P atience by definition is the capacity to accept or tolerate delay, trouble, or suffering without getting angry or upset. For me patience is equal to our faith in Christ, and it is tied to hope in Christ. Proverbs 14:29 says, “Whoever is patient has great understanding, but one who is quick-tempered displays folly.”
Over the course of my life, I remember always wanting to move out of New York. Opportunities would present themselves and I thought maybe this was the time. I even went as far as looking at apartments in Boston, which was where one of my employers’ headquarters were based. That fell through as it was just before or beginning of 2008 when we in the United States endured a financial crisis and I wound up being laid off instead of moving.
However I still remained hopeful that I would at some point move out of New York. I am not sure why I wanted to move so badly. Did you ever think you should be somewhere else? I never knew where but I never felt that New York was where I was supposed to be. So I kept trying. I kept waiting patiently. I kept hoping.
I truly believed that God wasn’t telling me no. He was just saying “NOT YET.” So I never gave up. When opportunities presented themselves I got excited again only to be disappointed. My hopes were dashed multiple times. Then something changed. I realized that change was my relationship with God. It became stronger and so did my ability to be patient in hope. I became more comfortable “living in the not yet.”
Patience and faith comes into play when you believe God knows what is best for you and/or God has a different plan that you are not able to see just yet. Holding onto hope helps as you wait for God’s sovereign plan to be revealed in his perfect timing.
My brothers and sisters, what are you expecting God to do in your life? Are you patiently waiting? Having patience is not an easy thing. We must slow down and wait on the Lord. If it will be, it will be. Or not!
When I think about what is going on in the world today, I often think about John Mayer’s song “Waiting on the World to Change.” I think, too, of all the waiting that God’s people had to do in the Bible—from the Israelites wandering in the desert to the people waiting for the long-promised Messiah.
So I keep waiting. And I keep hoping because I trust God’s plan for my life; I believe that faithful patience and endurance will be rewarded and that my hope will be fulfilled in time.
Therefore, since we are justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have obtained access to this grace in which we stand, and we boast in our hope of sharing the glory of God. And not only that, but we also boast in our afflictions, knowing that affliction produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not [disappoint], because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us. –Romans 5:1-5
Keep waiting, friends. All will be revealed.
P.S. I now live in North Carolina!
Lorraine M. Parker
Lorraine M. Parkeris an ordained Deacon and Elder in both the Presbyterian and Reformed Church where her passion is hospitality and leadership development for women in ministry. Shecurrently serves her denomination, the Reformed Church in America, as the Administrative Coordinator of Church Multiplication and Church Ministry. Lorraine is a native New Yorker and is honored to be a recent plant of Greensboro, North Carolina, where she continues to work and is enjoying spending time with her family which includes her oldest daughter, son-in-law, and three of her six grandchildren. In her spare time, she loves to cook, travel, and do jigsaw puzzles.
