Patience (James 5:7-11)

My friend Betsy and her sister Martha are from a family of 10. In their neighborhood in Portland, Maine, in the late 1950s or early '60s, there was an older couple who did informal Bible studies with the kids on the block---simple selections set to flannel board. The flannel board has long since been retired, and the old man and his wife have long gone to their reward.

Betsy grew up to choose Jesus over the middle-class moralism that passed for religion in her church of upbringing, but it was a lonely road for years, being the only saved member at family gatherings. More recently, her sister Martha came to the Lord in her 50s and is on fire.

Betsy was telling me today that it dawned on her recently that she and Martha were the only two of the eight siblings who would walk down the street to the neighborhood Bible shows of yore. Do you suppose, Betsy wondered aloud, there is a connection? May we not assume that the couple prayed over the children who came? Boy, it sure took a long time for their prayers to be heard---many decades of nothing going on.

I remember my two years working on a farm on Cape Cod in the early '70s. Sally and I made our straight furrows with the rake handle tip, following the string guide we had staked in the ground at either end. Then we deposited our seed in the elongated tombs and closed them over with soil. Morning by morning we watched. Nothing happened. Nothing seemed to be going on under there. Being new at this, it was hard for us to have faith that our work had been meaningful.

Then one fine morning, the tiniest fissure, running the length of the topsoil, appeared---almost a wishful thinking. The next day, more pronounced. The next day, unmistakable. Then finally: birth. (James 5: 7-11).

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