Patience

I wrote last week about how, for all I that I don’t like winter, this winter has not been abnormally long at all.  Cold weather in December, January, and February are to be expected in this area.  It’s part of the deal.  It’s no good complaining about it, because it’s just the way it is.

Having said that, though, it sure was nice to have a week or so of warmer weather.  We know winter isn’t over—in fact, as I write this, snow is predicted for today--but at least we got a break from it.  A break like that gives us hope that, yes, winter will not be forever.  Spring is, indeed, coming.  We just have to be patient and wait for it.

It strikes me that, in a way, this is the approach Bible uses.  You know, when we think about the Bible, we tend to think of the verses that say that God is love and God is forgiveness and all that sort of thing.  And there are lots of verses like that in the Bible, and they’re great verses.  But there are a lot of other verses, too.  There are a lot of verses of woe and of judgment.  Especially in the Old Testament (but sometimes in the New Testament, too) there are times when the people abandon God and God allows them to suffer the consequences.  Much of the history of Israel and of Judah is of them being taken over by one country or another.  Much of that history is of the people of Israel being taken captive and forced to serve other kings and other countries.

But even in those times, God never leaves the people without hope.  The book of Isaiah is a good example.  Much of that book is judgment against Israel.  But every once in a while, there will be a few verses, even a chapter or two, to let the people know that God’s judgment against them will not be forever.  God will forgive, eventually.  There is a better day coming.  They just have to be patient and wait for it.

Being patient is not always my strongest suit.  I’m one of those people who prays, “God, give me patience, and give it to me RIGHT NOW.”  When things don’t happen the way I think they should, I get frustrated.  And sometimes I try to force things to happen the way I think they should.  Maybe you do, too.  Of course, that never works for me.  In fact, when I try to force things I tend to make them worse, because I’m trying to make things happen before it’s time for them to happen.

Being patient can be hard.  But it’s one of the keys to faith.  It takes faith to believe that God is going to act when we see no signs of God acting.  It takes faith to trust that things are going to work out right when we see no signs of them working out right.  One of my prayers, almost every day, is that God will help me be confident that God is going to act in God’s way and at God’s time, and that God’s way and God’s time will be better than my way and my time.  Then, I pray for God to help me do the best I can until God’s time comes.  Maybe that will help you, too.

It takes faith to be patient.  But it’s worth it.  God knows what He’s doing.  And God will act, in God’s way and at God’s time.  And when we trust that, we find out that things do, indeed, work out all right.  In fact, they usually work out a lot better than they would have if we’d gotten things to work out the way we wanted them to.  So let’s have the faith, and the patience, to trust God.