Galatians [5:22] “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.”
Patience, as part of the Fruit of the Spirit may be one of the most difficult areas of our lives. We are not patient by our own human nature. We become easily frustrated if things don’t go in the way we envisioned them to go.
To define patience, we will again look at the opposite extreme. Impatience. I think that is too mild a term though. Think about extreme impatience, temper tantrum, stomping of feet and slobbering. Maybe screaming. You get the picture and most of us are not going to go to that extreme (at least not in public) J. But what lies between those two.
Evidence of Impatience is things like frustration, fault finding, spending money that you do not have. Trying to fix things under our own power. I once told a very wise friend that I was praying that God would give me more patience in the new year. She replied that God does not give us patience, but He gives us the opportunity to learn patience. That was a profound statement in my life and helped me to ultimately become a much more patient person.
We are not puppets. God is not going to just put patience in you. But as you allow the Spirit to have control over more areas of your life, patience should begin to be there. If you are feeling impatient or frustrated today, try to dissect and describe exactly what is making you feel that way. Maybe at the root of it is something that you are trying to control when really it is not yours to control. Patience should control our inward feelings as well as our outward actions toward other people. None of us will ever be perfectly patient, but we will come much closer with that goal in mind.
As we head into the Thanksgiving Holiday it is a privilege to bring to you this opportunity for self-reflection. This series of devotions are written by Harriet Bowman and allow for us to consider the work of God’s Spirit in our lives.