Personalities and Holiness
I've been trying to work through how personalities and holiness interact with each other the last several days. I've kind of confused myself, so I'm seeking your help. I would love to hear how you think these two relate to each other. I've had some conversations with friends about it, but I'd love to get some other ideas. Feel free to point out flaws in my thoughts too!
So here is a situation that happened to help flush out what I'm feeling.
On Saturday, Joel completed a task that I had been wanting him to complete. So I walked into the room and told him that I was really proud of him. Several hours later in the midst of another conversation, he revealed that my comment rubbed him in the wrong way but he didn't say anything about it --- he just chalked it up to my personality. But I was hurt that he didn't tell me. In my mind, if my comment has rubbed him wrongly, then I need to know that so that I can change my actions otherwise I am sinning because I'm not being loving towards him. But Joel doesn't see it as a sin issue.
So my question comes in this world where we have so many personality tests and discussions about personalities and gender issues, are we creating different levels of holiness for different genders or personalities? (in my example above I think it's pretty clear that Joel and I have different levels of holiness in this case.)
Here are some of my other thoughts:
1. God only has one standard --- holiness. Even though we are saved by grace and not works, our natural response to His amazing gift of love to us should be to strive with His help to become holy. He expects holiness out of all of us --- no matter what our personality is. (Yeah, I do know that the Bible talks about those in teaching leadership being held to even a higher standard, but that is the only exception I've seen.)
2. In areas of sin in MY life, if I'm not quite sure it is a sin, a tend to error on the side of calling it a sin. But I also think that I expect others to view my life in the same way --- if they think that I might be sinning but are not sure, I'm expecting them to call me on it --- which I don't think many of them are aware that I'm expecting them to do it or that they are really willing to do so. I'd rather try to change things for the better that perhaps are okay the way they are than to get to heaven and hear God say "Well you just made it in by my grace" and not say "well done."
3. I fear that our culture, including myself, uses personality differences and gender difference as a cop-out. I know that in the past, I've said things were just personality differences because I was being selfish and didn't want to change.
So what are your thoughts on all of this? Am I out to lunch? being a heretic? expecting too much from people? I'm really interested to hear all your thoughts.
posted by Wendy @ 8:25 AM
9 Comments:
Interesting post hon. So anyone who reads this knows my perspective on your example, this was how I saw it.
I finally finished this thing (our thank you letter to people that contributed to our Mexico trip, which I've been putting off writing for EVER), and it wasn't you saying that you were proud of me that bugged me, it was a combination of the tone of voice and my personaly mood at the time. In that moment, I was frustrated because Microsoft Word is the devil and hadn't been cooperating, so I was just like, "Finally, I'm done, now take this thing away from me." So when you told me you were proud of me, nothing you said was wrong or bad, it was just that in my bad mood, I took it as kind of condescending.
I mentioned it later as part of a different conversation, not because I wanted to let you know it annoyed me, but because it was a good example to me of when you SHOULDN'T call everyone out on every little thing that bothers you about them. It was obvious that you really were proud of me for getting the letter done, and I knew that, and after a minute or two I realized that I was just being stupid with my interpretation of condescension, so I blew it off.
My fear would be, that if I told you, "Wendy, don't condescend" right in the moment, that you would never feel comfortable saying "I'm proud of you" again. My desire to still have you feel comfortable to encourage me when I finish a task that I dread, overrides my desire to have you not use a particular tone of voice that really wasn't wrong in the first place. Does that make sense?
All this speaks to what I feel is a larger point in this topic, and is where we disagree: you seem to think that it is better for people to be blunt and tell everyone where all of their problems with them lie, so that the person can change. I think that this would be both impractical and undesirable. And that the result of it would be to either have strife with EVERYONE in your life, or to have a bunch of Stepford Wife style people who never said anything remotely controversial, as to not be constantly rebuked.
Think about the disciples: Peter was a live-wire. Thomas was a constant skeptic. James and John had a power struggle. But we didn't see Jesus tell Peter, "Dude, you really need to stop being so overly-zealous, because you're really bothering everyone." He told him he would be at the foundation of the Church. Jesus took people with lots of really different personalities, and used them where their strengths lie. He called out people when they were clearly being sinful, but he allowed his followers to and be neurotic and hyper and doubting. His call to them was to follow him, live in holiness, and to make disciples. That call didn't involve changing their personalities, it involved changing their hearts. Same with Paul. I don't think his conversion caused his personality to change. It caused him to point his intelligence, passion, and power of debate in a different direction.
If God didn't want us to have weird, varying personalities (that can indeed get on other people's nerves from time to time), he wouldn't have created us with them. That's what I think.
Sorry Joel --- I left out all the details of the situation because I didn't want any negative reflections on you --- not that you deserve any for the situation.
So maybe my issue then is not knowing where my personality stops and sin starts. I know that you feel that I'm dwelling on this too much, but I'm trying to get it resolved in my head so that I'm not always going around feeling awkward thinking that i'm not treating people the way they would like to be treated.
No worries, I just wanted to lend my two cents.
Three thoughts:
1) I don't think there's ANYONE out there that feels that you're mistreating them. I challenge them to step up, if they exist. You're a wonderfully kind and caring person. I just can't imagine someone coming out and saying, "man, that Wendy sure is rude/mean/dishonest/sarcastic/insert-other-adjective to me." Because you're not like that.
2) I think our personality is a part of "the flesh," and can be a source of sin if it is misused. For example, I have a personality of being a procrastinator. If I allow that to control me, and in so doing don't do something that God had commanded me to do, then it's a sin. But I don't think having the personality trait of being a procrastinator itself is a sin. It's just something that you have to be aware of and allow the Holy Spirit to be in control of. We can't allow our personalities to be a crutch, and say, "Well, sorry, I didn't go do that thing, but what you gonna do, I'm a procrastinator," any more than someone with a propensity towards sexual deviance can say, "Shoot, I just slept with a hooker, but oh well, can't help it, I'm a pervert."
3) I think this all harkens back to what Noel's been preaching about: razor's edge living. If you fall off on one side, we're rationalizing every action that we do with, "well, I was raised that way, " or "well, that's just my personality, I can't help it." But if you go the other direction, you end up trying to make it a sin to be anyone with tendencies more extreme than Ned Flanders. We have to be able to find a balance between calling a sin a sin and not blaming it on our past or our personality, and being able to let ourselves and others be the individuals God created us to be.
I guess I'm using specific circumstances to argue that in general, if I keep repeating a small thing that annoys
you, you should tell me. It doesn't have to be every time, but if it
is a constant annoyance what's the harm with letting me know? And in
the conversation that you let me know that I'm annoying you, you could
tell me that I really appreciate you saying that you are proud of me.
Yeah, I guess I'd agree with that.
I've been thinking about this a little bit since you posted -- not sure that I've come to any big conclusions. But here are a few of my thoughts:
-I think God loves it when we wrestle with life like this. So even though to the outside person it might seem that you are dwelling on it too much, it's okay! Because really you are seeking God through it.
-I agree w/ what Joel said that our personalities can be a source of sin -- and it is our responsibility to keep that in check.
-In this situation, I think it is most important to examine your heart in the comment you made. If you look deep and know that truly, you were so grateful and proud that the task was completed and you weren't trying to be condensending or sarcastic then I don't see it as a sin issue on your part. You can't control anyone else's frame of mind or mood. Another factor in that would be is whether or not you knew that Joel was in a bad mood. Cause there are times in my relationship that I want to say something to Tony, but have to use good judgment about whether now is the right time to say it. If he is on edge, and my comment can wait, I try to wait. :)
Overall I guess I would lean more toward trusting the condition of the person's heart, regardless of personality.
Hi Wendy! Wow, I just came by your site for the first time to say hi and landed in this very interesting discussion. Good thoughts...Pete and I have discussed this same thing. It's such a balancing act. I definitely agree with what Joel said about personalities being from God but not to be used as an excuse. And I agree with Wendy's sister-in-law that God loves for us to work through stuff like this for His glory. One thing I've been striving to do, is to pray more before acting or speaking--one of the main reasons that I'm trying to do this is that my first response is so often self-centered and sinful. If we are seeking Christ, I believe that God will bring forth the beauty of our personalities and not the wretched parts--except when He wants to teach us through them. Just some thoughts...I'm so glad I stopped by your site! Hope you guys are doing well!
Love,
Heather
Just so everyone knows --- the situation that I gave was just an example to get us thinking. It didn't cause any strife between Joel or I.
Wendy,
I don't know you well, so I'm not sure I should respond to this. Anyway, I was struck less by the "is this sin or not" question than by this statement:
I'd rather try to change things for the better that perhaps are okay the way they are than to get to heaven and hear God say "Well you just made it in by my grace" and not say "well done."
That bothered me a little, probably mostly because I'm sensitive to the idea that we must do X to be liked/accepted by God ... and I wanted to give you an e-hug and remind you that God knows you intimately - knows your struggles, your sin, and the ways you are growing right now - and you can't change how he feels about you, no matter how much/well or little/poorly you are doing for him.
Hmm, maybe I'm not saying that well at all. Here's another thought: this whole exchange is a sign that you're growing in him.
Maybe you didn't need any encouragement in that area, but I'd rather err on the side of encouraging. ;)
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