“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control…” Ga 5:22
Jets thunder in the sky above us. Trucks zoom past us on the interstate. News media reports what is happening halfway across the world the moment after it happens. People joke about the speed of business. In our fast-paced world, customers expect on-the-spot delivery, immediate access to information, instantaneous responses to our calls. Our world moves at a staggering pace.
Our homes reflect the culture. We jump up out of bed and run to the bathroom. Our meals are gobbled down while we dress and race to our cars. We urge our children to go faster, farther, sooner, as we try to stay on time and ahead of schedule.
It’s easy to get caught up in the fast lane isn’t it? If we opt for a slow-but-steady pace, people dash around us, blow their horns, or even shove us forward. Our bosses confront us, our schools issue demerits, our friends leave us behind. Are Christians meant to follow such a frantic lifestyle?
Our Lord reminds us, through the inspired writing of Paul, not to follow the pace of the world, but to be patient. “You, however, have followed my teaching, my conduct, my aim in life, my faith, my patience, …” (2 Tim 3:10), Paul claims, as he warns about avoiding people who follow an unholy lifestyle. He cautions Timothy about the “lovers of self, lovers of money, proud, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, 3 heartless, unappeasable, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not loving good, 4 treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God…” that characterize the end times. (2 Tim 3:2-4) Sounds like today, doesn’t it?
In a similar warning, Paul writes to Timothy, “But as for you, O man of God, flee these things. Pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, steadfastness, gentleness.” (I Tim 6:11)
So, how do we avoid the frantic pace and slow down? Sometimes learning to be patient comes the hard way. I think of Sarah, who knew the Lord had promised an heir, but as she approached her 90th birthday, that promise was still unfulfilled. She must have felt deeply troubled and maybe even hurt. Could she and Abraham have misunderstood God’s promise? Now that they were too old, would it be foolish to hope? And yet, the Lord visited Abraham and repeated his promise with the words that a year later they would have a son. They had waited so long and now they had reassurance from the Lord, BUT it would be another year before the promise came true, and they were already old! What patience Sarah must have had to believe God’s promise, and further, to believe she and Abraham would live long enough to raise the promised child.
The promise of a son was fulfilled when Sarah was 90 and Abraham was 100! (Gen 21) Can you imagine being patient for a child that long, knowing full well that the “way of women” was years in the past for you? Can you imagine clinging to hope when every new day seemed to bring you closer to death than pregnancy? What must it have been like to go through pregnancy and childbirth at the age of 90?
In His almighty wisdom, God ordained that birthing and rearing a human child is a measured process. Waiting to conceive, waiting nine months to give birth, waiting for the first tooth, first word, first step, and so on, takes time—time to savor the present and learn to wait on the future. Raising a child provides years of opportunities to practice patience. If that isn’t enough, caring for an elderly parent provides more years of practicing patience, while the dear one who raised you becomes more and more dependent on you. Yet again, aging provides a further opportunity to practice patience, as the body slows down and requires longer to do ordinary things. It seems God has provided a lifetime of opportunities for all of us to practice patience.
But do we learn it in the fast-paced, frenetic, frantic pace of our world today? God must believe patience is a high-priority item to learn, because if the lifetime of opportunities doesn’t instill patience in us, the Holy Spirit will.
Patience is one of the fruits of the spirit Paul mentioned in his letter to the Galatians. “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control,” (Gal 5:22) Paul claimed.
Paul taught that when filled with the Holy Spirit, we are set apart from the world with a supernatural peace despite the breakneck pace of life around us. We don’t have to live in worldly frenzy. Instead, we can be an example of calm in the chaos, tranquility in the tempest, and serenity in the storm.
How comforting it is that we don’t have to follow the world’s pace, but instead take the route of the tortoise, and slowly and steadily make our way home to the waiting arms of our Savior who modeled perfect patience for us!
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From Peggy's Pen 