Why does character matter anyway?
Why cultivate character? Especially if it's a difficult thing to do? Why not focus instead on enjoying our lives? Perhaps a better goal would be to cultivate happiness?
Pursuing happiness encourages us to look at ourselves, and at the moment. It promises short term pleasure, selfish pleasure, and often blinds us to the longer term consequences.
Genesis gives us story after story of people who were not very good at cultivating character, and shows us clearly the consequences.
First of all, there is Adam and Eve- the results of their inability to resist temptation are laid out in detail in Genesis 3: 16-19. Life would never be so good again- there would be struggle and tension between men and women; distance between humanity and God; struggle to make a living and banishment from Paradise.
Cain and Abel's story comes next; it is the story of the first murder. Cain has fallen far from the image of God....rather than creating life, he has destroyed it.
The disastrous stories continue, until in Genesis 6 we read this:
The LORD saw that the wickedness of humankind was great in the earth, and that every inclination of the thoughts of their hearts was only evil continually...
Now the earth was corrupt in God's sight, and the earth was filled with violence.
Genesis 6: 5, 11
It seems that it is not enough to be made in God's image. We have to learn to behave well, to make good choices, to act with wisdom, justice, compassion, integrity, courage.....we need to cultivate character because otherwise our lives, our families and our communities begin to fall apart. Character matters, because if we have no character, we become less than human.
Pursuing happiness encourages us to look at ourselves, and at the moment. It promises short term pleasure, selfish pleasure, and often blinds us to the longer term consequences.
Genesis gives us story after story of people who were not very good at cultivating character, and shows us clearly the consequences.
First of all, there is Adam and Eve- the results of their inability to resist temptation are laid out in detail in Genesis 3: 16-19. Life would never be so good again- there would be struggle and tension between men and women; distance between humanity and God; struggle to make a living and banishment from Paradise.
Cain and Abel's story comes next; it is the story of the first murder. Cain has fallen far from the image of God....rather than creating life, he has destroyed it.
The disastrous stories continue, until in Genesis 6 we read this:
The LORD saw that the wickedness of humankind was great in the earth, and that every inclination of the thoughts of their hearts was only evil continually...
Now the earth was corrupt in God's sight, and the earth was filled with violence.
Genesis 6: 5, 11
It seems that it is not enough to be made in God's image. We have to learn to behave well, to make good choices, to act with wisdom, justice, compassion, integrity, courage.....we need to cultivate character because otherwise our lives, our families and our communities begin to fall apart. Character matters, because if we have no character, we become less than human.
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