Upcoming Sunday Worship Services
“The Waiting Game”
Today I want to talk about patience, talk about what it is and why it is not only a valuable life skill, but much more than that. Patience is one of those words that has different depths of meaning – The online dictionary that I subscribe to offers 15 basic synonyms of patience with 10 to 20 synonyms for each of those: patience is characterized by calmness, constancy, diligence, endurance, equanimity, even temper, forbearance, fortitude, grit, guts, intestinal fortitude, sufferance, and tolerance.
Patience, however we define it, is a life skill, and if we don’t have it we are the worse off. We tend to recognize the need for patience most readily when we find ourselves being dominated by its nasty evil twin – impatience. So let’s begin by talking about some situations in which we feel impatient.
There’s the ordinary “I can’t wait for the ballgame to start” variety of impatience. I can remember Christmas Eve as a child, wanting Christmas to come so badly it seemed that time had nearly stopped. I ached. Wanting so badly to open my presents made this the longest night of the year. This is one kind of impatience. Waiting for school to get out, or for vacation to start, looking forward to the arrival of a friend… this kind of impatience, which is rooted in a longing for something good can be more a function of exuberance than anything else.
In situations like that we can say, “Breathe, soon your wish will likely be fulfilled..
But most impatience that we experience isn’t rooted in the expectation that something wonderful is about to happen. If you’re like me most impatience that we feel is just our undisciplined reaction to routine delays. Recently someone mentioned being stuck in a bumper-to-bumper traffic jam due to an accident. “Why,” she asked me, “do people honk their horns in these situations? Do they think our cars can fly?” A traffic jam, a canceled plane, a missed deadline by a workmate, our spouse forgets to do an errand and a knot builds up inside, a mix of anger, panic, fear. Much impatience is just a knee-jerk over-reaction to the frustration of losing control of our own agenda, even for a little while. I worry sometimes about a kind of impatience you may feel occasionally, that wonders, “Will this sermon ever end?”
Then there are serious forms of impatience – a dangerous form comes from being worn down, fed up and tired of what’s going on – this kind makes you want to quit, drop out and let go. Mothers and fathers sometimes know this kind of impatience – it makes you want to give in on an issue – not because giving in is right but because it will just make the issue go away, end the tug of war – . This is the impatience of the teacher or the nurse or the office worker who is at her wits end, expected to do more than is possible day after day… you’re sick and tired of going back to the grind, unappreciated, wondering if anything you do makes a difference in anyone’s life. There is the impatience of the sick, the infirm and the isolated - those who are tired of taking pills. or exercising when it hurts – tired of the diet, or of the uncertainty or of being alone… There is the exhaustion of the breadwinner who can’t seem to make ends meet. Some days you’d just rather quit than go on.
When we are impatient with things as they are, we can overreact, we can short circuit when pressures build up inside that aren’t good for us. On our bad days we can become one of those honkers on the highway of life – snapping at people, or making poor decisions that are harmful to us or to others. To be impatient in this way is to lose control – it is to allow ourselves to be hijacked by our emotions. The results effect us and those around us, body mind and spirit.
We’ve talked enough about impatience, the evil twin. Now let’s turn to patience, the better angel of our nature. Patience is the ability to wait for something without excessive frustration. It is a valuable character trait that, importantly, can be cultivated. Here are two definitions: 1. The power of suffering with fortitude; uncomplaining endurance of evils or wrongs, such as toil, pain, poverty, insult or oppression etc. 2. [Patience is] also the act or power of calmly or contentedly waiting for something due or hoped for.
I am particularly impressed with the idea that both these definitions describe patience as a power. Where impatience can be considered a weakness, patience shows strengths of character. Patience is strength – it is the power of self-possession. Patience has been compared to a keel on a boat--it allows us to keep our stability in the stormiest of seas while continuing to move in the direction we desire. Patience retains the ability to be in charge. So how do we acquire this power?
The story is told of a young minister, who had begun to fear that he lacked the patience required for his parish ministry. He was beset by impossible demands, weary of the projections of others’ needs on him, and sick of meetings where most talked but few listened.
He asked an older mentor, a godly person in his life, to pray that he might have more patience. The aged man knelt beside his younger brother in the Lord and began to pray that God would send trouble and difficulties upon the youth. The younger brother tapped the older minister upon the shoulder and whispered: “You must have misunderstood me; I asked that you would pray that I might have more patience, not more trouble.” The older man replied: “The only way to acquire patience is to earn it!”
I don’t think you actually need trouble to cultivate patience – you might need trouble to test it – but growth in patience can come simply with awareness and intentional work in the small moments. But I do firmly believe that to develop patience we have to want it – not in a passive “it-would-be-nice” kind of way, but with an urgency. I can remember when I was young thinking that people would do good works simply because they were morally right. Part of growing up is learning that life isn’t so simple. We don’t tend to do things simply because they are virtuous – many of us don’t always vote, we don’t always support our charities as we could, we don’t always write that thank you letter – all virtuous acts … Patience is a virtue, meaning that it is a morally excellent goal – but I confess to believing that I haven’t done my job if I leave it at that because it won’t necessarily get you to act. You need to know that whatever patience you develop (virtuous, yes) will benefit you, will improve your life and the lives of those around you. And I’m here to tell you that patience is good for you body, mind and spirit.
Let’s start with the body…
Preventive medicine researcher LiJing Yan, says a study of more than 3,000 men and women suggests that people who are impatient to "get moving" are twice as likely to develop high blood pressure than people who move at a slower pace. Yan, who presented the research at the American Heart Association, says for years researchers have been looking into the so-called "Type A personality" -- the hard-driving, take-charge, win-at-all-costs personality -- to try to link that personality with heart disease but those previous studies had mixed results.
"[But] what they did find was that as their TUI scale increased ( time urgency and impatience) so did their blood pressure. Volunteers were asked four questions designed to identify those who had a heightened sense of time urgency or impatience. The questions were:
- Do you often get very upset if you are forced to wait for something?
- Do you usually feel pressured about time?
- Do you feel you don't have enough time at the end of workday?
- Do you feel you don't have enough time during the day?
They found that those ranking highest on this scale – those who we most impatient - were twice as likely to develop high blood pressure..
Patience will not only improve the quality of your life, it literally, also has the power to extend your life.
The prayer of the modern American thus far has been at best something like this, “Dear God, I pray for patience and I want it right now!” It is time for us to do better. Patience does not come easy because it is more than refraining from striking out in haste. It is more than forcing a pause.
I asked my husband Larry when he feels most impatient and what happens to him then. Perhaps you can identify with this… He said when he is already in a hurry and then something unnecessary slows him down then he goes off inside. For example, wanting to get home to drive our son somewhere, and he stops quickly for something quick at the store, and then finds himself in the one grocery line that just isn’t moving. He watches people in other lines around him come and go and could just burst at the frustration. Can you identify with this?
Catholic writer Henri Nouwen says:
“Patience is a hard discipline. It is not just waiting until something happens over which we have no control: the arrival of the bus, the end of the rain, the return of a friend, the resolution of a conflict. Patience is not waiting passively until someone else does something. Patience asks us to live the moment to the fullest, to be completely present to the moment, to taste the here and now, to be where we are. When we are impatient, we try to get away from where we are. We behave as if the real thing will happen tomorrow, later, and somewhere else. Let’s be patient and trust that the treasure we look for is hidden in the ground on which we stand.”
Nouwen’s patience is something most of us may never have considered before. Is it possible that his annoying moment can be understood as holy? Nouwen would say yes, that, whatever is happening right now, no matter how mundane or how difficult, can be worked with and trusted and even loved as part of your unfolding story. Our task is to understand these moments as such, as a time for growth in spirit. This soul-deep patience that Nouwen counsels trusts that whatever, large or small, is happening to disrupt your agenda, whatever is unfolding right now is okay and can be worked with.
Nouwen is describing patience of the very highest order. The perfection of such an ability, of course is beyond us and is a life-long pursuit. But if it were possible it would bring us into harmony with all that is. I am reminded of the description, you may have heard before, of the little duck by Doug Babcock.: It goes like this:
Now we are ready to look at something pretty special. It is a duck riding the ocean a hundred feet beyond the surf. No, it isn’t a gull.
A gull always has a raucous touch about him.
This is some sort of duck, and he cuddles in the swells.
He isn’t cold, and he is thinking things over.
There is a big heaving in the Atlantic,
And he is part of it.
He looks a bit like a mandarin, or the Lord Buddha meditating under the Bo tree,
But he has hardly enough above the eyes to be a philosopher.
He has poise, however, which is what philosophers must have.
He can rest while the Atlantic heaves, because he rests in the Atlantic.
Probably he doesn’t know how large the ocean is.
And neither do you.
But he realizes it,
And what does he do, I ask you? He sits down in it.
He reposes in the immediate as it were infinity- which it is.
That is religion, and the duck has it...
He has made himself part of the boundless, by easing himself into it just
where it touches him.
I like the little duck.
He doesn’t know much.
But he has religion."
I love that little duck. He not only has religion – he has deep patience. And perhaps at this level they are indistinguishable. I picture him riding the swells in a beautiful dance with all that is – he is enduring the heaving of his world with a deep trust. Fully engaged, he touches infinity. It matters not that he has not much above the eyes, for his condition, which we would call faith, is beyond thought.
We encounter challenges to our patience in daily moments that range from the mundane in the grocery line to the most profound, in the intensive care unit. The outcome of so much in this world is beyond our command – the outcome will still unfold and the unfolding is sacred whether we can remain present to it or not. Our challenge always is to breathe and to trust the gift of life enough to be fully and actively present. In this way we honor the sacred.
I close with these words from T.S. Eliot: [from his poem, "East Coker"]
I said to my soul, be still, and wait without hope
For hope would be hope for the wrong thing: wait without love
For love would be love of the wrong thing; there is yet faith
But the faith and the hope and the love are all in the waiting.
Wait without thought, for you are not ready for thought;
So the darkness shall be the light, and the stillness the dancing.