I Love to Tell the Story

I've had a great time preaching each Sunday this Summer.  I've learned a lot about myself and my preaching style, but I've been getting really excited for the chance to preach every Sunday in the same place.  It's pretty stressful to learn a new routine every week.  Each church has different deadlines and different ideas of how much a service should be rehearsed beforehand, and, to be completely honest, I hope my days as a "traveling" preacher are over soon and I'll have an office with a hymnal in it so I don't have to drive down to First Church in Oberlin in order to choose hymns.  

Well, this Sunday is the last Sunday that I have booked this Summer.  I'm so looking forward to just showing up at church and worshiping on a Sunday morning for a little while.  I will not take it for granted.  Anyway, all week I've been thinking about how much I love preaching, and I've had this hymn stuck in my head.  I was going to just post it as a link on Facebook, but then my description of it kept getting longer and longer, so here it is-- as a blog entry.  

"I love to tell the story of unseen things above-- of Jesus and his Glory, of Jesus and his Love.  I love to tell the story because I know it's true.  It's satisfy my longings, as nothing else can do."

I really do love it.  I remember the words of my atheist college English professors, who said, "If you actually open the darn book [the Bible] you'll find that it's full of the craziest stories of all time."  So, so true.  The Christian story is a good one, and I'm excited to go on telling it for so many more years.  

Looking for Patience

Okay friends, I've really cracked.  I am feeling so in need of some help being patient about where God is calling me to serve as my first pastorate that I Googled "Bible verses on patience."  I'm not making a dig at people who do find solace in Googling topics to find them in scripture, but you know, I have a Master in Divinity so going to Google for help felt kind of silly for me.  

And here's the best of what I found:

But as for that in the good soil, these are the ones who, when they hear the word, hold it fast in an honest and good heart, and bear fruit with patient endurance. --Luke 8:15 

For in hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what is seen? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience. --Romans 8:24-25

But I received mercy for this reason, that in me, as the foremost, Jesus Christ might display his perfect patience as an example to those who were to believe in him for eternal life. -- 1 Timothy 1:16

I also remembered one of my favorite verses of all time, which is about worrying rather than patience, but which fits better than those above: 

Do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring worries of its own. Today’s trouble is enough for today. -- Matthew 6:34

Considering the amount of impatience in the world today, I guess I'm surprised that patience and waiting are mentioned relatively sparsely in scripture.  At least it feels like when patience comes up in the Bible, it doesn't line up in quite the right way with the way I'm feeling right now.  A lot of what I found in scripture is about waiting for the return of Christ or waiting for the day of the Lord to come, and frankly these are not such huge concerns for my own theology, which is much more oriented towards recognizing the Kingdom of God here and now-- on this earth, in our very midst.  That's not so much about patience-- that's about uncovering what is already present.  The problem I'm having is about being too anxious and antsy about what's to come in my life-- where I'll be working and living, and when.  I don't feel like scripture brings me there so easily.  

Any thoughts?  Googling isn't getting me where I want to go, so maybe my blog readers can.  

Okay readers, this is a call for your wise words on patience--Scripture, quotes, songs, your own advice-- I need them!