The Church, it must be said, is not particularly concerned with our preferred timelines.
This becomes apparent sometime between your first Vestry meeting and your fifth attempt to introduce a modest, entirely reasonable change that everyone agrees is a good idea — just not yet. Or perhaps ever. Or possibly after further consultation, prayer, discernment, sub-committee review, and a brief pause for tea.
The Church teaches patience not by offering a helpful seminar on the subject, but by arranging our lives so that impatience simply has nowhere to sit.
Prayers are slow.
Processes are slower.
Change moves at a pace best described as “biblical.”
We learn patience while waiting for the meeting to start because someone is still looking for the minutes from last month. We learn patience while the coffee brews — again — because the first pot was “a little weak.” We learn patience in liturgy itself: prayers repeated year after year, words worn smooth by faithful mouths, doing their quiet work long after novelty has given up and gone home.
The Church is very good at this sort of thing.
We pray for transformation, but the Church insists on formation. And formation, like bread dough and souls, refuses to be rushed. You cannot microwave holiness. You can only wait with it.
There is something profoundly countercultural about a community that believes God is not in a hurry. The Church teaches us — sometimes gently, sometimes with the subtlety of a folding chair — that faithfulness matters more than efficiency, and depth matters more than speed.
The Church also teaches patience by requiring us to love one another over time. Not in theory. In practice. With the same people. Again. And again. People who sing too loudly, speak too long, vote unexpectedly, and somehow always take your seat. There is no spiritual growth quite like staying put long enough for irritation to become affection and annoyance to become grace.
And here is the quiet miracle: patience, once learned, begins to change us. Not suddenly. Not dramatically. But steadily. Like water shaping stone. Like prayer shaping the heart.
The Church does not promise quick results. It promises deep ones.
So if you find yourself frustrated by slow prayers, slow decisions, slow change — take heart. You are being taught something holy. Whether you asked for it or not.
And God, who has all the time in the world, is very patiently at work.
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A Companion Prayer
Gracious God,
you are never rushed, never flustered,
never anxious about the future.
Teach us patience when we would prefer progress,
faithfulness when we would prefer results,
and trust when we cannot yet see the outcome.
Slow our prayers until they sink deep.
Slow our hearts until they learn to listen.
Slow our lives until we notice what you are quietly growing.
Give us grace to stay,
courage to wait,
and love enough to endure one another
until your work in us is complete.
Amen.