Quick-fixes

The road leading to our house is a beautiful disaster. It could easily be mistaken for a dried-up creek bed. It’s a rough and bumpy ride.

A couple weeks ago the neighborhood got together and leveled out some piles of dirt, assuming that it would smooth the road a bit. The problem is really not the road. The problem is the drainage system. It rained later that afternoon and all of the morning’s hard work was washed away, along with my dreams of ever being able to drive on a flat road.

The neighborhood could continually come together, week after week, to fix the road, but until they fix the drainage system their efforts are in vain. Yes, leveling out some dirt will be cheaper and take less time than repairing a drainage system, but ultimately, it’s for the best to go to the root of the problem.

Here is another less significant example: A friend gave me a necklace for Christmas and the chain broke only a few weeks later. I’ve gone into town multiple times to try to get it fixed but every time I go, the man who can fix it is not there. Finally, in my frustration, I decided to try to fix it myself. It held up for about a day and then fell apart again. Then, I grabbed the duct tape. This is ridiculous and gaudy, walking around with a necklace duct taped together. I wanted to go into town and get it fixed the first time, and now here I am three months later, and I still have a broken necklace because I’m continually trying “quick-fixes” and not going ahead and getting it fixed (or replaced) all the way.

I find this is even true in my own life. When something gets a little off kilter in my life, I want to quickly clean up the surface so that I can go on with a good appearance. Digging down to the roots just takes too much time and effort. At the time, it feels like it’s better to do a “quick-fix” but I know that in the long run I’ll be glad I dug way down.

This is something I feel like God has been bringing to my attention for the past few weeks and I didn’t fully understand what He was getting at until last night at house church when we started talking about patience.

So, it’s not that God has been trying to teach me that quick-fixes are bad (because sometimes, a lot of the time, it’s good to be able to know how to think quickly and fix situations) I think He has really been trying to get me to look at my heart and see my impatience.

There are actually two different types of patience. There is patience in waiting and patience in affliction. I’m pretty sure I could use work in both areas. Before last night I would consider myself to be a pretty patient person. I never lose my temper, I’m always willing to give people another chance, and I continually come at concepts, ideas, and projects from different angles until I finally get it.  But then we talked about antonyms of patience: disquiet of the spirt, discontentment (which is actually the daughter of pride), prejudice, and self-righteousness.

There are a lot of times during the day when I find myself frustrated that something isn’t happening in my own timing (patience in waiting) or when I have been praying for clear answers and am just not getting them (again, waiting) and even when God is trying to do some cleaning out in my heart and I move Him along (patience in affliction).

Yes, there are definitely areas where I can slow down a bit, practice patience, and not rush right over to the “quick-fixes.”

So, speaking of patiently waiting….a couple months ago I thought I would be leaving Rwanda at the end of May. I had a lot of ideas and possibilities for the summer and was sure that I was supposed to be done in Rwanda by then. Every single one of my summer ideas outside of Rwanda fell through and every single idea that popped up inside of Rwanda is working out. So, I’ll be leaving Kigali, Rwanda on August 4^th with my mother who will be accompanying me in my big transition back to the States for university. We booked out tickets last night, so it’s really official. This only gives me about five more months here with my family, in this great country, in East Africa.

My schedule is pretty full on a day to day basis and we have quite a few “summer” (technically “winter” here in the southern hemisphere) music camps on the horizon. I’m learning the importance of daily down times, and in those times, the importance of getting my replenishment and answers from Him.

Here it is early March and I’m trying to stay cool on a sweltering day, grateful that I still have five months, thankful for the life God has given me, anticipating the future, and patiently waiting.