Welcome, Visitors and New Beginnings Family, to “Coffee with Gary”! You are invited to pour yourself a cup of coffee, pull up a chair, and join me for a virtual conversation around the latest post, “A Lesson on Patience from a Box of Orzo”.

There are many tasks I perform that I consider routine. However, due to COVID-19 much of what was once routine is now anything but routine. One of those routine tasks was buying groceries with my wife, Linda.

Now buying groceries has never been one of my favorite things to do but hey, a guy has got to eat. Due to health reasons Linda and I decided that it is better for her to stay home while I get the groceries.

Being retired and over 60 years old, I do all my grocery shopping at the hours set aside for senior citizens. We use Pick ‘n Save and Woodman’s Market on alternating shopping dates and it was on my last trip to Woodman’s that nothing seemed to go right. My trip to Woodman’s started like any other. However, various shortages of the things that Linda and I like to eat began to annoy me. Oh well, at least the store had plenty of toilet paper!

Continuing on my way, I went down the pasta aisle looking for a box of orzo. To my dismay there wasn’t any. After all, is this not Woodman’s? They’re supposed to have everything! After several minutes of looking I meandered down to the end of the aisle to finally find an off-brand package of orzo.

To promote social distancing, Woodman’s has made all their shopping aisles one-way. At the end of one aisle, I noticed that I forgot something that was about ten feet behind me. I turned my cart around and moved back the other way only to be scolded by another customer for going the wrong way down a one-way aisle. Good grief! It’s not as if I didn’t have my mask on! Aggravated and tired, I finally trudged my way over to the refrigerator case.

When I go grocery shopping, I usually pride myself for knowing what I want and where to find it. That way I only have to grab the item I want and get out of the way. However, when I got to the refrigerator case with the buttery spread, I had to wait on the customer ahead of me. This person stood there for what seemed like forever reading every panel on the container he was holding and I was getting very impatient. Fortunately, my thoughts had not gone beyond the battleground of my mind before God in a manner of speaking tapped me on the shoulder saying, “Remember the aisle with the orzo?” In a classic “gotcha” moment with God, I wondered how many people had to wait on me as I fumbled around. Suddenly, my frustration subsided as I confessed my sin to God.

When I think of the trials the early Christians had to face and their perseverance in the face of persecution, I realize how petty I was being over a man holding a package of buttery spread. The Bible in James 1:2-4 tells us that the testing of our faith develops perseverance. Perseverance is foundational to becoming mature and complete, not lacking in anything.

As I recommit to being more patient, I hope you, too, are encouraged:  don’t let yourself be tripped up by a container of buttery spread, a package of orzo, or any other small inconvenience in your walk with the Lord. There are too many bigger things we will have to face!

Your fellow pilgrim in looking for a country of our own (Hebrews 11:13-16),

Gary