"Sow a thought, reap an action; sow an action, reap a habit; sow a habit, reap a character; sow a character, reap a destiny."

Character..... in an age of photo ops and slick sound bites, where spin doctors work image to the max.
        Can true, deep, rooted character ever be found?
        And if so, can it be sustained?

Last week we came to realize that this issue of character growth and formation is a concern for everyone who utters the prayer,
        "Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name."

We honour or dishonor, glorify or blaspheme God through our lives.
And how our lives unfold is directed in large measure by the shape of our character within.

Christian character - the shape and colour of our soul, what we are like:
        when people are watching....... and when they’re not;
        when waters are calm....... and when the storms rage;
        when things go our way....... and when they don’t.
                How do our hearts respond?
                How do we live?

Tonight we’ll consider a tension that arises when this topic is considered - a tension revolving around the place of others in our soul’s development.
        When do we reach out for others?
                And when ought we shrink back?
        When should we stand together?
                And we should we be alone?

Let us hear from the Word of God as Andy reads for us:
 

As we speak of Christian Character, we are drawn also to consider a force that has been eroding character within people for as long as humanity has walked the face of the earth;
        what many leading Christian scholars since the earliest days have considered to be the essential vice, the root sin, what pulled our first human parents off-course and has destroyed countless souls over the millenia.

I speak of pride.
It is the singularly greatest threat to godly character development which faces us. There are many layers to Pride; many contours we could consider. Ultimately, though, and at it's core, Pride is:
        a fascination with oneself.
                wanting oneself at to be "king of the hill, top of the heap"
                inflating oneself above others in ability, in worth, in purity.
                        standing taller, working harder, thinking better.

Pride - or as they say in Latin, superbia.

In 1 Peter 5 we read:
        "God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble."

And so, hungering and thirsting for the grace of the Spirit’s work in our character, we strive against manifestations of superbia in our lives. Which is exactly the point of the two scriptures which we read, though they approach the project from opposite sides of the playing field. Hence the tension that I mentioned before Andy began to read:
        A tension between drawing others into our lives and taking time to deliberately live under cover.
The Christian desiring character growth will seek elements of both.

Consider with me how that looks.
Beginning with the teachings of our Lord in the Sermon on the Mount, Matthew 6. The words are well known -
        - don’t let your left hand know what your right is doing
        - doing your praying in your room, door closed
        - observe your times of fasting quietly

Which seems to some people to be a huge contradiction between words spoken earlier, which are recorded in Matthew 5;
        words that speak about a city being set on a public hill, about light shining for all to see, about salt that lets everyone know it is there through taste.

How can Jesus call us to be public about faith, on one hand, and then scarcely two breaths later, call us to deliberate secrecy?
        Which ought to guide our character formation - secrecy or public view?

A.B.Bruce points out that the answer is......... both.
Jesus is dealing with two different struggles that face the christian life. The first is to bury our faith. The second is to show it off.
        Says Bruce, "we are to show when tempted to hide and hide when tempted to show our religion" (Stott Christian Counter-Culture).

There are times when feeding our ego, building our image.... thinking ourselves superb.......
        there are times when pride would want to wave the flags and blow the trumpets to make sure everyone notices - moments of spiritual hot-dogging. Secrecy is the anti-dote to such moments.
There are also moments when pride judges something best buried because it may dull our public shine; it may risk our reputation; it may cost. Then it probably is time to get someone else involved.

Matthew 6 speaks to the first dynamic.
Ecclesiastes 4 to the second.

Spiritual hot-dogging - we’ve all seen it. Some of us have been tempted by it. To find that extra twist of phrase or vocal emphasis when we pray, to let everyone see how tired we are because we are so busy for the Kingdom, to let slip that we’re in the upper end of John Bos’ famous bar graphs showing church giving distribution, to be seen with the "right" people.
        We welcome the compliments, and try to silence or isolate the critics.
        All the while we’re evaluating, measuring...... and hoping others are, too.

Superbia........pride.

All of which in no way brings honour to God, no glory to Christ who being in very nature God did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, humbled himself and became obedient to death - even death on a cross! [Philippians 2];
        Christ, who rebuked the devil when tempted to jump from the top of the temple where everyone would be able to see him, the spiritual giant, being rescued by some Cirque de Soliel of a heavenly sort.

Secrecy - says Jesus.
Live out your actions in secret.
watch out for the praise of others; it’s dangerous.

D.A.Carson, in his commentary on Matthew, says:

"The negatives of these verses are actually an important way of getting to the supreme positive -- namely, transparent righteousness, genuine godliness, unaffected holiness, unfeigned piety..... The real beauty of righteousness must not be tarnished by sham."

        When only the Lord knows of the gifts we give to the poor; when no one else in the church hears about the visits we make to the widows, or sees the hours we spend on committee reports or church school lessons; when only the ones we’re targeting are aware of how we feel about Canadian investment interests sponsoring abuse in war-torn Sudan; when only the Spirit is aware of our desire and struggle towards deepening our prayer life.
        John Flavel said, "Observed duties maintain our credit, but secret duties maintain our life."
                "Touchstone of Sincerity" in Christianity Today, Vol. 30, no. 11.
 

Of course - need we even say it? - some of the greatest goods can be taken and given but a subtle twist to be tainted into the greatest of evils.
        Working spiritual disciplines in secret is one prime example. One doesn’t have to extrapolate too terribly far to see how solitude can be twisted into a rank form of independence, or stubborn rebellion, or selfish indifference.

I’ve named it
        - and continue to do so -
Saying that I firmly believe one of the greatest strongholds of evil and spiritual destruction in this city is a divisive spirit that of independence.
        It has fragmented families and social groups.
        It has allowed people to wander off into all manner of strange spiritual searchings.
        It has allowed members within the Body of Christ to commit heresy and say, "I have no need of you."
        It has allowed church leaders to watch in indifference as believers wander away and their spiritual flames flicker and die.

We say, "My plate is full" meaning we have more time for pulling weeds and shovelling driveways than we do for the well-being of our brothers and sisters.

We say, "Well, that may be fine for you......" meaning that we don’t want to surrender to the truth as another person is making it clear to us.

We walk away muttering, "It’s not my cup of tea" and refuse to surrender our personal whim to the greater good of the Body of Christ.

Christian character is trinitarian.
Know what is probably the singularly most important element of the doctrine of the Trinity?
        Can you think of it and name it in your mind?

......

Passage that identifies it is John 17.
Come to mind?

......

It is the unity among believers that imitates, that images the unity of Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
        Together.
        One.

We said last week that Christian character is built in the imago dei, the image of God.
        Here is, perhaps more than any other way, how we most visibly image our Maker - in unity. Christ’s prayer makes that passionately clear.

Which is where the wise words of Ecclesiastes 4 come in.
Ecclesiastes is a book written by someone seasoned with the years of life, and gifted with the wisdom to sort it out in a holy manner.
        And it is with that holy and uncommonly good sense that we read about the great benefits of being together.

It’s a passage often quoted at weddings, gracing invitations and the like.
Which fits.
But more fundamental is it’s place in the life of a believer - married or single, young or older.
        Cut your finger off and it soon begins to die.
        Cut yourself off from the Body of Christ and your soul begins to die.

Developing Christian character requires other people - walking together with other believers. One of the most important and treasured elements in my spiritual life here in Ottawa has been a small accountability group of which I’ve been a part since I got here. We are free to trust each other, lean on each other, challenge each other, pray for and laugh with each other.

It’s a great staple for every aspect of life - sacred or secular, if you’re wanting to make that distinction..... which is questionable at best.

New York Times journalist Tom Wicker once said, "I was asked once if I thought Nixon had ever had a good, closer personal friend, in whom he could confide his deepest thoughts, from whom he might have been willing to heed straight talk? I cannot recall such a person...... a friend like that could have saved him." [in Os Guiness When No One Sees p.227]

Remember Paul Simon’s famous song of 1969:

When you’re down and out, when you’re on the street
When evening falls so hard, I will comfort you.
I’ll take your part.
Oh! When darkness comes and pain is all around,
Like a bridge over troubled waters, I will lay me down....

The Bible gives living examples:
        Elisha and Elijah
        Naomi and Ruth
        David and Jonathan
Displaying the bound cords of relationship that provide
        - mutual encouragement when we are weak
        - mutual support when we are vulnerable
        - mutual protection when we are attacked

        If you’ve been exposed to a twelve step program of any sort, particularly if you’ve been personally involved, you’ll recall the famous and feared 5^th step:
        "Make a searching and fearless moral inventory. Then, share it with God and one other person." - AA 5^th Step
They know the secret that personal growth, inner character development doesn’t come to Lone Rangers.

Which is what led St.Augustine to write in his confessions:

"Let all who are truly my brothers love in me what they know from your teaching to be worthy of their love, and let them sorrow to find in me what they know from your teaching to be occasion for remorse. I do not speak of strangers or of alien foes.... but of my true brothers, those who rejoice for me in their hearts when they find good in me, and grieve for me when they find sin. They are my true brothers, because whether they see good in me or evil, they love me still. To such as these I shall reveal what I am.......

.....I confess not only to You but also to the believers among men, all who share my joy and all who, like me, are doomed to die; all who are my fellows in your kingdom and all who accompany me on this pilgrimage, wether they have gone before or are still to come or are with me as I make my way through life. They are your servants and my brothers.
[Augustine, Confessions Book V]

May God guide and encourage us as we live these - together.