Don't Pray for Patience...

...because God will make you wait.

I thought of that on Sunday morning as we began the Advent season- a season of waiting. As was said in the sermon, Christians have been waiting now for 2000 years.

So, who's praying for patience?

Well, we all need it, I am sure. It is a cliche that we live in an instant gratification world. We want what we want when we want it reinforces that need to have it at the minute we want it. It wasn't that long ago (in historic timeframes) that the only things you bought on time were cars and houses. Now, as we pile up consumer debt encouraged by the world around us, we might even end up paying high interest rates on a candy bar or case of Pepsi.

We are not willing to be denied. Our waiting is avoiding the longer line.

Advent is no longer about waiting. It is about getting things done earlier and earlier, doing what we want as soon as we can. It is no longer the "hopeful anticipation" that the church knew for centuries before we became more aware of the greater world and its possibilities and we became jealous or covetous.

Lord, I don't like it when my ramblings take me where I don't want to go. Cure my impatience and jealousy by letting me celebrate what I already have, and then to live in the hope of what can yet be.