2. Little Things that Make for CHARACTER
2. Little Things that Make for CHARACTER
"My father, if the prophet had bid you do some great thing, would you not have done it?" 2 Kings 5:13
Consider the words of kindly caution and of well-merited rebuke spoken by the servant of the leprous Naaman, who, seeking a remedy for his diseased condition from the prophet Elisha, refused, in a rage, to follow the simple condition: "My father, if the prophet had bid you do some great thing, would you not have done it?"
Yourdiseaseis loathsome--but yourpride, your false notion of the use and benefit of great things, is still more to be loathed. Rise above the narrowness and bigotry and blindness, and find hope and health, not alone in the waters of Jordan, but in the clear, pure air of submission, of obedience, and faith in God. Naaman hadwealthin abundance; would not some great gift be better than some little act? He had greatpower; would not some exhibition of that power upon the enemies of Elisha’s God be more acceptable than a surrender of self? The world is always overestimating "great things"--and undervaluing simple things. Those things that are really great, which hide their greatness from us by their very unappreciated and unrecognized nearness--are often passed over, in the vain effort of mankind to do the "great thing," as men note greatness.
"The best things are always within reach." Study that statement. Let it have the closest scrutiny and the largest application. "The best things are always within reach." These best things, then, must be little things, and these little things must make for greatness, here or hereafter.
Is wealth beyond our reach? Perhaps wealth may not be best for us. Is health gone--gone so far that, even with effort and expense and care, we seem not to be able to reach and recover it? Then there may be a discipline in patient resignation, which will sweeten life and brighten hope of Heaven, in the very experience through which the soul is dragged by a disease-strickened body.
"Godliness with contentment is great gain"--great gain. He who looks upon life in this lowly sphere as a state or condition whose highest end is self, will fail miserably in securing permanent blessedness.
Why are we here? What purpose had God in our creation? Why do we have individual and personal existences?
Surely not for bodily or physical pleasure. Not for intellectual delights and the higher forms of mental intoxication. Not to amass wealth, or achieve fame, or secure and exercise power and authority over others. Surely not to gratify our pride and ambition.
We could not all be kings or queens, else who would be subjects and serve? Our wealth would be little worth if all were millionaires. Truly some wise and universal reason may be found to account for conscious existence in a world of material things--to justify the fact most evident of all facts, and yet most marvelous of all, that of human life. There is a response to that question that will be full and complete and satisfactory to all men, in its application.
"Why are we here in this life?"
Answer: "We are here to glorify God and to enjoy Him forever." That ’s the stately answer of the Catechism--the condensed statement of the thought of devout scholarship of all ages. To enjoy life and God is to bring to Him the fruit, the developed form, of that which He has given to us. The most that we can get out of life, and the most that we can make of it, is summed up in that most descriptive term,Christian Character. Could we discipline and develop and perfect character as outlined in Christ, in any other realm, without this first preliminary stage of existence, experience, contact, and conflict?
Godly character, then, for all men, is the goal. By it we glorify God, and, because of it, we enjoy God and goodness and shall enjoy Him forever. Much every way hinges on character.
We may not be rich inmaterialthings; but we may have thewealth of characterfar surpassing the power and the possessions of the millionaire. We may not have physical strength; but we may have health and wholeness in soul strength, that smiles and is content in the presence of the athlete. The one will soon reach a limit, and fail in its cunning. The other will increase daily, because the outward man must perish; but the inner man is renewed day by day. This great thing calledcharacteris so simple, so easily recognized, so readily attained, while still in a state of continued development, that its possession may be individually universal. Do you, then, like Naaman, desire to dosome great thingin order to feel and know freedom from bondage, deliverance, and conquest in the presence of spiritual foes, the cleansing of the soul from the leprous effects of sin, in order that you may glorify God and enjoy Him forever? Be content to do thesimple thingsthat make for that great thing called Character. The materials for the structure are near at hand. Build daily. Begin aright; find a firm foundation. Begin now, and you will soon note progress. By and by your friends will observe it; then strangers cannot but remark at what they see and feel of strength and beauty and largeness of your masterpiece.
Somebeginwrong. They are indifferent as tofoundations. They are careless as to the choice of materials. It is the stranger who is first impressed with the appearance of wisdom and wealth and strength and attractiveness. He wonders that such an exhibition of excellence is not recognized and admired in the community where it exists. But, on further inspection, he discovers that . . .
thewisdomdisplayed is superficial,
thewealththat dazzled is borrowed,
the appearance of strength and beauty is veneer or tinsel,
and underneath all no foundation, but shifting sands! This is well known to acquaintances, and best known to the man himself.
Reputation is not character! This short cut to character is deceptive, and in the end most self-destructive. Beware of a cheap grade. The best is none too good. If we would glorify God and enjoy Him forever; if we would make the most of life, let us seek the best!
Study with me, then, the little things, the despised small things, that go to make up character. Note wherein you seem to yourself to be deficient. Cultivate that especial quality by an act of the will, by prayer, by study of God’s book of precepts and principles, by observation and emulation of those men and women whose character you most admire. Then, there will be no day without its influence.
1. Self-Denial. The hardest blow must be struck first of all. The foundation must be laid on the firmest rock. No noble soul gets, without giving. As hard as denial of self may be, it is always easier to let go than to hold on, in the beginnings of the test, before a grip is fastened upon the soul by the world and the flesh and the devil, as all will testify who have tried both. This is an act within our power, thissubordination of self. We cannot take from another, without his consent, anything that would enrich us, so easily as to give to him from our own store that which he needs. The principle ofself-sacrificekeeps us in touch with helpless humanity, without self-impoverishment. Even Christ pleased not Himself, chose not to withhold for Himself, when that giving and self-denial lifted us, exalted us, to a plane somewhere along the level of the highest possibilities with Himself.
"In honor preferring one another." It is not the gift in itself, whether of time or service or of material possessions, anything that pleases and relieves the discomfort or provides for the necessities of the needy--that most aids and brings the best blessings to the giver. These, in a sense, do bring satisfaction to the soul, and make true the saying of our Lord, "It is more blessed to give than to receive." But self-denial is absolutely essential to largeness of soul-growth, because of the disposition it begets within the self denier of yearning sympathy and helpful interest concerning the helpless and hopeless ones in the world around him. The disposition to make others happy is always fruitful and reactive. It counteracts the fatal tendency, so common among men of conquest, of overreaching, of withholding more than is right, which tends to poverty. Soul-strength, soul-richness, soul-sweetness, and a multitude of excellencies, come to keep company with the heart that dwells within self-denial.
It is begun by a determination to serve. "Take this place;" "Let me do that for you;" "You are looking so well;" "I was pleased at what you said;" "Let me help you;" "Come with us,"--anything, everything said and done that is the outgoing of self to another; and by that life of "otherness" comes the Christ-life. Herein is the greater truth of our Lord, "It is more blessed to give than to receive." Can a selfish, grasping, indifferent life result in a character that shall glorify God? How could such a soul enjoy God, when every thought, feeling, sentiment, and desire is wrapped up in "me and mine," while others in despair are abandoned without care or consideration? There must be a dying to self at the foundation of all Christian character. This, then, is the little-large thing that lies within our power to do--thatmaybe done, thatmustbe done, in order to develop character aright; namely, Self-denial.
2. Patience.
Ruskin says: "Patience lies at the root of all pleasures, as well as of all powers. Hope herself ceases to be happiness when Impatience companions her." Do you get that thought? Think it over carefully. "Patience lies at the root of all pleasures, as well as of all powers. Hope herself ceases to be happiness when Impatience companions her." Patience may be consistent with energy, with unremitting toil up to the full measure of our strength; but worry weakens, hastens to secure or see results, puts off the culmination of thought and effort, and disturbs all that has been done to bring about solidity, beauty, and perfection.
"Learn to labor and to wait." The giant oak in its earliest stages fretted not because the stalk of corn or the sunflower reached up and touched its limit in a season, for in a season it also faded away.
Peevish discontent destroys all opportunity of making the most of conditions and circumstances. Every enterprise that has strength, that has permanency--has had to be indifferent to time, and allow the coming of days, and months, and years before its growth has fully matured. Every weakness in reformation, in discovery, in invention, in social organization, may be traced to undue haste in its accomplishment. The leaders in astronomical science have held their discoveries in abeyance for years, in order to test their theories or prove the accuracy of their laws. He is strong who is content to plod on, to bide his time, to wait the slow coming of the years, for the development of thought and purpose, for the acceptance and approval of his work and of himself. Do not become impatient; commit all things to the Lord. Let self-denial have an opportunity, if results are slow in coming, that patience may have her perfect work.
3. Courage.
There is opposition to everything. The timid soul is easily frightened. The dangers and difficulties we meet are not so formidable as those we never meet, but that threaten us, yet, at our coming, vanish from our path.
Courage comes from conviction, and conviction from truth. "First be sure you are right, then go ahead." Such progress, however, may cost something, but it may be worth all it costs. You may lose friends, separate yourself from associations otherwise delightful, and begin life over again amid new scenes and strange surroundings; but if you are right, have the courage of your righteousness, and move sweetly and steadily on.
How many souls have lost wealth, lost health, lost home and Heaven, because they lost courage! They were sneered at, quit work, took counsel of their fears, and fled in dismay. Blessing companions enticed to dissipation--they could not say "No," hesitated, and were lost. The quality of this courage is not physical. The boy or man isleastpossessed by it, who, because of physical strength, overawes his comrades or his community by his ferocious power. The gentlest, most unassuming, most self-denying, surprises the opposition by a dignity and heroism that cannot be destroyed, even if death itself is the result. How essential is this steadfastness, this moral courage, in the growth of character! It is a little thing, big with results. Without it, character is as a wall of untempered mortar. It is defenseless.
4. Love.
"Though I speak with the tongue of men and of angels, but have not love, I am become sounding brass or a clanging cymbal." Love never fails; all else shall cease, of hatred and malice, opposition, fame and the pomp and glory of the world; but love shall abide forever. He who loves, allies himself to God, for God is love. He begins here to breathe an atmosphere of that realm and of that dispensation for which this is preparatory. It is not the love for the lovable alone, which ennobles and expands the soul. It is a divine vision which concerns itself with the possibilities of good and the probabilities of peril in all sorts and conditions of mankind.
"It suffers long, and is kind." All may not bewiseand bless humanity with their wisdom; but a loving, tender heart may be possessed by all men, and be a blessing always. Materialwealthmay not be possessed by the masses; butlovemay be a treasure for all, to keep warm the hearthstone when storms beat without, and make glad the fatherless and the widow in the rainy day of adversity. Who cannot love? Love children and aged ones; love helpless and sorrowing souls out of their helplessness and grief.
Drummond says: "The greatest thing a man can do for his Heavenly Father, is to be kind to some of His other children." "Much of Christ’s life," he says, "was spent in doing kind things--in merely doing kind things." Kindness, then, is the active principle of love, just as patience is the passive principle. It is so easy to say unkind, to do unkind things; but it is just as easy to learn how to do and say kind things, if we will--and to be kind.
It is a little thing to love, yet love is the greatest of the graces of Christian character. It sweetens self-denial, and makes it easy and delightful. It is the staying quality of a believing soul; it is the crowning glory of Christian character. If we are asked to do some great thing, remember, it is to be done in the doing of this simple thing. My brother, my sister, if God, by the voice of His Spirit, by the word of truth, by the preaching and practice of His children, should bid you do some great thing, and that great thing be the building of a character in accord with His will, would you not do it? Do, then, the little things that make for character! Use the material within your reach, and do it today! Be self-denying;
Be patient;
Be courageous;
Be kind and loving.
If there is any other virtue, think on that; and, with Divine help, do it also!