Episode #39 - Patient & Kind: An Airport Story

Airports try my patience, as they do with so many other travelers. As a result, I have the tendency to become stressed and snappy as a result. I was taught an important lesson by a little girl waiting patiently to board who turned and shared her toy with my daughter. The act of kindness convicted me, and reminded me to take better control of myself. Well...there is a marriage between patience and kindness - you cannot have one without the other. And just as love is a choice, and kindness is a choice, so patience is a choice in our lives. 

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Transcript

Welcome back to all of our listeners! I’m BJ Sipe, and you’re listening to the Set Your Mind Above podcast – where everyday ordinary events teach us extraordinary eternal truths. I’m so glad that you’ve tuned in today, I am excited to share my life and my faith with you, and I sure hope that you’ll do the same with me along the way. 

Airports can be a stressful place can’t they? Especially now days with ramped up security, having to make your connections in a small window of time, maneuvering through the masses of people, and all while having to try and keep that facemask up over your nose. I would imagine that if you took someone’s blood pressure before they entered an airport and while they were inside the airport, you would see a pretty significant difference. At least that’s how airports make me feel. They never used to, in fact I used to love flying; it was my favorite form of transportation. Now it’s my least favorite, for all the reasons listed above and many more. One of those reasons is that it doesn’t bring it out the best side of me and many others sometimes. I have found that of all places, airports test the patience and kindness of others. Allow me to explain. While we were flying over and over again over the past several weeks, there were many times that we were trying to beat the clock and it just wasn’t working for us. I mentioned in yesterday’s podcast how Nashville went when Kylie and the kids were going to try and fly out west. We arrived at the airport two hours early, but I became increasingly frustrated and lost my patience. First, they charge you for an entire day’s parking fare even if you are parking for under an hour. Second, they had no luggage carts so it took us forever to haul all our stuff and the kids to the check in stand. Finally, when we arrive at the check-in stand, there were only 4 attendants working so it took well over an hour to just check our bags. I sat there staring at my watch, not having moved one inch in the line. As a result, I was rude and unkind to both the kids and my wife because I allowed myself to become so worked up. I wasn’t the only one, everyone around us was upset. People were cutting in line, running over each other, doing everything they could to no miss their flights. Well, the kids and Kylie missed their flight – along with dozens of other passengers because the check in process took so long. I wasn’t proud of the way I acted, and I took it to heart for when I was going to travel alone a few days later. Boy am I glad that I did, because my 4 hour trip turned into a 24 hour trip, and I most certainly was going to need patience that day. I say all of this to share a particular story about what happened on our last flight home into Louisville from Denver. We were standing in line with the other parents traveling with small children waiting for family boarding between groups A & B. We were tired. We were hungry. It had been a long day of travel at this point for everyone that was flying. Ava was sitting in the front of the stroller when another young girl about 4 years old peeked around from behind her dad’s leg and waved at her. I told Ava to say hi and then just sat back and watched. The young girl didn’t say anything at all, but proceeded to pull out her tablet and open an app. It was a game of sorts where you painted your nails with all different kinds of nail polishes. Ava lit up, and pretty soon the two of them were playing together as they waited patiently in line to board. It was such a sweet moment watching the two of them share a toy together as complete strangers. Her dad turned around and remarked, “If only adults could be this kind to each other.” I nodded my head, and then it hung slightly in a bit of guilt. Both of our daughters were teaching us dads in that moment how we ought to treat others around us, even in a stressful environment where we are tired and hungry. I love my daughter’s kind heart, and I was thankful for the kind heart of this little girl standing in line in front of us too. 

As we boarded and said goodbye, I could not help but think of the correlation between patience and kindness and what Paul says about love in 1 Corinthians 13. In all of the descriptions about what love is, have you ever noticed that most of them are in couplet form? That is because there is a correlation between one and the other, and the very first thing that Paul describes love as in 1 Corinthians 13:4 is that, “Love is patient & kind.” Why is it that we struggle with our attitudes and being snappy or rude in stressful situations like an airport or traveling in general? I believe the answer is staring us in the face right here: because there is a direct correlation between patience and kindness. If we choose not to be patient, we in turn will treat others poorly around us. Notice that I said choose, and that should give us pause. Love is not just an emotion, it is a choice, a willful action we decide. If love is patient, and love is a choice, that means that patience is also a choice. We have so many expressions that try to alleviate our guilt when we choose not be patient. “I just hit the end of my rope,” “They just get under my skin,” or “I reached my limit.” These are all lies that we tell ourselves to justify the fact that we choose after a certain point to no longer be patient. “I’ll be patient until I miss my flight…then I’m done.” Can you relate, or is it just me feeling super convicted and guilty right now? And that is when it happens – the moment you choose not to be patient is the moment you start being unkind to those around you. It doesn’t matter if they’re not the ones at fault, but especially if they are can you name one time that you treated someone with kindness after you had, “lost your patience?” In fact, someone “losing their patience” is synonymous with someone exploding or blowing up in frustration, isn’t it? I thought about these things and I started thinking about my daughter and that other little girl and the kindness they showed to one another. It all started with them patiently standing there waiting for their turn to get on the plane. They weren’t anxious about time, they were concerned about being first, they were just simply waiting patiently. Such an attitude laid the foundation for the kind gesture that was then shown next. I want to challenge us today to think about the marriage between patience and kindness. Are you the kind of person that has a “short fuse?” Is your patience thin and as a result are you kind of a monster to be around when things don’t go exactly the way that you want them to? Might I suggest that the answer to a lot of our attitude problems actually begins with stepping back, taking a breath, and making a decision to continue to be patient. Just as kindness is a choice, so is patience – in fact I would suggest that you choose or refuse both in the same moment in time. I pray that God helps me to become a kinder person, so I also pray that he helps me to become more patient. When someone is struggling, and you think they should be well beyond the point they are already, love them by continuing to be patient and kind. When someone says something foolish, something that offends you and tempts you to snap at them, love them by choosing to be patient and kind. When nothing is going your way, and you feel the stress and frustration rising inside of you, pause, and choose love by extending once again your patience with the situation and your kindness to those around you. Indeed if only adults could be this kind to each other, well we can, and it all starts by choosing to be patient. 

Thank you so much for listening to today’s episode. Tune in, Tuesday-Fridays, as a new podcast episode will be uploaded each day. Also, be sure to follow the Facebook page for the Set Your Mind Above podcast for future announcements and weekly video sessions that are uploaded on Saturdays. As you have the opportunity, share these thoughts with your friends and family, and share with me what important lessons you are learning from every day, ordinary events. Until next time know that I love you, that God loves you, and may we all each and every day set our minds above.