The Quest for Patience in a Fast-Paced World

Today on Feeding My Faith.

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Hey.

Welcome to Feeding My Faith.

I'm Dave Jackson.

Today we're going to talk about traveling at the speed of life.

And I was watching.

I forget what documentary something, but it had Questlove.

And if you're like, what's a Questlove?

That's the drummer for the Roots, which is the band for Jimmy Fallon.

Have mad respect for Questlove.

And they were asking him about different things, and he said one of the worst inventions was the remote control.

I mean, that really sparked some thought for me that maybe that was the gateway drug to just being impatient.

We want everything now.

Remote controls, really, you know, they started really, like, back in the 1800s.

Like, Nikola Tesla had one that didn't really go anywhere.

But they said, like in the 30s and 40s, like garage door openers, that was a remote control.

And I just know growing up we didn't have one.

And our garage was like a two and a half car.

That door was really heavy.

It had springs.

I remember the springs.

We had to always check them because in the event the spring broke while you were in the garage, that spring could, like, basically kill you.

And, yeah, that was fun.

And now everything's got a remote control.

And in theory, technology has made our lives convenient, that's what they say.

And everything we want is at our fingertips.

I have a friend of mine that was looking for some sort of depth finder for his boat.

And he was explaining how some part for the depth finder, you need this and that and you need the part number and blah, blah, blah.

And he was talking about how you do this and you look it up on ebay.

And I was like, what did.

What did we do before the Internet?

And it was like, if it wasn't in the store, you didn't know it existed.

You might have seen a advertisement in a magazine or on tv, but pretty much what you saw is what you got.

Now everything is at, you know, basically the point of a click here.

And the problem is, I think we kind of expect everything now.

I mean, when I was growing up, if I wanted SpaghettiOs, I had to wait for, you know, you throw the SpaghettiOs in a pan, five minutes for the pan to heat up, and then you get it, you know, Right?

And like now it's, you know, whatever, 45 seconds in a microwave.

I mean, we don't even really need to leave the house to grocery shop.

And yet we wonder why we're obese.

But if you really Want to test your patience for me?

Get in a car with someone and drive for more than 24 hours, where they're sleeping while you drive and you sleep while they drive.

Yeah, that's not a fun experience.

And when they wake up, they're going to go, are we there yet?

And so will you.

Because it just seems like forever.

And I know for me, in Ohio, like, are we there yet?

Like, we're still in Ohio.

It's only been four hours.

If you're in Texas, forget about it.

You can drive for six hours in Texas and not even be close to getting out of the state.

And so we hear the phrase all the time.

Patience is a virtue.

And I always want to add, and I want some now.

And that's actually not in the Bible.

There are some verses here about patience.

One is Proverbs 14, 9.

Whoever is patient has great understanding.

But one who is quick tempered displays folly.

I know at my job this week, I do tech support.

And we started to get kind of a line of people waiting to get their questions answered.

And that kind of pushes my buttons.

I'm like, must help people.

Must help them now.

Must hurry, get them to the point where my answers start to suffer in quality, shall we say?

My boss is like, this one doesn't even make sense.

What are you talking about?

I had like, it's okay, it's okay.

Just slow down.

You know another scripture, James 1, 2, 4.

Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, when you face trials.

And I realize that makes James sound like a lunatic.

Like, say what?

Yep, consider it pure joy whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance.

Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be more mature and complete, not lacking anything, then that mature and complete is kind of understanding in a way, isn't it?

And when we don't get our way, what's really kind of weird is one of the solutions that we as a species are turning to is to just shoot someone.

It's, you know, do as I say, or I don't know, I'll kill you.

We had a shooting less than two miles from my house.

Witnesses told the police victim was involved in an argument with a suspect over a shared driveway.

And during the argument, the suspect reportedly shot the victim.

Luckily, she wasn't killed.

But I don't know about you, I'm thinking any kind of gunshot is not a good gunshot.

And it's weird because I'm thinking when she comes home for the hospital, you're still going to share a driveway, but that seems to be, you know, do as I say, or, you know, we're going to bust out the 9 millimeters.

And there seem to be two sides of our needs, because if you think about it, we want fast cars, we want fast food, we want fast nonstop flights.

If we go to Disney, we want a fast pass.

We also want instant tax refunds.

We want entertainment on demand with no commercials, because who's got time for that?

We can't wait to turn 16 to get our driver's license, 18 to vote, 21 to drink.

We're in a hurry to grow up.

And apparently that doesn't stop if you're in a relationship.

Then everybody's like, well, when are you getting married?

And if you get married, oh, holy cow, because here it comes.

When are you going to have kids?

We always seem to be in a hurry, and when we don't get it, we lose our minds.

Now, because we're just conditioned that we get whatever we want.

Now, the computers at my church are ridiculously slow, and so when I say when we don't get our way, we lose our minds.

Yeah.

Like, I actually go to my church at times if I know I'm going to be using their computers early because I know it's going to take at least five minutes just to turn the thing on.

They really need replace.

But that's a great example of when we're used to things that are fast and now they're not.

The only thing that we want slower is the aging process.

Yeah.

If we could slow that down.

Because it seems like I don't know how it happened, but the next thing I know, I turn around and I was 60.

Wait, what?

Huh?

And there's a great song by John Mayer called Stop this Train, and he's talking about how it's freaking him out because his parents are getting old.

He's like, hey, can we stop this train?

And the lyrics are so scared of getting older.

I'm only good at being young.

So I play the numbers game to find a way to say that life has just begun.

I had a talk with my old man, said, help me understand.

And he said, when you turn 68, you renegotiate.

Yeah, you kind of freak out.

And even if something comes along to help us medically slow down the aging process, we want it fast and with no side effects.

And that usually doesn't work.

Hey, I know it took me 30 years to get this fat, but I'd like to take a pill and have it all washed Away in, I don't know, maybe a weekend if that.

And when we don't get what we want again, we get frustrated.

As I record this, it is, what is this Saturday and last Monday I lost a friend of mine.

He was 51, he had just got a new house with his wife and 11 year old daughter who he just adored.

And I'm very frustrated because I'm in Ohio and there are friends of mine that need hugs in Florida and I can't give it to them.

Neil was one of those friends that you just kind of pick up where you left off kind of friends.

And those are hard to come by.

And I'm still thinking I'm going to fly there.

It's price wise.

Well, you guys all know when you need a ticket less than a week, they're like, oh look, supply and demand.

So the price is through the roof.

But when death arrives, you know, because father times undefeated.

Yeah, that'll slow your life down and that'll make you really identify those things to lose some sweat over.

And you guys remember the old book, don't sweat the small stuff.

Oh and by the way, it's all small stuff.

Kind of get lost with that, you know.

And then there's the, the other side of are we there yet?

And that's just good old fashioned getting old.

It doesn't look like a picnic.

I know.

Look, I'm not ancient, but at 60 I can see where things aren't quite as like useful.

You know, when I hurt my knee, it took like a month to get over it.

Things don't heal as quickly.

But I remember I was talking to my grandma once when she was in her 90s and she was explaining how most of her sense of taste had just left.

And she said, well, I eat because I need to to live.

She's like, but I'm just putting hot mush in my mouth.

The joy of like, this is such good bacon.

Can you imagine not tasting bacon?

You know, you get it.

She's like, I kind of smell it, but even that's kind of gone.

And I just thought, man, that's, that's.

Who wants to live like that?

And I'm sure if that's you and you're on the back nine and look, you know you're on the back nine, you might be thinking, look, am I there yet?

You might be saying, can, can somebody come and get me?

Like, I don't know, maybe you guys lost your paperwork up in heaven.

But like I'm ready.

And the thing is, if you're still here.

God isn't done with you.

Don't get impatient to go home.

Now is not the time to sit in your house, talk about the good old days, disconnect everything, and just wait.

All right, well, I'll just sit here until Jesus comes.

God is not done with you.

So check this out.

Just remember the number 41.

Moses committed murder.

Straight up.

Moses committed murder and then hid in the desert for 40 years.

Your 41 came, and God helped him to help rescue Israel.

Moses went up on the mountain for 40 days.

On day 41, he received the Ten Commandments in the Bible.

You know, it rained for 40 days and 40 nights.

Day 41 came, and the rain stopped.

The Israelites wandered in the wilderness for 40 years.

You're 41.

They walked into the promised land.

Goliath taunted Israel for 40 days.

Day 41 came, David took him out.

Jonah preached a message of repentance to Nineveh for 40 days.

And on day 41, God stopped His plan to destroy them.

Jesus fasted and was tempted for 40 days.

On day 41, the devil fled.

After his resurrection, Jesus appeared to his disciples for 40 days.

On day 41, he ascended into heaven.

All that to say, don't quit.

The rain's gonna stop, the giant will fall, and you will enter your promised land.

Don't give up at 40 because 41 is coming.

In my little neck of the woods, where I teach podcasting, many podcasters stop at episode seven because we're impatient.

You're like, man, I've been doing this for a couple months.

I'm not on Jimmy Fallon yet.

I'm not making a million dollars.

Whatever was going through your head.

And studies show that if those people make it to episode 10, they will go on for years.

They're this close, and they just.

They're impatient, you know, and they quit again.

Proverbs 14, 9.

Whoever is patient has great understanding.

But one who is quick, tempered displays.

Folly.

The last podcast event I went to, I was working for my new company, PodPage, and I'm putting up their booth.

And look, I've been going to trade shows for 20 years.

I know booths, right?

A booth, the booth, the booth, right?

Or not.

Yeah.

As I struggled to put this booth together, I kept telling myself, because I could feel myself, I could feel the tension.

And I'm.

I'm starting to kind of lose it.

And I would just go, hold on, hold on, easy here.

Just enjoy the learning curve.

You know, as I'm rolling around the floor and bouncing on a chair, trying to hang things on it.

I just kept telling myself, this is the learning curve.

Next time it'll be easier.

And that's true.

That's understanding, that's patience.

You see, there is the way it is and there's the way it seems.

And probably 99% of our problems are based on the way it seems.

This is a good time to turn to God or a friend.

I like to think God is a friend for an outside perspective and ask him, like how is it?

Because so many times in the Bible Jesus told us to chill out.

He did.

Philippians 4, 6, 7, don't be anxious about anything.

But in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your request to God.

And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

Psalms 4610 he says, Be still and know that I am God.

I mean, even Jesus was afraid in the Garden of Eden, but he was also the model for trusting God and his plan.

So there's the, you know, there's the way it is and there's the way it seems.

And the way it seems is going to get you if you don't check your facts.

Keep that in mind.

And so if you're young, don't forget to look up from that phone and maybe cut back on some of the doom scrolling that keeps you in a permanent state of fear and feeling like you're not keeping up with life.

And focus on the important things like being a good person and the relationships with your friends, your family and God.

And it's so weird because in the 90s we would pay for unlimited minutes after 7:00 or 9:00 or something like that.

You would get unlimited minutes to talk to your friends.

Fast forward to now we have unlimited minutes and nobody calls anybody anymore.

Maybe we need to change that if you're older.

God is not done with you.

You know, if you're on the back nine, sure, your body doesn't work as well as it used to.

And yeah, that's frustrating, but it's also an opportunity.

No, it doesn't feel like one.

To look at things from a different perspective.

Even if you don't want a new perspective, it's an opportunity to get one.

Don't hide in waiting.

Jesus said the harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few.

And there are multiple ways to use your experience.

It doesn't always have to be your body.

We need to keep our eyes on Jesus.

Like that verse says, in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, thanksgiving thank you, God.

When it was cold here in Ohio over the winter, I started saying thank you, God every time the furnace came on.

Because someday it's not right.

It's a mechanical thing.

But just being thankful for what you have.

It says, present your requests to God.

And so traveling at the speed of life is a little crazy.

We're a little used to getting our own way.

We're kind of all going, are we there yet?

I'm used to this, being here in 0.7 seconds.

Remember, patience has great understanding.

Don't be quick tempered because that's just going to lead you to doing stupid stuff like shooting your neighbor over your shared driveway.

If you enjoyed this message, can you do me a favor?

Somebody that maybe needs to be a little more patient and don't send them that way.

Hey, you need to hear this, you impatient idiot.

Don't know that's going to go over well, but you might want to share this with someone.

That would be great.

Or you can just tell them to go to feedingmyfaith.com I'm Dave Jackson from theschoolofpodcasting.com thanks so much for listening and keep feeding your faith.

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