1 Corinthians 13:4 Love is patient, love is kind.

 Awhile back, while living in a very large city, we had an interesting experience. We had 2-3 trash carts that had to be emptied on the trash truck, and there were very specific rules as to how we could put them against the curb. Three feet away, 2 feet apart, you get the picture. I was striving to be very accurate in these rules. No one wants their trash to be left until the next week! Well, I guess I wasn’t getting the specifics “to the tee,” so the next week, the young man helping with the carts just left ours there! I couldn’t figure out why, so I attempted the next week to line them up ever so carefully. After running an errand, I drive up and see, amazingly, the trash carts were left again!!! UGH! I walked up to the carts, and there was a note on one of them. It was a “warning ticket” from the city. It simply read, “YOU WAS WARD!” I couldn’t even decide what this guy wanted me to do, much less, imagine trying to talk to him to find out!

After I figured out that the cart man surely meant “you were warned,” I got a few laughs out of the deal. In fact, our whole family has laughed about that incident many times now. But today, I got another kind of reminder. We are new to the rural trash system here, but they’ve seemed really nice. This morning I heard two very long, loud honks outside. We ran to the window and realized, “Oh no, we forgot the trash!” Caleb ran outside and said, “I’m so sorry, we forgot, we’ll have it right out,” while Nathaniel ran out with the cart. The young man just gave us thumbs up and smiled, took our cart, and went on his way. Wow, that was nice!

I’m not comparing rural and city trash systems here, but I am comparing something much more important. Patience and kindness go a long way with anyone you meet. Any relationship you have can benefit from your determination to be patient and kind. I always thought that I’d memorize 1 Corinthians 13:4-7, and I’m not quite there. But the “patient and kind” part at the first almost could take care of everything else. Your family, and all the other people around you, will bloom when you love them in this way. In fact, many problems we face in our relationships could be avoided by each of us paying attention to how we sound and how we act. Are we treating others like we would want to be treated? Really think about that. Sow some patience and kindness seeds, and see what you grow. Then maybe you won’t be tempted to give anyone in your life a rude and impatient warning ticket!

Jennifer

Biblical Meditation: Luke 7:12 Message Here is a simple, rule-of-thumb guide for behavior: Ask yourself what you want people to do for you, then grab the initiative and do it for them.