Galatians 5:22a (NLT)  But the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, PATIENCE...

This morning my wife asked me if I could do a simple chore for her. A shelf that we had put up was coming off the wall as the nails were no longer holding it in. I am not a great handyman, but there are certain things that I am capable of (in my own mind, at least). The answer was to get a couple of screws with anchors to replace the nails. I made the holes that the nails were in larger with a drill bit so that the anchors would fit in the wall. I put the anchors in. So far so good. I screwed in one side. Perfect! Now the other side...not perfect at all. The screw wouldn't go in. I tried two extra anchors that came with the screws and it was a no go. I tried different screws...nope. I tried using force but I wound up pushing the anchor into the wall, making the hole larger. Now I was upset! I complained to my wife and she suggested that perhaps I didn't screw it in right. That didn't help and got me more upset, causing me to snap at her a little bit. I may not know a lot about handiwork, but at least give me credit for knowing how to screw in a screw!

Off to the hardware store I went to try to find a solution to my problem, hoping that my shelf project wasn't going to turn into a demolition project. On my way I noticed that I had totally lost my patience, and all it took was one screw that refused to screw in right. I started thinking as to how that could have happened. Is my patience level the total of one non-working screw? Unfortunately for a lot of us, that is correct. That is why we constantly need to be filled with the Holy Spirit so that we can override the nastiness of the short-temperedness of our flesh. Someone once asked D. L. Moody why he always harped on constantly being filled with the Holy Spirit and his answer was priceless. He said that it was because we “leak!” We may be filled with the Spirit for a while, but the natural flow of the inconveniences of life coupled with our sinful nature makes for the need for a continual infilling. Life happens and screws sometimes don't screw in. We need help. That's why Jesus sent the Helper.

I left the hardware store with what I thought would solve my shelf problem, resolving in my heart to apologize to my wife for snapping at her and to do better the next time. As I waited to pull out of the store's parking lot, there was a lot of traffic. I had to go left, which meant that I had to wait for the traffic to clear on both sides of the street. After a long while, I saw a clearing. I just had to wait for one more car. As the car approached, it slowed down, decreasing the chances that I could make the turn in time. The car was turning into the store's parking lot! What are the chances of that? How dare that car turn in to the lot when I was trying to leave it!? Whoops...there I went again, but this time I caught it quickly and started to laugh at myself. "Boy do I need You Jesus, at all times" I thought to myself. Thank God that we are not left on our own to try to live right, but have the Holy Spirit to enable us to override life's annoyances and inconveniences so that we can be good witnesses of the love and grace of Jesus, along with the beautiful and much-needed fruit of patience.

Pastor Joey Vazquez