Love is Patient: Part 4

Growing in patience: Continued…

“This you know, my beloved brethren. But everyone must be quick to hear, slow to speak and slow to anger.” (James 1:19)

Wouldn’t it be great if there was some kind of exercise you could do to help you become more patient before you actually had to be patient? The problem with patience is that, when the opportunity to employ it presents itself, we are usually unprepared to be patient. How can we condition ourselves to be more ready to be patient? James gives us a hint: be quick to hear and slow to speak.

Most of us are poor listeners. When involved in a conversation, we listen just enough to decide what we are going to say next. We are less concerned with what the other person is saying and more concerned with how we are going to respond. We listen enough to hear their words, but we too often fail to hear their heart. In this passage, James is not simply speaking about the importance of hearing when we are in an argument, but rather developing a lifestyle of listening. If we never listen to each other in the easy times, how will we ever be able to stop talking and listen in the heat of an argument? We need to invest ourselves in listing to and understanding the people we relate to. In so doing, we will be more prepared to stop, listen, and be patient when it counts the most.

We can learn some amazing things when we stop talking long enough to really hear the other person. Many times, when I take the time to listen, I find out that what I was offended over was really just a misunderstanding. How many times do we get offended or angry at something someone else does only to find out that we misjudged the intentions and motivations of the other person? I have done this many times with my own children. There have been instances where I have gotten angry with one of my children over something I thought they had done, only to find out later that I was wrong and that it was really someone else. My impatience lead to anger and judgment for and act not committed when, if I had only had the patience to first find out what really happened, the whole incident could have been avoided. King Solomon put it this way, “He who answers before listening - that is his folly and his shame.” (Proverbs 18:13 NIV)

After listening, we must also be slow to speak. In that time, between listening and speaking, it is a good time to ask ourselves some questions. One of the scriptures that has help me the most to be patient is, “Also do not take to heart everything people say, lest you hear your servant cursing you. For many times, also, your own heart has known that even you have cursed others.” (Ecclesiastes 7:21-22 NKJV) One of the questions I ask myself is, “Do I do the same thing for which I am about to get angry over?” When I am driving on the freeway and someone cuts me off, I say to myself, “That’s OK, for I too have at times accidentally cut other off.” Before speaking in judgment, it helps to first judge our own life. When we listen and understand the other person, then look objectively at the situation, we learn that we are all not too different from each other. We all have stuff. We are all imperfect. We are all in process. If I can have patience for my own short comings, then I can have patience for someone else’s as well. I know how most of the time I don’t mean to harm or offend someone else, even though I do at times, so I can understand that others do not mean to harm or offend me. Listening to others and considering how to respond will make us more patient people.

More to come… David Robison