- This is part of a series on the theme of character. -

Think about the people you know and admire. Do you know any wise parents, mothers and fathers who demonstrate sound judgment in how they conduct their lives and raise their children? Do you know any grandparents who know when to cheer and when to rebuke, when to be tender and when to use force? Have you ever had a teacher who knew when to give advice and when to just listen, when to instruct and when to let life’s consequences be the teacher? Now try to put a value on those wise insights. How much are they worth?

We all esteem people who possess wisdom in their inward character. If we admire these quality people, how much more should we value the perfection of the living God from whom all wisdom, patience and discernment is derived?

When Moses asked God to reveal his glory to him, the Lord said, “I will cause all my goodness to pass in front of you, and I will proclaim my name, the Lord, in your presence” (Exodus 33:18-19). God had to shield Moses from the fullness of his glory by covering him in the cleft of a rock, and as he passed in front of Moses, God accompanied this awesome display by proclaiming the perfection of his own character:

And he passed in front of Moses, proclaiming, “The Lord, the Lord, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, maintaining love to thousands, and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin. Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished; he punishes the children and their children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation.”

Exodus 34:6-7

• Learning to value the perfection of the living God from whom all wisdom, patience and discernment is derived.

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O Lord, give me the wisdom of spiritual remembrance so that I will never take the riches of Your grace and goodness for granted. Remind me to recall all of Your many benefits and blessings over the years and to realize frequently how much You have done for me. You have carried me through difficult passages. You have comforted me in times of despair. You have encouraged me when I was despondent. You have given me hope when all seemed lost. You have blessed me with freedoms, friends and opportunities that I never deserved. As I review Your benefits in the past, let me also reflect on Your process in my present and on Your prospects for my future. In light of all this, I can fully affirm that Your will for me is good and acceptable and perfect. May this gratitude of remembrance give me perspective and peace in the present moment.

• Develop the habit of recalling your benefits and blessings on a daily basis.

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- This is part of a series on the theme of character. -

As we dig, we must ask God to provide us with insight and understanding. Ultimately, only God can open our eyes to see spiritual truth and then enable us to apply that truth to our lives (Ephesians 1:18). As God fills our minds with wisdom, our character will develop so that we’ll possess the ability to consistently make right choices – choices that are just, fair and moral. As Henry Blackaby and Claude King note in their book Experiencing God:

Once you come to believe God, you demonstrate your faith by what you do. Some action is required…. You cannot continue life as usual or stay where you are, and go with God at the same time…. To go from your ways, thoughts, and purposes to God’s will always requires a major adjustment. God may require adjustments in your circumstances, relationships, thinking, commitments, actions, and beliefs. Once you have made the necessary adjustments you can follow God in obedience. Keep in mind – the God who calls you is also the One who will enable you to do His will.[1]

As we seek to possess God’s wisdom, we’ll be able to move beyond simply expressing the vision and values of a leader. We’ll possess the kind of character from which lofty visions and values flow, the kind of character that isn’t swayed by public opinion or fear but pursues true greatness and knows Who the real audience is. Our character will be truly godly, so that others will delight in following us.

• Once you come to believe God, demonstrate your faith by what you do.

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- This is part of a series that has been adapted from my study of A. W. Tozer’s spiritual classic, The Pursuit of God. -

The audience to whom you play presents a defining moment in the life of every Christian. For either you choose to honor him above all else and thereby press on toward Christlikeness, or you choose the plaudits of others over God and stall out in your Christian walk. You have to ask yourself yet again, “Which audience are you performing for?” It cannot be both God and somebody else, for it is impossible to simultaneously please God and impress people. The temptation will be to choose the downhill path, for it’s easy and both sides are lined with adoring crowds cheering you on. But intimacy with God does not lie at the bottom of the hill. It lies at the top. And it can only be reached by taking the uphill trail, the one Jesus took to the cross and then to glory.

Touching the Void is the title of a recent film about two young climbers. Joe Simpson and Simon Yates set out to climb the west face of the Siula Grande in the Peruvian Andes in 1985, a feat that had previously been attempted but never achieved. With an extra man looking after base camp, Joe and Simon decided to climb alpine style – in one long push over several days.

Statistics show that 80 percent of the deaths and injuries in climbing occur on the descent rather than the ascent. Their decent was added to that 80 percent. They reached the peak with few problems, but on the way down Joe fell and broke his leg. Despite the hopelessness of the situation, the two continued the descent with Simon slowly lowering Joe down on a rope for 300 meters, then descending to join him and repeating the process. At one point Joe is lowered over a vertical abyss, with nothing below and no ability to climb back up. Simon is forced to make an agonizing decision – to cut the rope, so that both of them don’t die. Joe fell into a crevice covered in deep snow. Simon, assuming he’s dead, continued on down. However, Joe had survived the fall by landing on a ledge within the crevice.

The rest of the film tells the story of how Simon discovers that Joe is still alive and so lowers himself into the crevice, with no apparent way to climb out. In a last ditch effort Simon descends further into the crevice, hoping to somehow find a way out. He does. Eventually he makes it back to the original camp, enlists the help of others, and rescues his friend. It is quite an amazing story with a miraculous outcome.

Yet, what struck me most about the story was that in the face of certain death, neither man once appealed to God for help. In the book by the same title, Joe describes his early exposure to the Catholic faith tradition and his rejection of it. In time, he became hostile to God, considering him to be totally irrelevant to his life. He had willfully become a person beyond the point of no return, a man with a heart that had been hardened toward God.

This story serves as a cautionary tale for our spiritual journey. For even as God’s children we can willfully harden our hearts. And while this does not place our eternal salvation at risk, it does place our earthly lives and our eternal rewards at risk. I urge you to choose to humble yourself, exalt God, and thereby strengthen your heart, while you still have the opportunity. Resist the temptation to go the other way by exalting yourself and hardening your heart. We can only lift God up in our hearts by bowing them down in humble submission.

• Even as God’s children we can willfully harden our hearts.

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- This is part of a series on the theme of character. -

Solomon, who is credited with authoring the book of Proverbs, provides us with an excellent jumping off point for developing the character qualities essential to good leadership:

My son, if you accept my words and store up my commands within you, turning your ear to wisdom and applying your heart to understanding, and if you call out for insight and cry aloud for understanding, and if you look for it as for silver and search for it as for hidden treasure, then you will understand the fear of the Lord and find the knowledge of God. For the Lord gives wisdom and from his mouth come knowledge and understanding. He holds victory in store for the upright, he is a shield to those whose walk is blameless, for he guards the course of the just and protects the way of his faithful ones.

Then you will understand what is right and just and fair – every good path. For wisdom will enter your heart, and knowledge will be pleasant to your soul. Discretion will protect you, and understanding will guard you.

Proverbs 2:1-11

Leaders cultivate character by acquiring wisdom and understanding. Of course, those possessions don’t come without a price. They require the kind of dedicated and patient labor exercised in mining for gold and silver. Leaders must diligently “search” for the wisdom that is buried within God’s Word like treasure covered by layers of earth and rock. That means using the right tools and exercising patience and diligence as we spend time immersed within this life-changing book. As Marjorie Thompson writes, “It would be nice if we could simply ‘practice the presence of God’ in all of life, without expending energy on particular exercises. But the capacity to remember and abide in God’s presence comes only through steady training.”[1] You cannot pay someone else to develop your character strength any more than you can pay them to develop muscles for you. If you want to grow stronger, you will have to push the weight yourself.

Neither can you expect to have a muscular character overnight. It requires effort and time. Douglas J. Rumford says, “Character is like physical exercise or any form of learning; you cannot ‘cram,’ hoping to do in a day or week what can only be accomplished by months and years of consistent practice.”[2] This is why the writer of Proverbs uses words that call his readers to energetic and passionate action.

[2] Douglas J. Rumford, SoulShaping: Taking Care of Your Spiritual Life (Wheaton, IL: Tyndale, 1996), p. 354.

• Leaders must diligently search for true wisdom.

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Dear Father, I rejoice in the revelation that You want to be with me and me with You. The depths of Your grace are unfathomable—I cannot see how You could wish to have such intimacy with me. Yet daily I seem to forget this glorious truth and turn my heart instead to lesser goods that compete with the one thing most needful. Why do I clamor after other affections above Yours? How did I get betrothed to your enemy? I ask that you would untie me and break that knot, and take me to Yourself. Only when I am enthralled by You will I ever be free. Knowing this, I ask for the grace of holy aspiration, so that I will treasure what You declare to be important and stop giving myself to lesser things that cannot satisfy, but only entrap. By Your grace, I would break free from the bondage of the flesh, the world and the devil.

• Asking for the grace of holy aspiration.

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- This is part of a series on the theme of character. -

People generally don’t like being called “Dummies.” And yet how can we explain the overwhelming success of a series of books aimed at dummies? Beginning with the November 1991 publication of DOS for Dummies, the series now has more than 100 million books in print, dealing with everything from exercise and nutrition to managing finances to planning a European vacation.

From the very beginning, the concept was simple but powerful: Relate to the anxiety and frustration that people feel about technology by making fun of it through books that are educational and humorous – books that make difficult material interesting and easy. Throw in a dash of personality and some entertaining cartoons and – presto – you have a …For Dummies book!

The Old Testament book of Proverbs does much the same thing (minus the cartoons). It takes the timeless wisdom of God and makes it easy to understand for regular people with no theological training. You could call the book of Proverbs Wisdom for Dummies.

The Old Testament proverbs were collected and written down to help us make one of the most vital and basic choices in life – the choice between wisdom and folly, walking with God or walking on our own. In the book of Proverbs both wisdom and folly are described as people who walk through the streets of the city and call out to us, hawking their wares and beckoning us to taste a sample (Proverbs 1).

• The choice between wisdom and folly, walking with God or walking on our own.

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God of Abraham and David, You have planted a profound longing deep within me that no earthly attainment or solace can satisfy. This aspiration is for Your manifest presence, and it draws me to see the world as You meant it to be. The brief Camelot of Solomon’s early reign, with its splendor and its far-reaching influence on the nations around Israel, gives me a hint of what You are planning for the future that will not be ephemeral, but will go on into eternity. When I come in contact with the innermost desires of my heart, I must openly admit that this present world is not enough. You have planted one of my feet in this age and the other in the glorious age to come. Keep me in touch with this hunger and thirst for what You plan to bring, so that I will see more clearly that nothing in this world is enough to satisfy this divinely given restlessness.

• Growing in the aspiration for the manifest presence.

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- This is part of a series that has been adapted from my study of A. W. Tozer’s spiritual classic, The Pursuit of God. -

Ironically, if it is true freedom you seek, you must voluntarily return home. As Tozer so eloquently puts it, “God was our original habitat and our hearts cannot but feel at home when they enter again that ancient and beautiful abode.” For any freedom sought apart from God will surely condemn you to a life of bondage. If you take the world’s system and invert it, you have a pretty good snapshot of what life in the Spirit is all about. For as Jesus said in John 12:26: “If any man serve me, him will my Father honor.” The one who stoops to serve is the one God lifts up in honor.

Or consider the words of God to Eli in 1 Samuel 2:30: “Them that honor me, I will honor.” God is reminding Eli, the high priest of Israel, of the basic covenant between God and man – you honor me; I’ll honor you. But he was also warning Eli that the obverse is true: you dishonor me; I’ll dishonor you. This warning was given because Eli had failed to discipline his two sons who were also priests. Their behavior did not honor God. They stole from the temple offerings. They defiled the temple sacrifices. Yet Eli refused to discipline them and so the young Samuel is sent to announce the consequences of that failure.

Judgment comes in the form of what Tozer calls the “Law of Reciprocal Honor.” This universal law has been secretly working all along. And God’s wrath falls swiftly. Eli’s two sons and the other disobedient priests die in battle. Hophni’s wife dies in childbirth. Israel flees from her enemies. The Philistines capture the ark of God. And Eli falls backward and breaks his neck. All of this tragedy is from one man’s failure to honor God.

• The one who stoops to serve is the one God lifts up in honor.

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- This is part of a series on the theme of encouragement. -

In the latter years of his life, C.S. Lewis had a remarkable correspondence with an anonymous woman from America.[1] In his letters, Lewis urged the woman to deal with life in an emotionally honest way, acknowledging grief, fear and anger openly. He also warns her about the danger of allowing anger and fear to drive her away from God. His letters refer often to suffering and the difficulty of dealing with abrasive people. He also writes regularly about prayer and its place in the spiritual life. In all the letters, there are three themes that continually surface: honestly dealing with our emotional state, responding graciously to trials and trying people and being diligent in our prayer life.

The letters are fascinating to read, but what is most striking is that Lewis bothered to write them at all. He confessed to being often overwhelmed by his workload, and by this time in his life he could hardly write because of rheumatic pain in his arm. Yet, as Clyde S. Kilby notes, the reason Lewis continued the correspondence was because “Lewis believed that taking time out to advise or encourage another Christian was both a humbling of one’s talents before the Lord and also as much the work of the Holy Spirit as producing a book.”[2] Being a source of encouragement to a fellow Christian was as meaningful to him as anything else he did. His is an example to all of us about the enormous value of spiritual encouragement, of being present with each other, of giving generously to those who may have little or nothing to give in return.

All of this reminds us that we are not called to walk the road of life alone. God kindly gives us the grace of knowing his encouragement and acceptance. He then provides us with the encouragement and acceptance of others. Finally, he invites us to participate with him in the giving of these same gifts to those who follow our lead.

[2] Ibid., p. 7.

• How can we learn to deal more honestly with our emotional states?

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