Brothers and sisters, be patient until the Lord comes. See how the farmer waits for the land to produce its rich crop. See how patient he is for the fall and spring rains. You too must be patient. You must stand firm. The Lord will soon come back. (James 5:7-8)

In an earlier DWOD—Be a Go-Giver, you read about how our daughter Priya had gone out of her way to serve others in the television news room while she was still working an entry level position as an autocue (teleprompter) operator. She also used her days off to shadow reporters and learn from them. This way when her turn came to be a reporter herself, she would be up to the task.

Then she took one more step since Jan. 15, when the aforementioned post was written. With the permission of her superiors, she prepared a couple of clips as though she were reporting on a story and submitted them to the more experienced reporters for their feedback. They were only too eager to offer her constructive critiques. In the process, they and her supervisors also took note of the initiative she was taking to improve her skills.

Of course, once she took these steps and kept on honing her craft, she simply had to wait for an opportunity to prove herself. The decision to send her out on the field needed to be made by others. She had to learn to be patient…which was not exactly easy for her.

In the passage quoted at the top of this post, the apostle James uses the example of a farmer to address the impatience of his readers for the Second Coming of Christ. The farmer prepares the soil, sows the seed and plucks the weeds. Once these tasks are complete, he has done what He needs to do and leave the rest to God.

The rains must come in due season, there should be adequate heat, there should be no grasshoppers or other pests that could destroy the crops. All these are out of his control. He has no choice but to wait for “the land to produce its crops.”

Dear DWOD friend, this is one of the most difficult lessons for you to learn as you advance toward your destiny. Yes, you’ve taken the prophetic words spoken over you to heart. Yes, you’ve sought the counsel of the Holy Spirit and godly leaders about the steps you need to take for those words to be fulfilled. Yes, you’ve actually taken them.

Yet, you have not seen the results you had anticipated by now.

This is where it is very easy to lose patience, to stop waiting, to force things to happen or to get angry, upset or depressed.

It is in times like these that helpful words such as those penned by James stand us in good stead. Although his context was the Second Coming of Christ, they are applicable to your particular situation as well.

In our daughter’s case, all that patience finally paid off as she was offered her first reporting shift last week. Here is what she produced. http://atlantic.ctvnews.ca/video?clipId=383201. She comes across as a professional who has been reporting for quite some time, doesn’t she? It is because of all the work she did while patiently waiting her turn.

Yes, patience pays. The farmer shall indeed reap a rich harvest. The reporter-in-waiting will eventually get her chance. And you, dear friend, will indeed receive the breakthrough that propels you into your God-ordained, long-awaited destiny.

So, “let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up” (Ephesians 6:9).

If your right eye causes you to stumble, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. And if your right hand causes you to stumble, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to go into hell. (Matthew 5:29-30)

When Jesus uses such strong language to get his point across, we’d better get it, amen?

Why does he go to such extremes? Obviously, because He wants us to pay rapt attention.

Clearly, He lets us know that we need to make sure that we do not give in to temptation, because it has eternal consequences.

We cannot afford to slack off on this count. It is way too important for us to ignore this stark warning.

Surely it offends our sensibilities when we sense Jesus calling us to be ruthless. But, ruthless we need to be at times.

Recently, the Lord spoke to Sulojana about the time she spends on Facebook. To be perfectly honest, she spends way less time than I do. But, she felt the conviction of the Holy Spirit very strongly in this area. She could not ignore it or discount it. She had to take action. She has been extremely careful about the time she devotes to social media interactions ever since.

A couple of weeks ago, we were both pleasantly shocked to discover that our son Sathiya has programmed his computer in such a way that he gets kicked off Facebook after browsing for just 10 minutes. It forces him to pay attention to what is really significant within that very short window of time. Whatever doesn’t get taken care of just gets ignored. And he is fine with it. Because it was a directive from the Lord Himself. Is that ruthless? Yes!

The apostle Paul calls us to “redeem the time, for the days are evil.” (Ephesians 5:16). When it comes to how we spend our time, we need to be ruthless. There is simply no getting around it.

After all, time is the most precious commodity we have in this life. Money lost can be replaced. Relationships lost can be restored. But time lost can never be regained.

Dear DWOD friend, this is one area in which you cannot continue to be Mr. Nice Guy or Ms. Congeniality. If an expenditure of time does not in some way contribute to advancing into your destiny, you need to be ruthless and cut it out of your life.

Perhaps some of you may be called to take this one step further. You may need to cut out relationships that are dragging you down and keeping you from making the progress you need to make.  You may need to be ruthless with “friends” who take up your precious time complaining or tempting you to indulge in activities that are a waste of your time.

If you’re ready to take this message to heart, start keeping a log of exactly how you spend every waking minute every day for a week. Then you review it.

Ask yourself whether you were redeeming the time or receding on the road to your destiny. Examine whether the way you used the gift of time would bring a smile to your heavenly Father’s face or tears in His eyes.

Now you need to make some choices, don’t you? Go ahead, make His day. Be ruthless. You will not regret it.