The principle part of faith is patience.

Host: The chapel sat on the edge of the town, quiet and unadorned, its stone walls breathing with age. The late afternoon light slanted through stained glass, scattering colors across the pews — a quiet riot of reds, blues, and golds trembling on the wood.
Outside, the world still moved — cars, laughter, the hum of daily life — but inside, time had decided to move differently. It slowed, deepened, softened.

Jack sat halfway down the aisle, elbows on his knees, hands clasped, his gaze fixed on the flickering row of candles near the altar. Jeeny stood by the window, her silhouette framed in color and shadow, her breath visible in the cool air of the empty church.

Above them, carved into the wall behind the altar, were simple, eternal words:

“The principal part of faith is patience.”
— George MacDonald

Jeeny turned from the light and looked toward him.

Jeeny: “You know, I think this might be one of the simplest, hardest truths ever written.”

Jack: “Yeah. People talk about faith like it’s fire. But MacDonald says it’s waiting.”

Jeeny: “Exactly. It’s not the grand gesture — it’s the quiet endurance. The long in-between.”

Host: The candles flickered, small and stubborn, their flames bending slightly under the draft that whispered through the open door.

Jack: “Funny, isn’t it? Everyone thinks faith is belief. But belief is easy when you get what you prayed for.”

Jeeny: “Faith is what you do when you don’t.”

Jack: “Exactly.”

Host: The silence that followed wasn’t empty; it was the kind that held meaning — like a pause in a song before the final note.

Jeeny: “You ever think patience feels too much like giving up?”

Jack: “Yeah. Especially when you’ve been waiting so long you forget what you’re waiting for.”

Jeeny: “That’s the paradox, isn’t it? Faith tells you to trust the unseen, but the unseen never tells you how long.”

Jack: “So you end up praying into an echo.”

Jeeny: “And learning to love the echo anyway.”

Host: The sunlight moved slightly, a slow gold drift across the aisle. Dust motes floated like tiny planets through it, silent, eternal.

Jeeny: “I think patience isn’t just about waiting for something to happen. It’s about believing that waiting itself isn’t wasted.”

Jack: “That time is still sacred even when nothing’s changing.”

Jeeny: “Yes. Faith is the art of staying when everything in you wants to run.”

Jack: “That’s brutal.”

Jeeny: “It’s beautiful.”

Host: She walked toward the altar, her hand brushing lightly against the wooden pews, fingers tracing the grain like memory.

Jeeny: “When MacDonald said that, he wasn’t preaching serenity. He was describing survival. People forget that patience is an act of resistance.”

Jack: “Against despair.”

Jeeny: “Exactly. Against the temptation to stop believing just because life didn’t arrive on schedule.”

Jack: “Faith doesn’t work on deadlines.”

Jeeny: “No. It’s not a transaction — it’s a conversation. And sometimes, silence is part of the answer.”

Host: The bell outside the chapel struck once, deep and resonant, its vibration moving through the floorboards like a heartbeat.

Jack: “You know, I used to think faith was for the naive. The people who couldn’t face reality.”

Jeeny: “And now?”

Jack: “Now I think faith is for the strong. For the ones who’ve seen how cruel reality can be, and still don’t give up on kindness.”

Jeeny: “That’s patience too — holding kindness even when it’s not returned.”

Jack: “You ever think faith is just the ability to keep loving in the dark?”

Jeeny: “That’s not just faith. That’s courage.”

Host: The air in the chapel grew warmer now, filled with the mingled scent of melted wax and old wood.

Jeeny: “You know, MacDonald wrote stories — fairytales, parables. He understood that faith isn’t abstract. It’s human. It’s what holds us together when reason can’t.”

Jack: “So patience isn’t passive. It’s endurance. Steadfastness. The willingness to outlast fear.”

Jeeny: “Exactly. The heart’s long breath.”

Host: A single candle near the center wavered, threatening to go out, but steadied itself again. Its fragile light seemed to echo their words.

Jack: “You think patience can exist without hope?”

Jeeny: “No. But it can exist without answers.”

Jack: “And maybe that’s even harder.”

Jeeny: “It is. Because you’re not promised results. You’re promised presence.”

Jack: “Presence?”

Jeeny: “Yes. Patience keeps you open long enough to recognize that maybe what you needed wasn’t what you were waiting for.”

Jack: “So faith reshapes the waiting.”

Jeeny: “It sanctifies it.”

Host: The two stood quietly now, both facing the altar, both lost in thoughts that felt older than language.

Jeeny: “You know, people think miracles are sudden. But maybe the biggest miracle is endurance.”

Jack: “The quiet kind that doesn’t make headlines.”

Jeeny: “Exactly. The kind that gets up, breathes, forgives, keeps showing up.”

Jack: “Faith in motion.”

Jeeny: “Patience in disguise.”

Host: The light through the stained glass shifted again, and the chapel filled with a final glow — a deep, warm amber that made everything look both ancient and new.

Jeeny turned to him, her voice barely above a whisper.

Jeeny: “You know, I used to think faith meant trust in God. But maybe it’s trust in time. Trust that what’s meant to bloom will bloom when it’s ready.”

Jack: “And the hardest part is not digging up the soil to check.”

Jeeny: (smiling) “Exactly.”

Host: The candles burned low, their light softer now, gentler. Outside, the rain began — quiet, steady, patient.

Jack: “Maybe that’s what patience really is — moving through uncertainty without bitterness.”

Jeeny: “Yes. It’s the posture of peace, not proof.”

Jack: “And faith — faith is staying still long enough to see the pattern form.”

Jeeny: “Even when you can only see one thread.”

Host: They stood in silence again — the kind of silence that doesn’t demand, doesn’t doubt. The kind that simply is.

And as the chapel grew dimmer, George MacDonald’s words seemed to hum softly through the air — a truth as steady as the candles, as quiet as belief itself:

that faith is not fire,
but endurance;
that its greatest act is not leaping,
but waiting;
that patience is not weakness,
but the slow, steadfast courage to stay;
and that the soul that keeps breathing in the dark
has already learned
the purest form
of trust.