Actively Patient

Yesterday I had the chance to get together with my new co-workers to chat, do a little Bible study and pray. It's a pleasure to be able to do that as part of my professional duties.

As a startup company, we still have a variety of things that we need to complete and this process has taken a fair bit of time. I've been involved since the idea was first suggested to me in July 2006. Steve, as one of the major partners, has been heavily involved for around a year now (or more), helping developing the Business Plan and all of that. Rick, as the original founder, has been developing ideas for the company since 2003, and before that when he first hurt in 1996.

In short, patience has been very important.

From Psalm 40, we were reminded that patience is more than just waiting. It involves prayer and crying out to God. It means that we need to place our full trust in God even when plans aren't working out as well as we had hoped. And oftentimes, we need to work hard while we're waiting, to prepare for the eventual goal.

This lesson applies to several other key areas of my life. Patience is not the expectation that everything will work out by itself. It doesn't mean that we have no part to play in planning and preparation. We just need to make sure that we aren't putting our own plans ahead of God's. We need to make sure that our goals are a reflection of God's ideals and not just our personal dreams. We need to make sure that we let God accomplish things in his own way without us getting in the way.

Patience is the pursuit of God's will and God's timing. We need to be actively patient.