PatienceSample

Seek & pursue

Oh boy, if you’re like me, you often joke more about avoiding praying for patience because you know if you ask for it, God will test you. He’ll bring situations where patience is required. A petulant child, an annoying colleague, a negative friend, illness, uncertainty, there’s plenty of things that life brings that require patience. God will likely stretch your good intentions to be patient with real-life scenarios. Sometimes it leads to grumbling, frustration, and pain.

But wait, isn’t patience a virtue? And something we should be seeking God for? Isn’t it also a fruit of the Spirit? One to be pursued? Doesn’t patience help transform us more into the likeness of Jesus?

Patience is true power. And Jesus shows His patience most brightly when He is relating to us sinners. And patience comes from wisdom, expressed by love. And who is the source of both? Jesus.

I sincerely believe that God uses all situations to conform us more into His likeness. But we have to let Him. We have to be aware of it and seek it out, especially in the difficult moments. Let’s use it to slow our mind and our breathing, to spend a few more moments with Him, to allow God’s Spirit to grow and develop something within us.

So, next time we’re called to be patient, let’s take the opportunity to soak in His presence just a little… while… longer.

Written by BREE BOND