Advent Impatience

We’re a week into the thick of advent season. Trees are half-decorated, plans are double-booked, Amazon forgot that now is an important time to deliver on time. Amidst all that, now is the time to celebrate the birth of the one who saves His people from their sins, which is good, because we keep sinning.

I’ve got three sins to warn against, one a week starting today. This does not mean we’re free to do the other ones. But these are some of the sneaky sins we let slip into our hearts, and they are some of the sins that are especially out of season.

The first sin that has no place in these days of advent is impatience.

When you do a pull up (or try to), you’re training your deltoids and lats. When you do a set of push ups, you work your pecs and bi-ceps. When you start talking about December 25 on December 1, what spiritual muscles are you exercising? The patience muscles.

There are straightforward commands about it: “Be patient with everyone” (1 Thessalonians 5:14 NASB) “Be patient…be patient” (James 5:7, 8). Patience is wise: “The patient spirit is better than the proud spirit” (Ecclesiastes 7:8). It not only belongs with wisdom, “Love is patient” (1 Corinthians 13:4). It is part of the fruit of the Spirit (Galatians 5:22). And it is one of the Christian’s adornments: “Put on…patience” (Colossians 3:12).

When the lines at the store are long, when the online store empties your shopping cart for no apparent reason, when you kept your kids out hours past their bedtimes for four nights in a row and they’re showing all the signs, when your relatives are offended by your egg nog, these are reminding you that Christ has not returned yet.

Patience does not mean just letting everything go, it means letting go of your main-character energy. These are days of purposeful waiting for the Lord. “Bear fruit with patience” (Luke 8:15).