Be Humble and Gentle

December 21, 2025

Well, my verse of the day did it again. It delivered a gut punch, revealing an issue in my life that requires a lot of attention. Here’s the verse. “Always be humble and gentle. Be patient with each other, making allowance for each other’s faults because of your love.” Ephesians 4:2 NLT. This just in, I am not very patient. One would think that as one gets older, one would become more patient. After all, experience should help with our impatience, shouldn’t it? However, I have discovered that the older I get, the less patient I am. Things that used to roll right on by me seem to latch on now and fester. When I can’t figure something out, I quickly get frustrated with myself, and that only makes matters worse. Well, since this verse hit a nerve, I have discovered the best way to work through it is to dissect the verse and see what God is trying to teach me. Paul wrote Ephesians to the church at Ephesus, so Paul is addressing a group of Christ followers who are working together to build each other up and to point others in their world to Jesus. Notice the emphasis on “each other” in this verse. Paulo encourages us to be patient with each other and to give each other the benefit of the doubt. Why? Because of our love. He means our love for Jesus and our love for each other. Paul is reminding the Ephesian Christians (and us) that they are a team and need to work together and help each other. When I first started in marching band, I really struggled learning to march and play at the same time. I wanted to learn and get better, and fortunately for me, my fellow Marching Cougars were patient with me. They encouraged me and pushed me to get better, and I did. They helped make me a part of the team. I am convinced that if we were to adopt this same attitude in our local churches, most of the fussing, fighting, and squabbling that goes on would cease. That is what Paul is trying to teach us in this verse. Instead of picking our fellow Christ followers apart for every little thing that gets on our nerves, why don’t we instead lift them up and encourage them? Instead of criticizing them, try praying for them. This goes for dealing with those outside of our faith family as well. We are all on the same team. We are all humans. Almost all of us are trying to make the world in which we live a better place. Our society does its best to divide us and keep us angry with each other. We as Christ followers need to push back. As the late Glen Campbell said, let’s “try a little kindness.” What if, starting today, we tried to start living with patience and kindness as our goal? Together, we could make our churches and our world better places to live.

Be blessed and be a blessing . . . Bro. Andy