I’m abundantly blessed with five lovely granddaughters, and each of them has gone through the phase where they are obsessed with horses.  I raised three boys and none of them ever seemed to be interested, so maybe it’s a girl thing. I’ve been with them at farms and fairgrounds when they get their chance to ride a horse, and they are enchanted.  It’s fascinating that tiny girls are so comfortable with these huge, strong animals.  Horses have great power and strength, and of course, must be monitored closely, but they choose to be gentle and willing and to enter into a relationship with a trusting little girl.

What if you woke up one day into what seemed like a children’s book titled “Upside Down Day”? The ceiling was below you and the floor overhead.  When you brushed your teeth, the water ran up toward the ceiling. All the rules were opposite of what they usually are. Stop signs included the words, “if you want to”. The elevator buttons chose all the wrong floors. You get it.

For the second time in this series of articles, which are written in connection with a Women’s Bible Study, I have sat and stared at my computer screen, wondering where to start.  You may remember, I mentioned being completely stumped when I was trying to figure out how to teach a concise lesson on the fruit “love”.  And since God’s love and God’s goodness are so much the same, here I sit again. I have stared into space at home, tried at a coffee shop, and did housecleaning chores that I rarely do as a means of procrastination.

“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness…” (Gal 5:19). “Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another…” (Eph 4:32).  “Love is patient and kind…” (1 Cor 13:4).  So why does it feel like kindness is losing its place in our society, in the world, and sadly, even among those who call themselves children of God and disciples of Christ?  Why does typing our thoughts onto social media feel like it negates the instruction to let our words be “seasoned with salt”?  Why can’t we disagree and even dispute without character maligning? To quote my two-year-old grandson, when something confounds him, “What’s going on?”

It’s early January as I write article four in the series, Meditations on the Fruit of the Spirit. It still gets dark by five o’clock, and a polar vortex has taken up residence with howling wind and below freezing temperatures.  How fitting that our Bible study this month will cover the fruit of Patience. 

This is the second in a series of articles I’m writing in connection with a Women’s Bible Study I’m hosting.  We are studying the fruit of the Spirit and the second class is about Joy.  I’ve titled the articles “Meditations” because in my preparation, I find there is so much to take in, so much attention given to these qualities throughout the Bible, that the best way to sort through the information is to take a step back and consider and reflect.