PATIENCE

I've been realizing lately that I'm an impatient person. I never used to think that, especially since I chose to start into a career that demands a great deal of patience. But somehow, God has a way of eventually exposing your weaknesses, especially when your faced with new and different situations; ones that cause your true self to appear no matter how hard you try to hide it. See the thing with patience for me is that for the most part, I try to be a very efficient person and patience doesn't work like that. I like to get things done, even if its not done the best way possible sometimes. If I think of something, I like to mentally scratch it off the "to-do" list and move on. To me, the satisfaction of completion outweighs the process, especially if the process will take a really long time. There are too many things to do and experience that we can't waste time on waiting around here! Does anybody else ever feel this way, or is this just me?
However, despite my own feelings about it, God expects us to be patient. If we desire to display a Christ-like character to those around us, we must display patience. I think it's interesting that the very first characteristic of love, listed in 1 Corinthians, is PATIENCE. Perhaps God knew that would be one of the hardest things for us to do and so He listed it first - just to make sure we didn't look past it! And so, I humbly accept that I need God to give me patience. And as I have started taking steps in the process, I have learned that God has so much to give us as we wait. I mean, I know its hard to see that in the beginning, but as you begin to look back, you realize it was worth the wait. Now don't get me wrong, I have many things ahead of me that require a great deal of patience and the Lord's timing, but I'm starting to realize that just being efficient about them and sratching them off the 'to-do' list doesn't always allow us the opportunity to experience the Lord's best for our lives.