Have Patience With Me

When we read of patience in the scriptures, it is generally in the context of waiting with faith on the Lord for His blessings.  For example, when the people of Alma were under bondage at Helam, Mormon recorded that “they did submit cheerfully and with patience to all the will of the Lord” (Alma 24:15).  James taught that the “trying of your faith worketh patience,” and Alma exhorted the Zoramites to “reap the rewards of your faith, and your diligence, and patience, and long-suffering, waiting for the tree to bring forth fruit unto you” (James 1:3, Alma 32:43).  All of these require waiting for the Lord’s blessings while continuing to keep the commandments of the Lord.  The parable told by the Savior in Matthew 18 about the unforgiving debtor, though, highlights the need for a different kind of patience.  The servant of the lord owed ten thousand talents, and when he couldn’t pay he begged in these words, “Lord, have patience with me, and I will pay thee all.”  After the lord forgave him, this servant then found one of his fellowservants who owed him an hundred pence, and the debtor repeated exactly the same words: “Have patience with me, and I will pay thee all” (Matt. 18:26, 29).  But in this case the man would not forgive the debt or show patience towards the debtor, and he cast him into prison.  This story highlights the need for patience towards others and the fact that patience is a major part of showing forgiveness to others who have wronged us.  If we are to forgive others as the Lord commands, then that includes showing patience toward them in their sins or weaknesses.

                Recently my eight-year-old daughter in frustration after being corrected numerous times for less than desirable behavior, “Can’t you just be patient with me?!”  Ultimately her statement is like that of these debtors in the story, “Have patience with me.”  We rightfully focus a lot forgiveness in the Church, and recently President Nelson encouraged us to accept the Savior’s gift of forgiveness: “A second gift the Savior offers you is the ability to forgive. Through His infinite Atonement, you can forgive those who have hurt you and who may never accept responsibility for their cruelty to you.”  Part of that forgiveness surely is to show patience towards them when they continue to make the same mistakes over and over, and perhaps nowhere is that needed more than in parenting as we seek to teach our children.  I realize that far too often I am like the man who owed the ten thousand talents: I go repeatedly to the Lord seeking patience towards me and forgiveness for sins I keep committing, but then I fail to offer the patience I desire from the Lord towards my children when they make mistakes.  Surely we some consequences are often needed when correcting a child, but we can completely “forgive the debt” in our hearts by showing forth patience and new opportunities each time.  I hope that my children don’t look to me with the same attitude as the man from another parable who viewed his master this way: “I knew thee that thou art an hard man, reaping where thou hast not sown, and gathering where thou hast not strawed” (Matt. 25:24).  Just as I seek to reap the patience of the Lord in my own development of Christ-like attributes, so too do I need to I sow patience towards my children as they struggle along the same path.  And the story told by Elder Renlund of the experienced missionary who was frustrated with his difficult companion helps us to put things in perspective.  When the senior missionary complained to God, he felt this impression: “You know, Curtis, compared to me, the two of you aren’t all that different.”  Elder Renlund summarized, “Curtis learned that he needed to be patient with an imperfect companion who nonetheless was trying in his own way.”  I’m not all that different in spiritual maturity than my children when compared to God, and the parable of the unforgiving debtor reminds me that if I want patience from the Lord, I had better learn to show it to my own family.