Your True Character

Character is the way that something or someone is, their real identity, what they truly are inside. Character is one of the things that Christians struggle with particularly while they are still new born babies in the Lord. We all know that when you get born again you don’t just change most of your habits overnight but we tend portray this sense of purity, holiness, and strength, that “we’ve got this” type of thing in public. Sometimes we even pretend to the Lord. I mean, we pray loud in tongues pretending to praise God while in actual fact we want to ask Him so many questions about the confusions we face. Well, let me talk for myself here. I’ve stopped pretending to the Lord. I’ve seen God healing me from the sin of sexual immorality, anger, hatred, and I will praise Him for that. I know that God is able to heal obesity when everybody says that you can’t change the structure of your “obese genes” and I praise Him for that. I believe deep in my heart that Jesus Christ died for mankind and He rose again on the third day, and I praise Him every day for that. Yes, sometimes I have my doubts and that’s when I talk to God about it. I tell Him, the bible says that we will lay hands on the sick who will get well but God, why can’t my simple headache be healed after I pray for it? And that’s when I realize that I still lack faith as a Christian; I need to pray for more faith in God.  The great thing about God is that when you have doubts He doesn’t condemn you. People might always think that because you have doubts you’re a weak Christian or a sinner, but God knows that you’re still new in your Christian walk and there’s still much more to experience.  He will always show you the truth about Him step by step. 

Character is what you really are. It is who you are when you find a lost cell phone or purse somewhere and you chose what you do with it. It is when impure thoughts run on your mind, and you chose what you do with them. Your real character is what you know about yourself not the fake mask you give out to the public. My sister was annoyed at me a few days back because I was so mesmerized by the clothes and shoes and accessories that she has, and I was asking for most of them. I’m just a typical sister hey. So irritated, she started lashing out on me telling me that she can’t give me her stuff. She was right it was just the tone that she used that made me want to answer her back because I know that if we were to trade places, I would give her all that she asked for, well I think so?  While she was busy lashing out on me I wanted to remind her of all the time she took my things, that’s how our fights normally started in the past. One small flame just leads to a huge unnecessary fire! I just looked at her praying that God will help me not to cause an unnecessary fight, I mean she’s got the right to say no if she doesn’t want to give me her things you know. I told myself that I’m not only going to be Christian in public, encouraging people on social networks, respecting people in the church, but doing none of that in my own family. Your family knows your true character; you don’t have to pretend with them. I sat with my sister on her bed chatting one evening and she said to me, “You used to be such an angry, selfish, hateful person. I never thought you’d be who you are today.” I used to put my sisters half naked pictures on dating sites, pretended that it was me, seeking love from men; (Trust me I know what it means to be a psycho) and yes I never thought I would be where I am today. And my sister knows all this about me. She sees the metamorphosis the Holy Spirit has done in my life, she knows my true character. 

When you come to an understanding that God knows who you truly are you won’t have to pretend to be someone you’re not in the face of people, pulling a spiritual face when you’re with them but back home cursing and cussing. I remember a few days back I couldn’t find my Dream Week ticket. I knew that I had definitely placed it somewhere in my bible but when I looked for it I couldn’t find it. My real character began to manifest. I aggressively shook my bible hoping the ticket would fall yet all that fell were my bible pages. I angrily threw everything in my bag on the floor using the “F” word. Like, where is my f….. Ticket, you God know where it is! I got so mad at my Father. My true Character was being revealed. Just a few moments ago I woke up telling Him how good He is and now when things don’t go well for me, I reveal how I really feel about Him. Our true character comes out when we have nothing, when things are not going well for us. Are we able to maintain our praise? Are we really true to ourselves and to the love we claim that we have for God? It is easy to believe in God when everything’s going well for you, but His true disciples are those who do not change when circumstances change.  You know, it was the day of Dream Week, I didn’t have money, and I was thinking how costly it would be to get another ticket. After a while the Holy Spirit brought to my spirit several bible verses that calmed me down and I ashamedly faced the wall, with my arm covering my eyes, crying like a child asking the Lord to forgive me. Instead of being so angry at Him, I just chose to surrender it all. I believed that if it’s God’s will for me to attend Dream Week regardless of my lost ticket, He will make a way for me. After having a good cry I opened my bible once again and my ticket…well, it was right there on the first page safe and sound.

If a person's outer life is pure but his inner life is not, he is a hypocrite.~Zac Poonen

God is really good. (Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost. Titus3:5). Even though our character is flawed He loves us, He still draws towards us anyway. He wants us to have abundant life here on earth, and later in heaven. One morning I was jogging and I was feeling really defeated. I said, “Here I am busy trying to fix my physical self but my character is rotten. What’s the point!!!?”  The Holy Spirit said, “Change what you can change, and I will deal with your character!” Change your academic record, change the foods you eat, change your habits, and God will take care of what you cannot change. As long as you stick by Him, read your Word, continue praying,  God will eventually change your inner man. (Let us not be weary in well doing: for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not. Galatians6:9). During one of the Dream Week sessions my mind was wandering all over. I was battling yet again with impure thoughts, I was skeptical about everything that the pastor was saying. Yet at the end of the session the Holy Spirit physically manifested to me. Throughout the whole conference I was trying to act holy thinking I would feel what I felt in last year’s Dream Week conference, and on the last day when I’ve given up on trying so hard, God touches me once again. (He chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things and the things that are not-to nullify the things that are, so that no one may boast before him. 1Corinthians1:28-29).  We are saved not by our good works but by what Jesus Christ has already done for us. 

Therefore, as it is written: Let him who boasts boast in the Lord! ~1Corinthians1:31