Episode 1002: Praying for Patience

[00:00:00] Scott Maderer: Thanks for joining me on episode 1002 of the inspired stewardship podcast.

[00:00:07] Dan Miller: Hi, I'm Dan Miller from 48 days.com. I challenge you to invest in yourself, invest in others, develop your influence and impact the world by using your time, your talent and your treasures. Live out your. Having the ability to find the work you love is key.

[00:00:24] And one way to be inspired to do that is to listen to this inspired stewardship podcast with my friend, Scott May.

[00:00:32] Scott Maderer: no, the truth is sometimes when we pray for patients, what we really should be praying for is love and trust. Instead love for each other. Love for God and love for ourselves as well as trust in God, because that's what. And having patience. Welcome and thank you for joining us on the inspired [00:01:00] stewardship podcast.

[00:01:01] If you truly desire to become the person who God wants you to be, then you must learn to use your time, your talent and your treasures for your true calling and the inspired stewardship podcast. You will learn to invest in yourself, invest in others and develop your influence so that. Okay. Impact the work

[00:01:22] and today's spiritual foundation episode about investing in others. I talk with you about why the expression don't pray for patients is both right and wrong. I talk about what patients really means to us, and I also share why there are other things we can pray for. On yesterday's episode. One of the jokes that Barbara and I were talking about was about this idea of don't pray for patients.

[00:01:49] And we both laughed. This is one of those expressions that I've used. I've said, and I hear a lot in Christian circles about how you should never [00:02:00] pray for patience, because God will put you through a bunch of trials and tribulations so that you can learn to develop. Patients and in some ways that's right.

[00:02:10] And another's, that's wrong. The wrongness around it is it makes God sound like some sort of punishing school master or somebody who looks at it and cackles with glee. Oh great. I've got a good chance to put somebody put through things so that they'll learn this new ID. But the rightness of it is I do think sometimes when we start praying for patients, it's because we're already going through something that requires patience.

[00:02:45] We're already going through a time of struggle. If you think about it. I think job is the poster child for patients in the scripture and the word patients. The Greek word that we translate as patients [00:03:00] is readily better translated as a long tempered or slow to anger. And in that way, I do think it's something that we, as human beings need to develop.

[00:03:11] We need to learn to pray for. I think when we get tired of seeing our own struggles and the struggles of others, we need to recognize that we do have to endure it in some way. That doesn't mean we just put up with it. That doesn't mean we don't act to change it. That doesn't mean that if you're in an abusive situation, Stay there and take it instead.

[00:03:36] It does mean that we need to develop the ability to rest in the Lord and work within what God is putting in our path, how we can give up the annoyance and the anxiety and the worry. And we can put that over to God. And then out of that, we could learn [00:04:00] the idea of patience. And patient action. It's more complicated than we make it out to be.

[00:04:10] We often can be put in situations where we're dealing with health problems. We're dealing with emotional problems. We're dealing with trials and tribulations. We're going through something that isn't where we want to be. And yet we can look at this and we can say that we develop. The ability to rest in God, to put over our fatigue and our worry and our tiredness to God that is learning patience.

[00:04:44] And again, sometimes we can learn patience in these sorts of times. That doesn't mean we're perfect. That doesn't mean that we're not going to lose our temper when we're in traffic sometimes, or have other problems like that, that come about. And yet. [00:05:00] Patients does matter because it shows a maturity, it shows that we're not just there, roughing it out, sucking it up, doing it all on our own.

[00:05:11] Quite the opposite. God has created us to be somewhat. Who loves others and who loves God. And if that is how we're created is to be in relationship with others, then learning patience. Isn't about just learning endurance or learning to put up with it. Rather it's about learning to reflect the love of God and the love of others, despite what's going on around.

[00:05:40] Patients can support our relationships because let's face it. If the world was such that everyone just did what you want them to do, when you want them to do it, you wouldn't need patients, but that's not the world we live in. And what's more, it shouldn't be the world we even hope for. Instead, [00:06:00] we have to begin to recognize that our desires for someone else.

[00:06:05] Isn't always their desires for themselves. We don't need to put our agenda onto other people. That's sort of the point of this patient's is held up as a virtue in the Bible and a great virtue as well, because patience is actually the result of. Of trusting God. Patience is the fruit of the spirit that comes from trusting.

[00:06:36] God patience is a result. Not a cause it's not the thing that lets us have endurance during times of struggle. Instead it results from learning to trust God, even when things aren't going well, even when there's a moment of dissatisfaction, even when there's trouble, we [00:07:00] still love and trust God. And. Godly patients, so to speak, that's recognizing that we can act within patients or we can not act either way.

[00:07:15] His okay. Patients can be quiet and sitting and staying and listening and patients can be active and working and trying to make the outcome change depending on what's needed, because it is a fruit of the spirit. It's showing that trust in God. And sometimes what God is telling us to do is act. Sometimes God is saying, okay, That is an injustice in the world that you are observing act to correct that injustice.

[00:07:48] And other times, God is saying, sit quietly this morning and listen, and sit still and just be for a moment. And that [00:08:00] is enough. Know the truth is sometimes when we pray for patients, what we really should be praying for is love and trust. Instead love for each other. Love for God and love for ourselves as well as trust in God, because that's what results in having patients.

[00:08:24] Thanks for listening.

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