Values That Stick: Patience

Easter 4 – A Message on Ephesians 4:1–2 and Luke 13:6–9 for St. Luke's Lutheran Church, Richardson, Texas

I woke up in the middle of the night this week from a nightmare that felt all too real. First, a lizard crawled out from under my foot in my indoor slip-on shoes. Then the mom lizard. Then suddenly—like dozens and dozens many-legged babies—crawling out from under my foot. I could see and, worse, feel them crawling under my foot. Then I was fighting a huge black spider. It attached its legs to my hands, and I couldn’t get it off. I was waving my arms, trying to scream for help. At first nothing came out. Then finally I yelled loud enough that my own voice woke me up—arms flailing in the air.

Once in St. Louis, I was fighting some creature so hard, I fell out of bed and kicked the dresser. So Dan is glad on the nights when I’m just talking in my sleep (I have prayed and preached in my sleep, too!).

After these horrible nightmares, I woke up in the dark, heart racing, and thought: This didn’t come out of nowhere. Because right now, life feels a little like that nightmare: Overwhelming. Out of control.

Dan was out of town all week. Erin, our Administrator, was on vacation as well. (I’ll never do that again!). Everything that could go wrong, did—issues with my laptop, technology, the automatic lock at home stopped working, the printers/scanner at church, building issues—everything needed attention at once. Also one of our kids  came to town with a friend—wonderful!—and they brought ther puppy, who is not exactly housetrained (my bathroom is not his bathroom!). And then Synod Assembly was happening this weekend, our annual church meeting.

So, Dan is gone, I’m sleeping alone, and fighting the plagues of Egypt by myself, which is my brain's way of processing a lot of information and emotions that I wasn’t paying attention to during the day. Then I realized: here I am preparing a sermon on Patience, and when life piles up, patience is the first thing to go—especially patience with myself, to process all that was going on, and patience with tasks, and patience with others.

Maybe you know that feeling too. It’s usually not one big thing—it’s ten small things all at once. A schedule with no room to breathe. A relationship asking more than you feel you can give. A situation that is not resolving as quickly as you hoped. And suddenly, we’re not responding—we’re reacting. We get short with people we love.
We feel irritated over things that normally wouldn’t bother us. We want answers now. Change now. Resolution now. And we live in a world that reinforces this:

• Faster is better
• Immediate is normal
• Waiting feels like failure
• It if takes more than 5 minutes at the drive-through we have to comment that this isn’t really “fast” food.

And yet… deep down, we know that the most important things in life do not work at lightning speed. Good, healthy relationships do not grow overnight. Healing does not happen instantly--it takes time, rest, ebb and flow. Faith does not deepen on demand. And neither does patience.

Listen again to the Apostle Paul in Ephesians 4: I beg you to lead a life worthy of the calling to which you have been called…with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love. Patience isn’t just a personality trait. It’s part of our calling—right alongside humility, gentleness, and love. And this word Paul uses—bearing with one another—it doesn’t mean “putting up with.” It means holding space for one another. Making room for each other’s imperfections, growth, and timing. It’s relational patience.

It gets explained and lived out in the parable Jesus tells this story in Luke 13—about a fig tree that isn’t producing fruit. For three years, the owner comes looking… and finds nothing. So he says what we might expect: Cut it down. Get rid of it. Sounds like corporate downsizing. It’s not working. It’s not producing. It’s taking up space. But the gardener says:

• Give it one more year.
• Let me dig around it.
• Let me nourish it.
• Let me care for it.

That’s patience. Not passive waiting. Active, hopeful investment. The gardener doesn’t ignore the lack of fruit—he leans in. He invests. The gardenert ends. She nourishes. She trusts that growth is still possible. 

And that’s how God is with us.
God is patient—not because God doesn’t care about growth, but because God does. God doesn’t give up on us when we’re not producing fruit. God doesn’t cut us off when we’re slow to change. God stays with us… tends to us… nourishes us—with love, forgiveness, community, bread and wine, hope. God invests everything in us.

That’s why he sent Jesus, a human being, who inches his way down the birth canal, and how to read and write, and how to think and feel like us, and go through puberty. Because God invests life, heart, death, resurrection, and eternity in us. That is patience—eternal patience. That is trusting that fruit will come, that our side of the relationship with God will grow and mature like Jesus did.

The good news is: you don’t have to manufacture patience on your own.Patience is a fruit of the Spirit. It’s not something we force, or muster by our own will—it’s something God grows in us. Patience is that quiet confidence that says:

• I don’t have to fix everything right now
• I don’t have to control everything.
• God is present in this moment—and the next one too.

Still, there are ways we can open ourselves to that growth—especially when our patience is stretched. Because patience gets hard when when we feel overwhelmed and out of control—like I did last week

• or when a child is struggling and not changing as quickly as you hoped
• when a spouse or partner doesn’t see what you see
• when  work feels overwhelming
• when prayers seem unanswered
• It’s hard when you feel like the fig tree—or when you’re waiting on someone else to change.

So how do we make space for God to grow patience in us? First, it seems the hardest person to be patient with is ourselves. My week might have felt less overwhelming if I had just taken 10 or 15 minutes and sat with God and named what was feeling unmanageable. Then God would have said, “don’t worry, I’ve got this” and maybe I could have avoided the battle with lizards and spiders.

A second way to make space for God, is to slow down our reactions. Patience begins in that small space between what happens and how we respond. Before the words come out. Before frustration takes over.

• Just take a breath.
• A pause.
• A simple prayer: “God, be with me in this moment.”
• For some, it helps to count to 10, or just to say, “let me think a minute..”

We remind ourselves that we trust God’s timing more than our urgency. We want things fixed now—but God is often doing something deeper. Patience asks: What might God be doing here that we can’t see yet?

Third, we practice staying. In a world that walks away quickly, patience stays present (unless you are unsafe for any reason). Patience stays in the conversation.
Patience stays in the relationship. Patience stays committed to growth—even when it’s slow. 

And what about the children and grandchildren in our lives or our circle of influence? We don’t teach patience by telling kids to “be patient.” We teach it by living it.
Children learn patience:
• when we don’t snap at them when we’re tired
• when we listen instead of rushing
• when we model calm instead of chaos, even when we’re stressed or running late
• when we show them people are worth time

Children learn patience when they see us:
• wait without complaining
• trust without panicking
• love without giving up

Because patience isn’t just taught. It’s caught.

So here’s your invitation this week:
Pay attention to where your patience is being stretched.
• When are you feeling reactive?
• Where are you wanting things to move faster than they are?
• Where are you tempted to give up—on a situation, a person, or yourself?
And instead of pushing harder…what if you came alongside Jesus, the gardener? What if you: gave it time, tended it with care, trusted that God is still at work, because patience is not about doing nothing. It’s about trusting that growth takes time—and choosing to stay present while God is growing you.

God is already at work in you. Slowly. Steadily. Faithfully. Even when you don’t see it yet. 

Does this mean I won't have any more nightmares with lizards crawling and battling giant spiders? I hope so, but even if I do, focusing on patience this week reminds me that God is with me in the terrors of the day as well as the night. When life starts to feel overwhelming, and out of control—we can remember the fig tree. Remember the God who is patient with you.
We can pause.
We can breathe.
We are not alone.

Because patience isn’t about having less to carry. ..It’s about knowing Who carries it with you. Jesus carries our whole life with us. And his patience takes root in us, we begin to experience:
• the patience that steadies us when life is rocky
• the patience that grounds us when life feels like too much
• the patience that trusts God is at work doing much more than we can see

And in time…like the fig tree, the fruit will come. And as we bear this fruit that lasts, our mission together becomes ever more delicious, wonderful, and life-giving!