Cultivating Character

   In his book Seizing Your Divine Moment, Erwin McManus writes of a day when he was speaking at a Christian retreat in Florida. His family had accompanied him on the trip. “My assignment,” McManus relates, “was to call several thousand singles to a life of sacrifice as we basked in soothing tranquility.”

   During some free time, McManus and his 10-year-old son, Aaron, took a walk along the ocean. Suddenly he noted a disabled man on crutches, struggling to make his way to the water’s edge to join other bathers. But because the sand was too unstable, the man fell and was unable to get up again. McManus admits that his instinct was to turn and walk in the opposite direction.

   I know this instinct. It is the part of each of us that prefers not to get involved, not to face something that could be beyond our grasp. The temptation is to freeze, ignore it, and hope that someone else will step up to the situation. Something in one’s character goes into neutral, and self interest threatens to trump self sacrifice.

   Not so with McManus’s boy. “My son stopped me,” McManus says. “I have to go help that man,” the boy said.

   McManus: “I could only look at him and say, ‘Then go help him.’”

   When the fallen man proved too heavy for a small boy to help, others quickly gathered around and offered the necessary strength. At first the child was distressed that he could not do it himself, but McManus said, “I explained to Aaron that his strength carried the man. It was because of him that others came to his aid.”

   This is character in motion, best illustrated in the instincts of a 10-year-old. With apologies to Erwin McManus, whom I greatly admire, who in this particular story is the grown up?

   Character is a word that describes the default “me.” The person I am over the long haul in life. The person who emerges in the most difficult,challenging moments. Character identifies the attitudes, convictions, and resulting behaviors that distinguish my life.

   Let’s put it another way: character is what people can expect of me in most situations. Most, I say, because all of us defy or betray our essential character from time to time. When we say “he acted out of character,” we are noting either some exceptionally good or bad behavior that contrasts with what we have come to anticipate of a person. Character, then, is the deep current of what we are day after day after day.

   The deep current within us out of which character arises must be monitored and, if necessary, redirected and rebuilt. Words like growth, transformation, and maturity are important to resilient people. True, they could become self absorbed by this penchant for self development (all virtues have a trap built into them), but let us concentrate on the strength side before we worry about the potential weakness.

   We can all produce surface changes in life. The current concern about weight reduction is a good illustration. People adapt a diet and an exercise program, and for a few months they regain a weight level that pleases them. But unless they have revised their entire view of eating, they eventually migrate back to former ways and feel worse than before they began.

   We often do the same with a habit we don’t like. We turn over a new leaf, as they say in a marriage relationship, or we reorder our ways of work. But the discouraging thing is that a few months later we find ourselves back to the “same ol’ same ol’.”

   Surface change usually doesn’t work. It’s only when one does a root canal (an apt metaphor, I think) on one’s soul and rebuilds at the foundational level of life that real change happens. And this means that we’re at character level.

   In the tradition of spiritual disciplines, there is an exercise called self examen — the discipline of putting oneself under the microscope and seeing oneself as God might. Few of us would argue that this is not important, but it’s probably fair to say that not many of us make self examen a regular discipline. George MacDonald (no relation) says:

Foolish is the man, and there are many such men, who would rid himself or his fellows of discomfort by setting the world right, by waging war on the evils around him, while he neglects that integral part of the world where lies his business, his first business — namely his own character and conduct. (emphasis mine)

   The practice of continuous repentance is a part of character development. It seems to me that the concept of repentance has been misunderstood and unfortunately applied to the occasional expression of deep regret over an unusually heinous sin. And, of course, this is something that is occasionally called for. But in the larger sense, repentance is that regular, sincere acknowledgment of all that is broken within me and which needs fixing. It is the expression of the humbled tax collector, of whom Jesus spoke, who was so distressed over his life that he felt unworthy to even enter the inner parts of the temple. Thus he stood, Jesus said, at a distance and prayed, “God be merciful to me a sinner” (Luke 18:13 KJV). Simple words but much in contrast to the Pharisee, who presumed his own innocence and thanked God that he was not like other people ... like the tax collector, for example (v. 13).

   Continuous repentance need not be a maudlin exercise of self-recrimination. We don’t need to return to a “woe is me” time when there was an overage of words designed to strip one’s sense of value in God’s eyes. Rather, we’re talking about a frank assessment of one’s shortfalls, an acknowledgment before God of their existence, and a serious intention to correct the wrongs. Face it; name it; renounce it; replace it.

   Then again, I have taken deliberate notice of men and women of my own generation whose paths I cross from time to time. There are few experiences more valuable than to sit in the shadow of a godly old man or woman, heroes of a kind, who carry the scars and marks of a long lived faith. Give me a crack at them, and I’ll find a hundred questions to ask so that I can get to the root of their character. Who were their heroes? Where were the life building crises? What have been the enduring principles of life? Regrets? Delights? Hopes and dreams?

   Paul wrote, “Join with others in following my example, brothers, and take note of those who live according to the pattern we gave you … our citizenship is in heaven” (Phil. 3:17, 20).

   I’m not confident that character can be changed without a vision of what’s possible. What kind of a man do I wish to be in five years? Better, where could my life more powerfully emulate Jesus in five years? Give me three or four patterns of behavior or thought that need strengthening.

   Presently, I’m working on patience, one of the qualities the Bible calls a “fruit of the Spirit” (Gal. 5:22). I used to think of myself as a patient man, but I’m not so sure now. I find a flicker of irritability rising in me when the line at the post office is too long, when everyone else decided to clog up the interstate at the same time I wanted to drive it, when someone sends me an e-mail file that takes 10 minutes to download. I have a suspicion that these bits of impatience really echo other aspects — maybe more significant aspects — of my life that I refuse to face. So when I’m standing in the post office line and feel this impatience, I push myself to stop and think about my idiotic, immature reaction. Why am I upset because I’m going to lose four or more minutes in my schedule? What’s the deeper impatience? Where’s the anger coming from?

   The moment in the line becomes a tutorial for my character. There will be moments ahead when patience will be needed for far greater issues than this one. Learn patience here so that you will have it then.

   Character is developed — for believers, anyway — when we let the Scripture inform us. We are what we permit to enter the deepest parts of our soul. A steady diet of television,cheap publications, and shallow literature will make us dreadfully inadequate people. A daily exposure to the Scripture and to literature that focuses on Scripture is a necessary part of the diet.

   The resilient person who would build Christian character understands the importance of carefully considered values that spring from a life grounded in Scripture — a regular and serious application of the Holy Word.

   Once I was stranded in Hong Kong, having been bounced (reason: overbooking) from a flight on Singapore Airlines. The airline people politely told me that there was no chance of leaving for at least two days. I booked a hotel room for the first night and returned to the airport the next day. Hour after hour I sat, hoping that a seat would open up on some flight and that I’d be given a boarding pass so I could get home.

   Seated next to me was a man who was clearly accustomed to international travel. He shared my predicament. Suddenly, he got up and approached the gate agent. I could tell that their conversation was more than a little vigorous. And when he returned, he was holding a boarding pass.

   “Now let me tell you how it works,” he said. “I went over there. I used every bit of profanity I know; I told him what I thought of his airline and that I’d never fly it again. I demanded a seat on this next flight, and I got it.” He flaunted his boarding pass. And then he said, “So if you go over there and do the same thing, you might get lucky.”

   I approached the same gate agent and said, “Sir, I’ve been told that if I get real mean and nasty, it’s possible you’ll give me a boarding pass. Now, frankly, I’m not that kind of a guy. I don’t believe in belittling people and swearing at them. Nevertheless, I’d really like to get home. So, do you think you could help me out?”

   He said, “I’ll see.” I returned to my seat with optimism. I expected to be able to say to my friend, “There’s another, a better, way to get things done.” And when this happened, he’d probably express admiration for my character and ask me about my faith. I really did expect this.

   The conclusion of the matter was that my comrade boarded the flight and headed home. I spent the next day and a half in Hong Kong.

   The moral of the story: character doesn’t always result in the kind of success one wants. We don’t develop character because it brings success; we develop it because it is the right way, the God-pleasing way to live.

Gordon MacDonald is a former pastor and current best-selling author and serves as editor-at-large for Leadership Journal and as chairman of World Relief.