Playing Hide-and-Seek with Patience

Patience: a word derived from the Latin verb “patior” that means, to suffer. Ergo, patience is the inner strength to bear what gets our goat with composure, instead of anger. More than any other virtue, patience is what I’ve tackled most in my writings. It’s because it comes and goes with me—like playing hide and seek. In one of my books I wrote, “I was born with a wart: impatience.”

When things do not come up to my standards or sense of urgency, I suffer inside—okay, seethe. In recent days on TV and the newspapers, we’ve witnessed how impatience can translate to road rage and kill!

What I have learned over the years (through the process of aging) is to mask it. But masking and exterminating are two different things.

Patience, for a Christian, is supposed to be rooted in faith in our savior, Jesus. In His life, He demonstrated patience for us. He went through humiliation, betrayal, suffering, and finally death on the cross—without anger, not a tinge to seek vengeance.

As I reflect on my illusive patience for the millionth time, I seek to have a glimpse of the deeper meaning of everyday circumstances—that things are not always what they seem, or how I want them to happen.

I now ponder this verse for the nth time, too, personally highlighting patience, “But the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, PATIENCE, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control . . .” Galatians 5:22-23 (NLT)

This fruit is what every Christian covets.

The first cyber poster below talked to me, so I borrowed it and added my own second poster. Both are for my benefit.

Am I succeeding? With dollops of daily grace, I am—most of the time now. That is far better than none-of-the-time, which took the lion’s share of my persona in years past.

It’s probably why the Lord continues to allow me to closely interact with millennials—in both my writing and teaching—for 16 years now. Nobody can try your patience more than they can!

In response, this would be their emoji: