Maundy Thursday: Patience & Kindness

Someone once said that we are people who “tap our feet at the microwave.” Efficiency and speed have become virtues that we celebrate and promote.

Delays or impediments to our plans usually extract great frustration from us and lead to complaining.

When we feel that our agendas are being challenged or thwarted by life’s circumstances or other people, it frequently creates a gruff and agitated spirit within us. We find ourselves becoming rude, short-tempered, and aggressive with those around us when things don’t go our way or at our preferred speed. One only has to reflect on his or her attitude during a traffic jam or an elongated line at the grocery store to discover that patience and kindness towards others become something especially difficult to manufacture.

When we are impatient with others, we typically expedite our anger and frustration. Impatience and unkindness are like ugly twin sisters that can have a tremendously negative effect on those around us.

In Jesus we find someone who was perfectly patient and perfectly kind. On the night that He was betrayed by Judas and abandoned by His disciples, He found Himself cast into the hands of an angry and hellbent mob. They mocked Him, spit on Him, and beat Him. They lied about Him and did everything they could to humiliate Him. As the God Man He could have lashed out and destroyed His accusers by literally wiping them off the earth. He could have lost His temper and yelled back at them. Most of us would have retaliated in one way or another.

In this situation, we see Jesus patiently and kindly dealing with the very people who were going to kill Him. These two fruits were a part of His divine nature but they were also essential ingredients to get Him to the Cross on our behalf. If He had sided with His own emotions that day and chosen to deal wrathfully or unkindly with His captors, it would have taken Him off the path to die for our sins - and we would be hopelessly lost.

As the Spirit seeks to produce patience and kindness in us we must consider whether or not we are making too much of our own agendas and comfort. These things are frequently antagonists to these fruits in our lives. Patience and kindness emerge when we humbly submit our plans to God and also recognize that the plans and needs of other people are equal to our own.