A member of the church last week shared with me a small booklet a former pastor of the church I am serving wrote. In it was this simple but profound question, one that I have not asked: What do you want from Jesus this Christmas?I've asked the other question quite a lot. What should I give Jesus this Christmas? But what I want from Jesus....well this is a timely question for me.
God has had fun with my wife and me this Advent. We have been forced to craft sermons dealing with the very issues we have wrestled with all our lives. She dealt with worrying. This Sunday I have to deal with patience. She is the worry wart....though she worries much less these days. I am the impatient one.
What do I want from Jesus this Christmas? Simple. Patience.
I know that I can't just ask the question and move on waiting for God to do all the work. Asking for this gift will require that I pray, read, get help from others, and pray some more.
I pray that God will nudge me in the right direction.....bop me on the head when my silly temper gets in the way or my robust response to others dysfunction.
Help me be more calm dear Lord. Help me.
2 comments:
I prayed of for patience once...it was disatorous.
You know, I read your post that followed this post that I commented on. You are right, I was wrong. When I prayed for patience, I thought I had to endure the things that I spoke out against before; that is not the case. Thank you for clarifying that for me. It makes a lot of sense.
Now, I'm going to tell you what I want from Jesus this Christmas. I've never asked him for anything at Christmas so this is a bit strange for me.....and extremely selfish.
All I want for Christmas is my 4 lb. Yorkie to be well so that she can once again be the bridge that brought my father from his depression after my mother died. If the truth be told, I want her to be well for me too.
With all the sickness in the world, with all the hate and fighting; I'm sitting here hoping that my dog will be healed.
What kind of person does that make me?
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