learning

For all of God's gifts, He gives as there is room in our hearts to receive.  We have to give in order to receive. I have to give my impatience in order to receive patience. I have to give misery in order to receive joy.  I have to give in order to receive. And it's really not easy to give over these hard things in our hearts, because they come out like the scrapings of shards of glass.  Then they are replaced with the Maker's hands-- healing hands. He replaces and heals the wounds of the impatience and misery... and we receive patience and joy. 

As a young Christian, He removed impatience from my life on a base level.  Most of the time I don't get bothered by the struggling cashier, or traffic, & I don't tend to take hateful comments from strangers personally.  He is still working on me in some of those types of areas, as no one is perfect.  Where am I today?  I'm miserably impatient with myself & with others when the step to take is obvious and yet not taken, when commitments are not taken seriously, or when the same old thing is circled around for the kadrillionth time.   I do all of these things... and I hate it & when someone else does them... I hate it! I get impatient with the process of things and I say mean things-- usually to myself & every blue moon out loud about another person. I'm really embarrassed that I do that.  It's like... you could tell me anything, nothing surprises me and I don't judge for the content of someone's past or present... but when the way out becomes obvious to the other person and they don't take it, it just drives me bonkers.  It drives me totally bonkers when I do it too, and I start falling all apart.... like... "why can't I just stop circling around this same old thing and move on already?"

Deuteronomy 2:2-3, "Then the Lord said to me, “You have made your way around this hill country long enough; now turn north."

It's time to take direction from God & give up my own tendency to wander.  Please help me to stop wandering, Lord!! Please just carry me out of this cyclical maze I've lost myself in.

Back to the impatience verses patience. These gifts from God come in layers as the yuck in our lives are sloughed off in layers.  God is good to us in that HE is always perfectly patient with us; He knows the best way to remove the junk from our hearts is to do it over time and with gentleness.  If it all came out at once we wouldn't be able to handle it and we would never develop the perseverance needed to mature in Christ.  So, we can learn to be patient with others as HE is patient with us-- it is after all partly how to Love as God Loves.  

Just one more thing HE is working to change in me... impatience.