Be the change that you wish to see in the world. – Gandhi
If
your patience were likened to a keg of dynamite, would you have a:
(a) Short fuse? (b) Long fuse? (c) No fuse? (d) No powder? (e) No
Keg? (f) Other? (Serendipity Bible 10th
Anniversary Edition, page 1298).
Patience
is given as one fruit of the spirit: The Spirit however, produces
in human life fruits such as these: love, joy, peace, patience,
kindness, generosity, fidelity, tolerance and self-control—and no
law exists against any of them. Those who belong to Christ have
crucified their old nature with all that it loved and lusted for. If
our lives are centred in the Spirit, let us be guided by the Spirit.
(Galatians 5:22-25 Phillips). This accountability passage is
sobering for it is a reality check on the healthy spirituality of
man. Just as to patience alone we must wonder the extent to which the
Spirit fills the hearts of men to do justly even little things –
never mind escaping high crimes and misdemeanors. My wife had a
saying on her closet door – a little prayer – “God give me
patience, and give it to me now.” The sin of impatience is really a
lack of consideration of the processes that are most generally
required in yielding any product or service in life. In this sense
it can be seen to be a very great sin and not a petty one at all for
it is a sin through which we deny and seek to escape the reality
lying behind virtually all of life. We yearn for worry and work free
instantaneous miracles rather than facing with patience the task
before us. We self-righteously await miracles rather than doing the
grunt work necessary to change the world. Certainly armaments are a
good case in point. We want weapons to instantaneously realize what
rightly demands excruciatingly involved processes of peace and
justice.
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