Patience, Patience

Someone once said that coincidence is God's way of working anonymously. Perhaps it could be added that irony is his preferred sense of humor. I'm not sure which one applies to me more this week but either way, God certainly has my attention once again. Let me explain . . .

The next sermon I am now studying for in our series of messages on the fruit of the Spirit is "patience." Normally this would not be out of sorts, if follows in proper Pauline order:love, joy, peace, patience, etc. (Galatians 5:22-23). However, not only am I perhaps one of the least qualified people on the planet (in my mind anyway) to preach a sermon on this subject, but its timing in my life could not have been more coincidental? Ironic? Well, you pick . . . Either way, I see God lovingly chuckling at me once again.

You see, next week I have to be examined by our denomination's regional governing body (our classis) in the final stage of my ordination process, a process that at times has more than tested my patience. I'll admit it. It's even broken me occasionally. Anger, threats to throw in the towel, even questioning God's sense of timing. After all, my path to ordination as a minister in the church has now taken a meer ten years of my life. And I'll admit this too: there have been moments when the waiting and the requirements far exceeded what I believed to be necessary in shaping an individual for church leadership. Ten years? Are you sure it has to take that long?

As I took some time this week to reflect on my journey something dawned on me for the first time: what if it should take that long? What if refining character, testing endurance, digesting piles of information, and just plain discipleship really does take a long time to instill in someone? Perhaps.

What am I saying? Do I believe that somehow I've now reached some point of Christian arrival? That all that waiting refined in me a flawless, goldy model of discipleship? Nah (just ask my wife). In fact, sometimes I wonder if my journey is just beginning. But I will say that I have learned something about patience . . .

And here's my new working definition of the word: "when we trade in our timing for God's." After all, if I can just accept the reality that he has granted me enough time on this planet to accomplish what he wants me to do, then I obviously have exactly enough time left to do it. No ten years gone. No limited time left. No clock ticking on my existence. Just trade in my timing for God's. Take for example the notion that God just took ten years to start teaching me about patience.

My timing would have looked a little different than that. Isn't that ironic?