patience! As a child, the first time we hear and understand "no" as a refusal to meet our desire right now, our life-long encounter with the need for patience begins. Instead of throwing a tantrum we begin to learn the importance of delayed gratification. "Patience is the ability to idle your motor when you feel like stripping your gears," says wise Barbara Johnson. Learning emotional control is one of the most important steps on a child’s path to healthy growth.

We need to learn that lesson early because along life’s way we will meet many challenges, difficulties, even outright obstacles. Learning to integrate them is our life’s assignment. Oliver Wendell Holmes commented, "If I had a formula for bypassing trouble, I would not pass it (the formula) round. Trouble creates a capacity to handle it . . . I do say, meet it as a friend, for you’ll see a lot of it and had better be on speaking terms with it."

The patience of a mature person is not so much about waiting passively until unfavorable circumstances change or disappear but overcoming them as a way of developing good character.
After I injured my knees, one part of my therapy involved water therapy. You cannot run in chest-high water. It is simply exhausting, but walking slowly and deliberately is less stressful — rather graceful in fact. That kind of water therapy is a picture of living patiently and building strength.

These days, learning patience is a lesson not limited to children. In many ways our adult inability to be patient — to learn the difference between needs and desires — led us into the current "Great Recession." Our Washington lawmakers also need to learn this critical lesson. The financial and other problems our country faces will not be solved overnight. If extremists push us into doing that I believe the result will be disaster.

Patience! Think small — seed size. Plant it, protect it, nurture it, and in time the good harvest will come. Circumstances may or may not change, but we will.

Paul in I Corinthians 13 said "Love is patient." Patience is a sure way to demonstrate love while living into the unknown future. It’s a choice — and we can make it.

Love,
Pastor Dave