Love is Patient

Last night I was laying in the guest bed listening to Bryan hack up a lung across the house.  I was so frustrated and ticked off that I couldn't even go to sleep in the same room with him.  I mean, come on Bryan, do you have to cough so much?  He was getting on my nerves!!! 
Now, logically, I know that I was WAY out of line.  The poor man is sick.  But, selfishly, I was exhausted from a week of VBS and then travel.  All I wanted was to be able to fall asleep on my CPAP machine and sleep like the dead for 8 hours or so. 
While I was being serenaded by the coughing, my mind turned to the book Radical by David Platt that I had begun reading.  He asked two questions in the introduction.  Questions that we should ask as we are reading the bible.  What is Jesus saying?  and What am I going to do about it?
So I prayed.  I don't remember what my prayer was, but I know what was given to me.  Love is patient.  1 Corinthians 13:4
Uh oh....not the P word.  Now I have been taught to NEVER pray for patience.  And believe me, I never have.  Not the kind of discipline I want.  I know that if it is prayed for, God is going to put me in all sorts of circumstances to teach me patience.  Nope, not gonna do it!
I think everyone that knows me even in the slightest will attest that I am not a patient person.  To even put my name and patience in the same sentence is a laughing matter.  But, last night, God told me to pray for patience.  I truly didn't want to.  I went around and around with God.  Trying to find a way out.  Then I remembered those two questions.  *sigh*
I know that patience is a virtue that God desires us to have.  I know it is needed to love others the way that Christ intends.  So what was I going to do about it?  So, finally after a LONG time, a prayed for patience.  Now, believe me, I am still not happy about it.  I DO NOT want to learn patience.  But, here I am, waiting for the first crisis to fall, so that I can be taught and disciplined.
Being a follower of Christ means more than just reading his word, we have to act on it.  I am learning this and it isn't easy.  So, please pray for me as I learn the virtue of patience and please try to stay out of my way if it looks like I am about to explode!