Character and Conduct

It seems like a no-brainer - character and conduct! The two should go together like peanut butter and jelly or like green eggs and ham - especially in presidential candidates and actually in all who aspire to lead.

In our post-modern world, we have taken a turn in the road from objective to subjective, from absolute to relative, from truth to whatever works for you and on and on. We have also taken a turn away from foundationally knowing that character matters. We hear and even say or think that a person's private life (even public figures like presidents) is what they do on their own time and is nobody's business. Thus the wedge between character and conduct begins to widen.

Character determines conduct or should! Character is who a person is in the bedrock of their soul. Character is who and person is and what a person does when no one but God is looking. Character is built and developed. Character determines our values and thus guides our actions. Character matters! So does conduct.

The problem is that we (the world of 2008) have divorced the two - character and conduct - so that we minimize the value of character and shut our eyes to conduct that comes from flawed or missing character. After all, if we examine the relationship of character to conduct too closely, then accountibility follows. And accountibility is fundamentally scary!

There is another problem: we demand perfection as in "no dirty laundry" in public figures - at least the ones who don't follow our philosophical base and we tolerate almost anything when the public figure is doing what we champion.

This is twisted thinking and practice! The business of restored hearts demands by very definition that something is wrong and needs restoration. Builders don't restore brand-new houses. There's no need. What God calls us to is restoration, grace, mercy and justice. (Micah 6:8)

The fact is that all our character is flawed and damaged by sin. We are born that way.

It is only in the process of restoration through the truths of the Gospel that God builds His character deeply into our souls. From the inside out we begin to reflect His character and truth rather than the twisted character and lies which constitute who we are from birth because of sin.

God's process of heart restoration is all about His buildling His character - even infusing His character - as He scrapes away all the bad stuff and replaces it with the new. That's what restoration is - getting rid of the old and broken and replacing it with new. God is the Great Restorer!

God knows and cares about character and conduct. God also knows that repentance (followed by forgiveness) is possible and restoration is real when the Gospel begins to work its way into one heart at a time!

Botox, Brokenness and Restoration

Charles Spurgeon wrote in All of Grace, "Justification without sanctification would be no salvation at all. It would call the leper clean and leave him to die of his disease; it would forgive the rebellion and allow the rebel to remain an enemy to his king ... " Wow! Talk about counter-cultural!

According to the Westminster standards, "justification" is "act of God's free grace, wherein He pardoneth all our sins, and accepteth us as righteous in His sight, only for the righteousness of Christ imputed to us, and received by faith alone." (Shorter Catechism, Q. 33)

"Sanctification" is that process or "work of God's free grace, whereby we are renewed in the whole man after the image of God, and are enabled more and more to die unto sin, and live unto righteousness." (Shorter Catechism, Q. 35)

Spurgeon got it right: the act without the process does leave the leper to die of his disease or the treasonous rebel to remain an enemy of his King! But what an opportunity to be counterpoint, to be salt and light in our world! It is the heart of the Gospel that God doesn't just pronounce us "just" but that He also commits to the process of making us "just" to the bone, deeply into the warp and woof of our life to our very heart!

In a world of fast food and quick fixes, the Gospel speaks loud and clear that make-overs and cosmetics, even botox and liposuction don't fix the problem. Only God's work of restoration (which is a process, actually THE process of sanctification) brings God's restoring love and grace to all the brokenness of life!

I'm signing on for the process of restoration and committed to being the heart and hands of that process in my sphere of influence. I can't fix the brokenness in my own heart nor can I fix the brokenness others experience. Only God can!

It's like the little song children used to sing in Sunday School, "O, who can make a snowflake? I'm sure I can't. Can you? O, who can make a snowflake? No one, but God! It's true!" Who can fix my brokenness? I'm sure I can't; can you? Who can fix your brokenness? No one, but God! And it's true!