Last Monday I began a series God’s Diet Food. This spiritual food— the fruit of the spirit is God’s divine personality and character traits that lives in believers. So far, love, joy and peace have been served. Today’s fourth course is patience.
Patience is
- steadfastness and tenacity of purpose.
- forgiving those who have wronged you instead of seeking vengeance.
- extending mercy to those whose faults and character defects are irritating or offensive.
- persevering under difficult circumstances by resisting weariness and defeat.
- maintaining a hopeful attitude under adverse, unpleasant situations.
The Lord allows you to experience adversity, defeating disappointment or even betrayal so that you can learn patience. Refining you. Removing worthless, ineffectual paradigms that decrease relational intimacy with the Trinity. Paradigms that have become imbedded in both your conscious and unconscious thought patterns.
Paradigms such as:
- I am in control.
- I don’t have to surrender all of my life to God.
- All of my desires are God’s desires for me.
What can you do to increase patience?
SPIRITUALLY
- Diligently study and obey His precepts.
- Trust Him. Depend upon His goodness and faithfulness.
- Praise and thank Him that His will is being done in your life.
- Seek His Kingdom. Thinking eternally, not temporally.
- Live a life of excellence.
CONCRETELY
- Mentally discipline your mind by daily completing at least one annoying or tedious task expressly for developing patience.
- Learn to relax whenever you feel impatient. Concentrate on breathing by taking a few deep breaths.
- Remind yourself that things take time. Think about your happiest memories. Would you have these memories if you had been impatient?
- Look at the bigger picture. Will this matter one year from now?
- Take a few minutes daily to think or do nothing.
Patience is powerful. It promises a rainbow after the rain. And everyone knows at the end of a rainbow is a pot of gold!
Thanks for listening to my voice! Feel free to like and share it with your friends.
Be the VOICE heard amidst the deafening sound of sameness!
This is a really tough one for me. Having a son with Asperger’s Syndrome is helping me develop patience. However, more often than not I lose it. God help me.
🙂
You are not alone Stacilys. It’s my weakest one too!