- Haven't y'all so enjoyed this series on love?
- So good.
- It's hard.
- I'm like, "Goodness gracious."
It's hard, I mean it's legit.
This is real heart stuff.
But, we're at the point now of
talking about, "Love is patient."
We keep coming back to 1 Corinthians, chapter 13.
And there's that verse, verse four, where it says,
"Love is patient."
And I think just to really show her faith in God
Laurie asked if I would talk about this.
(laughter)
If lightning would strike when I talked about,
"Love is patient."
But, I'll tell ya I've learned so much about
the fact that love is patient by being
a relatively new adoptive mom.
I've learned more about patience
and because I love Missy, there's some places
where my heart is learning patience
because I love her so much.
Um, about a year ago she, since I brought her home
from Haiti she didn't have any, they didn't have
toilets, much less toilet paper in the part
of Haiti she's from.
And so when I brought her home to the States
after a two-year adoption process
she just is enthralled with running water and toilet paper.
And so the first couple years she was home
I lost count of how many times I paid a plumber
to come to our house because in her
just - exuberance
- Exuberance, she was super exuberant
and she likes my bathroom more than hers
for a lot of reasons but, anyway, it was always my bathroom
and it had got to where it was literally
warping the floors in our bathroom.
So, you know, at first it was cute
and then you're like, "Baby, this is actually like a thing."
- Plug the house here
- Like we've gotta work on, just, less than a roll.
And so we worked on it, I made up little songs
about five squares is where it's at
I mean, everything I knew to gently shepherd her
to be a better tissue steward.
Well, about a year ago I'm walking into my bathroom
and she likes to take baths in my bath
'cause it's a little bigger than hers
and she's just, I mean other than y'all's kids
and the viewers kids, Missy's like the greatest kid
in the history of time. (laughter)
Just beautiful, well, she's in my bathtub,
you know, bubbles up to here.
I walk in and I'm going in to get something out of the shelf
in the restroom where the toilet is in my bathroom.
It's separate from where the bathtub is.
I walk past her and she's like, "Hey, Mommy."
And I'm like, "Hey, Punkin'."
And I step into where our commode is and step into water,
'cause it goes down a step.
And so for the hundredth and some odd time,
she has been enthusiastic and once again water is just,
you know, just, overflowing with other things in,
and I'm, I'm standing in it.
And I just morphed into this shrill woman
and I start fussin' and she can't see me.
She's right around the corner behind me,
she can totally hear me, but I was like,
"Honey, I have told you about this and if you clogged it up
why didn't you tell me?"
'Cause I had told her, if you'll just tell me when you clog,
I can, I can fix it faster than if you let it go for
a half an hour and then we have to call the plumber
and get a structural engineer.
So, I'm just fussin' and then I realize
she hasn't said a word.
So, I kind of step out of where the commode is overflowing
and there's my miracle kid
with just tears streaming down her face.
- Sweet baby. - And in that moment
I thought, "Lisa, this is not a character issue,
this is a plumbing issue."
And I called our contractor and I was like,
"Hey, Fred, you know those toilets they have
on cruise ships that'll like suck a coke can down?"
(laughter)
And I said, "Do those have a residential application?"
And he was like, "Well, yeah, it's called a
such and such toilet."
And I said, "Are they like, prohibitively expensive?"
And he was like, "No, there like 100 bucks more than
a regular toilet at Home Depot.
And I said, "How soon can you put those in our house?"
And so, by the next day, within 24 hours
of berating my child for using too much toilet paper
um, I got new toilets and so as soon as it was installed
I had Missy, you know, christen the potty. (laughter)
And I mean, I cheered like she had won an Olympic medal
because I was like, "this is just not
a big deal to lose my patience over."
I'm gonna, I'm gonna ruin my kid's heart
over something that really is a minor thing.
And I think at some level, he's not actually talking
about toilets here, Paul, in 1 Corinthians,
but when he says, "Love is patient" I did a little
word study and that word
in the original language is "macro thermia."
In other words, take a long time to get hot.
It's about having a long fuse.
About, don't get anger, angry or lose your patience
unless the situation really, really calls for it.
And when I think of how Father God is with me,
goodness gracious, he's bought
a lot of toilets on my behalf.
He's been so kind, He disciplines me in kindness,
but more often than not, He gives me a lot of grace.
- Hi everybody, I hope you enjoyed this video.
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