Patient Trust

I don't think we like to think of ourselves as a "branch" or a tree planted by streams of water (Psalm 1/Jeremiah 17:8). We want our growth to be instant. Fast. Immediate fruit. When there are delays in our growth we fret and wonder if God has given up on us. We don't know how to be kind to ourselves in those seasons, let alone allow ourselves to recieve God's kindness.

When I was in Israel a few years back, we often came across Olive Trees that were said to be thousands of years old, yet still producing beautiful fruit. Beautiful to see that kind of steady, mature growth. I wonder if many of us would rather be a poplar tree. Yes it experiences very fast growth, much like a weed, but it is a tree that doesn't bear fruit. In fact, it's a tree that isn't good for much at all. So maybe the opposite is true. Maybe we are more like Olive Trees, which take a long time to age and produce fruit, but over time it produces much fruit. Fruit that will last.

I came across a word by Pierre Teilhard De Chardin from my reading in the "Daily Office" Week 4/Day 1 Morning/Midday that seems to fit with this idea of patient growth. The word is entitled "Patient Trust"..

"Above all, trust in the slow work of God.

We are quite naturally impatient in everything

to reach the end without delay.

We should like to skip the intermediate stages.

We are impatient of being on the way to something

unknown, something new.

And yet it is the law of all progress

that it is made by passing through

some stages of instability –

and that it may take a very long time.

And so I think it is with you;

your ideas mature gradually – let them grow,

let them shape themselves without undue haste.

Don't try to force them on,

as though you could be today what time

(that is to say, grace and circumstances acting on your own good will)

will make of you tomorrow.

Only God could say what this new spirit

gradually forming within you will be.

Give our Lord the benefit of believing

that his hand is leading you.

And accept the anxiety of feeling yourself

in suspense and incomplete." 

Pierre Teilhard De Chardin