The Way Forward: Patience
The Way Forward: Patience
Isaiah 40:28-31
Today, we continue our work of teasing out the threads in the Union Church “tapestry” that make us who we are. We examine each “thread,” or core value, and ask, “How does this thread shape our life together?” This morning’s core value is patience.
Patience always has two strikes against it. So far, we’ve talked about gratitude and humility. Who can’t get on board with that, right? Even if we aren’t always grateful and humble, we’d like to be. Patience, though, is a harder sell. Usually patience comes up because someone close to us is chewing us out, “You need to be more patient.” Or, we just berate ourselves, “Why can’t I just settle down and wait?”
Patience is a struggle. We live in a culture that is all about taking wants and turning them into urgent needs. Our whole economy depends on people having insatiable appetites for stuff, stuff they may not have know even known exists, stuff which, with a little marketing, they’re not going to be able to live without. We see our neighbor’s “stuff” (house, car, golf clubs, mower) and we want their stuff: “I could live, drive, golf, mow so much better if I had their stuff!”
The problem, of course, is that none of this is true. You can get new golf clubs and your golf game won’t change. You can get the new house and realize that the only thing that’s changed is your address. You can get the new car and, though you may enjoy the new car smell, you won’t really get where you’re going any faster. Life doesn’t change from the outside in. Rather, it changes from the inside out. Real change takes time and hard work. In is hard to put in that time, if we don’t know how to be patient and take our time.
My point is this: we live in a world of insatiable needs and immediate gratification. This is so true that some of the most successful industries in our society are in the business of helping buy stuff that they really can’t afford: credit cards, lay-away plans, payday loans. We’re going to make money by giving you money so you can buy what you can’t afford and you will pay us exorbitant interest all the while.
Somehow, in some way, if we are going to live a life that is about more than accumulating stuff, then we need to find a way to tell the difference between a want and a need. We’ll never be immune to stuff, especially stuff that really smart people are trying to sell us. We can, though, learn to wait. We can learn to walk out of the car dealership if the sell is too hard. We can learn to turn the commercials off.
A wise person told me that if she runs into something on line that she likes, she will put it in her “cart” but her rule is that it has to be in the cart for 24 hours before she can buy it. Imagine how many things you would discover you really didn’t need if we took our time and let our impulses settle down!
It seems really safe to me to say that a spiritual life, at some level, involves stepping back and declaring, even if it is just for ourselves, that there is more to life than getting stuff and meeting our own needs. Of course there are basic needs we do have to account for: housing, food, safety, and so on. However, almost as soon as we’ve met those needs we add to the list. Eventually, we look around and think, “I have more than I ever dreamed of having but I’m still not satisfied.” We see how shallow and meaningless we feel and we wonder, “What if the problem is me? What if all I’m doing is distracting myself from what’s really wrong?”
Human beings are insecure. Our super power is being aware of the past and aware of the future. We all know that our time on this earth is limited. However, not one of us knows how much time we have left. None of us really know how we’re doing. So, material stuff is a tempting scorecard, especially if I’m doing okay: “I have this and that, that must mean that I’m on the right path, right?”
If you want to be more than a consumer, you have to practice the “magic words.” In this case, the “magic words” are not “please” and “thank you,” although those words will always have a magic of their own. No, the magic words that we need to practice are, “I can wait.” Yes, I can work to tell the difference between a want and a need. Yes, I can lead myself away from temptation. However, sooner or later, I’m going to run into something or someone which is just “kryptonite” for kicking my “needs” into overdrive. Can I be strong enough—grounded enough—to metaphorically put that “something” or that “someone” into the “Amazon cart” and shock myself by saying, “I can wait?”
Here are two questions that arise at that point. First, what if I had someone to wait with me? This is one of the best things that a community can do: learn to wait together. We can support each other: “I can see how hard this is but I want you to know I think you’re doing great! How about I bring you dinner tonight?” We can distract each other, “Sounds like you’ve got some waiting to do. How about if we watch the game together?” One way or another, we say to the person who is waiting, “I’ll wait with you.”
The second question is this, “What am I really waiting for?” Maybe the immediate, urgent, impulsive need was for a new and improved car or a new and improved romantic partner or a new and improved set of golf clubs. At some level, you’re convinced that what is keeping you from living the life you deserve is your old car, or your old romantic partner or your old golf clubs. The problem is “them.” The problem, of course, is that even if you manage to replace the old with the new what still won’t be new and improved is you. The only question is how long will it take you to face that truth?
It’s hard to wait, to be patient, to learn to just be. The promise, though, is that if I can learn to wait then I will discover what’s really worth waiting for. In a world where we “can’t get no satisfaction” we might actually discover what’s really satisfying: choosing to get familiar with the notion of “enough;” making choices to change myself; clearing space in my life for appreciating what surrounds me and occasionally catching a glimpse of God.
Our text says that this is what happens when we learn to “wait on the Lord.” God becomes present in the most unlikely of places when we are doing the most unlikely things. We show up for someone else on their hard day, maybe even their worst day. We’re not sure what to say or do but we show up. Somehow, your inadequate words provide actual comfort or, when you’re not sure what else to do, your arm around that suffering person’s shoulder actually seems to make a difference. In a moment of compassionate action, it feels like something more is at work through you. Boy, does that feel good.
Or, perhaps far more uncomfortably, the person having the bad day will be you. Despite your deep dismay at being a person in need, someone cares, someone shows you that you are not alone, someone cares enough to sit down and wait with you. In that moment, you are left gasping at how powerful that care is, so much more powerful than anything you could buy.
“We can wait together.” How do we do this? At the Union Church, we create a space in which everyone’s value is affirmed. You don’t have to prove you belong. You belong. We don’t really care about your the stuff you own. We care about you. We’re not here to get something from you, we’re here to get to know you and we hope you’ll get to know us. But the really revolutionary thing we’re going to try to figure out isn’t what any of us can get but what we might be able to give—to one another and to a world full of needs.
The promise of our text is really quite powerful. If we learn how to wait, if we learn how to be patient, we will be sustained in that life. We will run and not be weary. We will walk and we will not faint. It will be like we have been raised up on the wings of eagles, not because we are so strong but because our lives finally have a foundation. My worth won’t rest in the outcome of some drama at work. My worth won’t rest in whether I can buy the newest, incredibly improved distraction that someone is selling. Instead, grounded in God’s presence, I can get on with who God created me to be. In the end, patience—learning to wait— isn’t an end in itself. Rather, patience is how we buy ourselves time to reset our lives and ground ourselves in a community’s love and God’s grace.
It takes time to grow. Learning to be patient—with ourselves, with one another, and with God, is how we carve out that time. It’s hard work but it gives us the chance to grow in the ways that we actually need to grow.
I had a really concrete experience of this truth a few years ago when the church built the courtyard. At the time, no one really had any idea how important and sacred this space would become. This space was a huge part of what allowed us to gather during the pandemic. At the time, there were just a lot of ideas about how the courtyard should look. The more those ideas got clarified, the more excited everyone became: “This is going to be amazing!”
Eventually, the discussion turned to the plants that would be planted. We wanted native plants, planted is a design that reflected the soft, curved, non-symmetrical lines that actually happen in nature. We live in prairie land. Why don’t we have a prairie worship space. The urgency rose with the excitement: “Let’s plant this now! Let’s start tomorrow!”
When we were told that we could plant full grown plants and shrubs that would make it look like the courtyard has always been here, for a little extra cost (or maybe kind of a lot more money), I totally bought in. “I want this to look great, now! Let’s go!”
It was Jerry McDermott who looked me in the eye and said, “We’re not doing that.” “Jerry,” I thought to myself, “is this because we need more money?” (That’s the impatient, impulsive response.) Out loud, I just asked Jerry why we wouldn’t do this. He had such a great answer, “We don’t need the plants to look like they’ll look in four years. We’re not going anywhere. We’ll just watch the plants grow.” We just need to learn to be patient.
Sometimes, as a church, we need to take our time. We need to learn to wait. We need to cultivate the fine art of watching things grow. Sometimes, when we do this as a church, one of us can be extra patient when someone else is having a not-so-patient day. Sometimes, as a church, we might even send each other back into the world, far more ready to introduce a little more patience to our completely impatient world.