Patience During the COVID-19 Crisis

Something I have noticed since this whole corona virus pandemic has surreally unfolded, is some people’s lack of patience. You would think that people fortunate enough to get a flight from a foreign country back home to North America would be very grateful. After all, several airlines have restricted their flights, and some travelers lagged behind to change their date home rather than act when this whole corona virus epidemic started to grow out of control. Instead, I was reading one news article stating how angry passengers were that they were all crowded, standing shoulder to shoulder, in one airport awaiting to be tested before being free to cross into the United States. Under the circumstances, I’m sure authorities, who have had to hastily throw together some kind of system to check hundreds of people, were doing their absolute best. Not only that, they were putting themselves at risk to cater to vacationers who were lucky enough to have gotten away in the first place! Some Canadian snow birds are irate that they had to cut their extended vacation short.  And some are not changing a thing in spite of every warning to pack up and get home ASAP.

At the same time, I understand the frustration of having to wait in long line-ups, and add to that the fear of catching someone else’s virus. But fears aside, I now see an entire world shutting down. People are being told to stay at home and socially isolate. Stores are closing or limiting their hours, streets are nearly empty as more and more people are working from home. Children are out of school, so there are no school buses. Senior residences are not allowing visitors except maybe immediate family. All the places where people congregate are empty. In a sense, it feels like a war zone, and we are all hiding in a shelter to protect ourselves. And so (almost) everyone (who cares about others) is in a lockdown, and in a waiting position, wondering when normal life will resume again.

I thought today about this whole difficult idea of having to wait, especially in our minute by minute, fast-paced society, where you can get anything you want at the press of a touch on your mobile device. This is a society where many young adults have a “self-important” mindset, perhaps because they don’t really know what real hardships are, and now they are facing having to wait. But it's not just young people that are impatient, it’s all ages. And it is a real crisis because of the very real danger of concocting the virus if we don’t socially distance ourselves!

I’d like to provide some insight in all of this, and I’d like to share the plus side of waiting. Here is the first gem from Scripture that has been of particular benefit to me about patience:

Jas 1:3  Knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience.

Jas 1:4  But let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing.

I remember when I first read this Scripture when I was in my 20s. I had always wanted a writing job. I did do some free-lance writing, and one time I got hired as an editor of a new entertainment newspaper in Winnipeg called City Lights. But I mostly wanted to travel and do some free-lance writing from my exciting trips. It’s all I ever wanted to do, live the life of adventure and never settle down. Oh boy, did God ever have other plans for me. He opened up employment in office jobs. I couldn’t get any further away from my desired goal than that! These jobs, although paid well and I enjoyed friendships with my co-workers, were as boring as boring could get. What adventure was there in that?

But God’s Word really does work when you are His beloved child and committed disciple. I came to discover that the life God planned out for me was not going to be easy, and even recently, the Lord reminded me that I am not here on this earth for my own fulfillment! Well, doesn’t that just fly in the face of all these seemingly self-absorbed travelers who feel inconvenienced, and I am not excluded in this because of my own desire for travel, rather than staying put where God has me planted?

Waiting has indeed deeply uprooted my selfish desires for self-fulfillment in life, although I’m always a work in progress. I have learned that life is not about me and getting my own way, that waiting actually has caused me to seek God, and His incredible life-giving Word for life’s many perplexing issues and difficulties. It has given me a reality check on the fact of how short life really is, and that I best fulfill HIS work here, rather than spend all my time and energy to fulfill what I WANT.

James 1:4 says something startling that I couldn’t understand for years. How can patience perfect you so that you are content in need of nothing? At least that’s how I read it. I now think I know in part, what it means, at least to me. It means that through waiting, that thing that I want so badly will lose its need for immediate fulfillment as I learn to give it over to God, and trust Him with it. When I am trusting Him, I am no longer worrying about it or discontent because I realize it’s not the fulfillment of my desires that counts, but my walk with the Lord that matters most of all. I must be willingly to forgo my own heart’s desires, and follow the Lord’s loving guidance for me instead. I am sure God has spared me from many a catastrophe by not granting me my desires right away.  And in the end, He rewards me with a joy, peace and gratitude that no amount of traveling could ever give me.  And I have this whether I travel or not.  I am blessed indeed!

We are instructed to be patient while suffering, as in the following important Scriptures.

Patience in Suffering

Jas 5:7 Be patient therefore, brethren, unto the coming of the Lord. Behold, the husbandman waiteth for the precious fruit of the earth, and hath long patience for it, until he receive the early and latter rain.
Jas 5:8 Be ye also patient; stablish your hearts: for the coming of the Lord draweth nigh.
Jas 5:9 Grudge not one against another, brethren, lest ye be condemned: behold, the judge standeth before the door.
Jas 5:10 Take, my brethren, the prophets, who have spoken in the name of the Lord, for an example of suffering affliction, and of patience.
Jas 5:11 Behold, we count them happy which endure. Ye have heard of the patience of Job, and have seen the end of the Lord; that the Lord is very pitiful, and of tender mercy.
Jas 5:12 But above all things, my brethren, swear not, neither by heaven, neither by the earth, neither by any other oath: but let your yea be yea; and your nay, nay; lest ye fall into condemnation.

Keep in mind that God loves us, and He is bigger, much bigger than any virus. He can make it disappear into nothing. But perhaps this time, He wants us to wait because there are many important lessons to be learned during this time. And this is really a blessed time to take advantage of reading and praying, phoning others to see how they’re doing, yes, I said PHONING to hear someone’s voice, or texting. There are many beneficial things we can do. Maybe instead of all the running around, we need the quietness to be still, and think about the things that truly matter in life. To close, I’d like to quote one of my favorite Scriptures:

Isa 40:31  But they that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint.

Sincere blessings to each one of you reading this.  Stay well.