Why God Humbles Us

In my quiet time with God today, I read the Old Testament book of Daniel, chapters 4-6.

Daniel, living as an exile in Babylon, which had conquered God's people, is an adviser to the Babylonian king, Nebuchadnezzar. Daniel interprets a dream for the king, telling Nebuchadnezzar that, although he is powerful and rich at the moment, his kingdom will soon be taken from him. Because of his arrogance, Nebuchadnezzar will be driven from his throne, forced to live like a wild animal.

A year passes and the king is still in power...unchastened by the dream. Then, one day while walking on the roof of his palace, Nebuchadnezzar observes with self-satisfaction, "Is not this the great Babylon I have built as the royal residence, by my mighty power and for the glory of my majesty?" (Daniel 4:30)

Just then, a voice came from heaven and told the king, "This is what is decreed for you, King Nebuchadnezzar: Your royal authority has been taken from you. You will be driven away from people and will live with the wild animals; you will eat grass like the ox. Seven times [seven years] will pass by for you until you acknowledge that the Most High is sovereign over all kingdoms on earth and gives them to anyone he wishes.” (Daniel 4:31-32)

After seven years of God's humiliation for his arrogance, Nebuchadnezzar repented for his sins and confessed his faith in God. As he tells it, his sanity is restored. (The abiding insanity of the human race is the notion that we can "be like God," masters of our own lives and fates. Nebuchadnezzar apparently had followed this insane line of thinking to the nth degree.)

Eventually, his advisers and others sought Nebuchadnezzar out and his kingship was restored, although he approached it with a different attitude. His kingship and all of the other gifts God chose to bestow on him weren't his due, nor the result of his goodness or power: They were only trusts given to Him by God to be used with faithfulness, diligence, and wisdom.

In Daniel 4:37, the king says, "Now I, Nebuchadnezzar, praise and exalt and glorify the King of heaven, because everything he does is right and all his ways are just. And those who walk in pride he is able to humble."

"And those who walk in pride he is able to humble."

We may sometimes resent or question the ways in which God humbles us. But maybe God has to humble us in order to restore our sanity, to help us to acknowledge the fundamental fact of the universe, that God is God and we're not. He needs to humble us so that we will turn back to Him and live.

The way of self-centered pride may gain us the whole world. But eventually, it will cost us our eternal lives. When we insist on worshiping at what Carolyn Arends has called "the altar of ego," we aren't walking with the God we know in Jesus Christ.

Jesus asks, "What good is it for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul?" (Mark 8:36)

Nebuchadnezzar's answer to that question was, "It doesn't profit anyone at all to gain the trophies of this dying world and lose our life with God for all eternity."

I try to spend time in God's Word each day. I don’t do that to earn brownie points with God. God doesn’t give brownie points. He gave Himself on the cross for sinners like me. I spend time in God’s Word each day so that I don’t fall into the trap of thinking that this world or this human being is all that. I need to be reminded of how gracious, loving, powerful, and righteous God is. I need to reconnect with the only Source of life there is: the God revealed in Jesus.

I don't want to be my own man. I want to be God's man. I want to be a man who belongs to the One Who bought my soul out of sin and death by His death on the cross. I want to belong to Jesus.

I don't need the kingdoms of this world--prominence, popularity, power, property. I just need the God revealed in Jesus. I ask that God would remind me of that each day, to keep me sane.

"One thing I have asked of the LORD, this is what I desire: to dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life, to gaze on the beauty of the LORD and seek Him in His temple." (Psalm 27:4)

That’s how I feel when I’m sane. And I'm not always sane. Sometimes I let my ego, my thoughts, my emotions, or my desires take control. I need to be humbled to see God, the world, and me aright. That's why I keep coming back to God in His Word, the God I know in Jesus, the God Who has established His Church as a fellowship of healing for recovering sinners like me: So that His sanity will penetrate my life and so that I will believe in Him and live.

[I'm the pastor of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio.]

Flying High with Two Religious Carnival Pitchmen (Ugh)

Kenneth Copeland and Jesse Duplantis are two heretics who espouse a false message referred to as the "prosperity gospel." Like people such as Creflo Dollar and Joel Osteen, they tell people that if they give enough (especially to them) and pray enough and believe enough, they'll have riches and be happy and problem-free. (Clearly, they must not have noticed how the early apostles, like Jesus, had no wealth and were martyred for their faith in Christ.)

From this clip, I guess that they also never noticed that Jesus, even though He was intent on going to Jerusalem to fulfill His mission of dying and rising for us, always moved among the crowds and made Himself interruptible. When people asked for help--blind people, the parents of sick children, those suffering from some other affliction, those who had questions, He took the time to be with them and help them. Jesus had an agenda; but He knew that He could best pursue it by being interruptible, underscoring His identity as the long-awaited Messiah (the Christ) and helping people to see that He was the way to life with God.

The fact is that it's when we Christians move among people and allow ourselves and our agendas to be interrupted by the needs of other people that we do God's will.

Copeland and Duplantis seem to forget the whole point of God's incarnation, His taking on human flesh in Jesus. He came to move among the evil, the demon-possessed, the druggies, and everyone else. If God isn't too good to do that, then I'm surely not! Neither are Copeland or Duplantis.

I've had some of my most amazing opportunities to share Christ's love and to pray with and for people while flying on commercial jets.

The crap peddled her is nothing more than a rationalization for materialistic impulses. Duplantis and Copeland aren't seeking to help people or to glorify God, but to help and glorify themselves. Their private jets are no different than gold-plated coffins. Jesus' question applies here: "What good is it for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul?" (Mark 8:36)

(Hat Tip to Ann Althouse for posting this video.)



[I'm the pastor of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio.]

"You're not the Placater-in-Chief" (Quiet Time reflections)

These are reflections from my morning quiet time with God. (For more on how I spend my quiet time with God, see here.) I had never previously noticed the thematic cohesion in Matthew 20, until today's quiet time. It's amazing how God can keep speaking to us in fresh ways when we take the time to pay attention to His Word.

Look: Matthew 20 begins with Jesus telling a parable about God’s right to give the same level of generous grace to all, no matter when they come to believe in and follow Him. Jesus says that in the kingdom of God, the last will be first and the first will be last and their standing will have nothing to do with how the world sees things.

Later, James, John, and their mother approach Jesus, asking Him to assure them that, when Jesus comes into His kingdom, James and John will be his right- and left-hand men. The mother who voices this request isn’t particular about which one is higher than the other, but she does want the boys to be one and two in Jesus’ kingdom. But Jesus says: “...to sit at my right or left is not for me to grant. These places belong to those for whom they have been prepared by my Father.” (v.23)

Later still, two other men, blind and unaccompanied by their mommies, call out for mercy to Jesus. Jesus had asked James, John, and their mother, “What do you want?” (v.21). Jesus now asks the blind men, “What do you want me to do for you?” (v.32) The blind men ask to be sighted and Matthew writes: “Jesus had compassion on them and touched their eyes. Immediately they received their sight and followed him.” (v.34)

Listen: While James and John were apostles and would have a special part to play in the kingdom of God, Jesus’ answer to their request (their prayer) was different from the one given to the two blind men.

To James and John, Jesus gave a nuanced no. Jesus tells them that they will, as they so confidently and ignorantly say they can do (v.22), drink the cup that Jesus is about to drink: They would drink of death because, after Jesus’ death, resurrection, ascension, and the arrival of the Holy Spirit, James and John would faithfully exercise their particular callings as apostles, telling others about the way of new life with God through Jesus. They would lose their lives for their faithfulness.

But Jesus told them that only the Father could or would decide where they would be seated in the kingdom of God.

On the other hand, we have no further record of the blind men given sight by Jesus here. They asked for their sight and they followed Jesus. That’s all we know of them.

Maybe they already were followers (disciples) of Jesus when they cried out for mercy. Now, with sightedness, they could physically follow Jesus along with the other disciples. We don’t know.

But several things are clear:

1. The blind men asked for sight, not for power. It’s not just unseemly to ask for power; it's a sin. To crave it. To need it. Jesus asks: “What good is it for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul?” (Mark 8:36)

2. Matthew avoids indicating what status in the kingdom of God might belong to the now-sighted men or what their status might later have become. He only tells us that they followed Jesus.

This is important. It’s a dangerous business trying to guess other disciples’ status with God. We can’t know the depths of their prayer life or the breadth of their faithfulness. We can’t know the secret sacrifices they may make to follow the Lord. We can’t know all of the temptations and sins with which other believers may wrestle in order to keep following Jesus. Only God knows and only God sees the true nature of a person’s discipleship or the disciple’s place in His kingdom.

Because of all of this, there's a good chance that any judgment we might make about a believer's status in the kingdom would be wrong. God told Samuel not to anoint young David’s handsome older brother: “Do not consider his appearance or his height, for I have rejected him. The Lord does not look at the things people look at. People look at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.” (1 Samuel 16:7)

3. Even if James and John occupied a special, revered office in Christ’s Church on earth, which they did, it doesn’t mean that the blind men don’t enjoy higher status in the kingdom of God. The only One Whose judgment counts when it comes to evaluating our lives is God. He loves all equally. Christ died and rose for all. All who repent and believe in Christ have a share in His kingdom. Status, place, is entirely God’s decision. Period. For each Christian, it should be sufficient knowing that we belong to the God we meet and trust in Jesus. Everything else is self-absorption.

Rather than trying to outguess the sovereignty of God, our call is simply to follow and go where Jesus sends us. I’m a sinner saved only by the grace of God given to those who trust in Jesus.

By grace through faith in Christ I’m granted a place in God’s kingdom. Who am I to argue over the seating arrangements?

Or to concern myself with whether others regard me as a great disciple, faithful, upstanding, wise, smart, important, worthy, exalted, or anything else?

Whatever place I am given in the kingdom of God is more than I deserve and infinitely better than having no place in His kingdom. “I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God than dwell in the tents of the wicked.” (Psalm 84:10)

Respond: You take the lead today, Lord. I will follow. Wherever You want to put me, I will accept. I’m not the leader; You are. You’re not the follower; I am. You’re not the caterer to my desires, the Placater-in-Chief; You are my Lord and my God. Today, help me to treat You that way. In Jesus’ name. Amen

[Blogger Mark Daniels is pastor of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio.]

My Hope for Brian Williams

I wrote about Brian Williams and the allurement of celebrity here.

But my hope is that the country, which has seemed so gleeful in its condemnation of and laughter at Brian Williams, will forgive him and that NBC will reinstate Williams once the anchor has done "his time."

How many of us, prone to exaggeration and telling what I call, "heroes of our own story" tales, haven't been guilty, unintentionally or otherwise, of the same wrongs as Williams? And most of us haven't been in the public eye when we've told such stories, meaning that we're not as widely and unceremoniously vilified for our exaggerations as Brian Williams has been.

The Williams story is, as I suggested in that earlier post, cautionary. Those with aspirations to be famous should think twice about their ambitions. Fame is like money, of which Jesus said: "What good is it for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul?" (Mark 8:36) If fame or money become our aims, we may gain both but lose ourselves in the process.

Brian Williams, unlike many in the public eye, has admitted his wrong. Forthrightly, without excuses. Chastened, this man who has been, it seems, a responsible journalist, should get the grace and second chance that we all assume we ourselves deserve.

Some feel that Williams deserves no consideration because he has a lot of money, as though money softens the blow, as though money were his motivation for being a journalist. These ideas miss the point. No amount of money can compensate for the guilt and regret Williams must feel right now.

Nor can it give him the sense of fulfillment he likely felt from pursuing his calling as a fair-minded journalist.

Unlike some public figures, whose "apologies" are nothing but recriminations toward those who hold them accountable or who view their mea culpas as pro forma hoops they need to jump through in order to gain the honors they believe they deserve, Williams seems genuinely repentant.

His suspension seems to be an appropriate consequence of his breach of journalistic propriety. In other words, the "punishment" fits the "crime."

But, having accepted his medicine, Brian Williams shouldn't be forced to be a scapegoat wandering in the wilderness for the rest of his life.

In six months' time, Williams should be back at his desk on the NBC Nightly News. If not there, some other news organization should use his considerable talents.

At least that's what I think.

The Light of the World!

[This was the prepared for sermon for worship this morning with the people and friends of Living Water Lutheran Church in Springboro, Ohio.]

Matthew 2:1-12
To begin this morning, I ask you to turn to Isaiah 49:5-6 (page 508 in the pew Bibles). We're told:

“And now the LORD says-- he who formed me in the womb to be his servant to bring Jacob back to him and gather Israel to himself, for I am honored in the eyes of the LORD and my God has been my strength--he says: ‘It is too small a thing for you to be my servant to restore the tribes of Jacob and bring back those of Israel I have kept. I will also make you a light for the Gentiles, that you may bring my salvation to the ends of the earth.’"

The speaker in this passage of prophecy written many hundreds of years before the birth of Jesus, has often been believed by Christians to be the Messiah, the Christ, revealed later to be Jesus.

And in verse 6, Messiah, the Anointed King Who God promised would come to set things right in Israel--bringing people back to the right worship of God, granting forgiveness to those who repent and trust in Him alone--quotes God the Father.

Here, God the Father tells God the Son, the Messiah, in effect, “It’s much too small a project for You to usher in the Kingdom of heaven for the descendants of Abraham. I want every human being on the planet to have the opportunity for salvation from sin and death. All people. You will bring light into a world darkened by sin and death!” 



On the first Christmas, Jesus came into the world to be a light to all nations.

The passionate desire of God for relationship with people isn’t confined to one ethnic group, race, or nation.

He wants to give all people the light they need to first, see their sins and vulnerabilities--and therefore see their need of God’s offered hand of forgiveness--and second, He wants to give all people the ability to see Jesus Christ as their hope for lives made eternally new by God Himself.

God doesn’t force the Light of the world on us. The spiritually blind will only be given sight if they want the Messiah.

But He shines still today in the witness of Scripture, in the Sacraments, in the fellowship and service of the Church, in the witness of Christians who prepare themselves always to account for the hope that Jesus the Messiah has given them.

Please turn to John 1:9-13 (page 739). Here, John writes about the Messiah after Jesus’ death and resurrection, at least seven hundred years after the prophecy from Isaiah we just read.

John writes: “The true light that gives light to every man was coming into the world. He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him. He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him. Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God--children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband's will, but born of God.”

Jesus, the Light of the world, scours the nations not just to show us our sins, but also to enlighten the hearts and minds of every person to know that...

• those holes in our hearts with which we all are born,
• that gnawing need for meaning and significance,
• that canyon of separation between God and us

CAN BE FILLED!

They can be filled by the Messiah Jesus.

That’s what the New Testament is talking about when it says that all people can be saved by grace through faith in Jesus Christ alone. (See here, here, and here, among other places.)

We see God’s passionate desire to draw all people to Himself through Christ in today’s Gospel lesson, Matthew 2:1-10 (page 668). Please turn to it now.

This lesson records the event we call the Epiphany, from the Greek word epiphaneo, which means to shine upon. On the first Epiphany, a bright star led men called Magi, often called wise men, to the Light of the world, the Messiah.

And throughout this season of the Church Year called Epiphany, we will read Gospel lessons in which people had epiphanies, aha moments when someone recognized that when they came into the presence of Jesus, they were doing much more than meeting a man. They were in the presence of God in the flesh!

To our lesson, now. Verses 1 and 2: “After Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea, during the time of King Herod, Magi from the east came to Jerusalem and asked, ‘Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews? We saw his star in the east and have come to worship him.’"

The Magi were practitioners of both astronomy, a useful science, and astrology, quackery that believes the stars control the destinies of human beings.

You wouldn’t expect these guys to be among the first people to care about or seek out Jesus.

In Deuteronomy 18:10-11, God forbids relying on superstitions or mediums of any kind. Such practices are called abominations because they're expressions of the human desire to "be like God." Superstitions like astrology appeal to our human impulse to be control freaks, to take control for ourselves instead of submitting to the will and control of the Creator of the universe.

So, the Magis weren’t believers in God. Whatever knowledge they may have had of Hebrew Scripture would have merely been the result of human curiosity, not faith.

And they were also foreigners, Gentiles likely from Persia, modern day Iran.

Yet, when the Messiah was born into the world, God, in His sovereignty, chose to reveal the birth to the Magi through the very stars they superstitiously followed.

Folks, the Light of the world can use any means He chooses to invite people to worship Him, to lead us to grace and new life in His Name, to pull us to His Word of truth.

And the Light of the world wants to call even the most notorious sinners, people good Christians might think are hopelessly separated from God, into a relationship with Him.

In God's eyes, there are no hopeless cases! As long as human beings draw breath on this planet, there is a chance they can come to know Jesus and His grace and forgiveness and be saved from sin and death. That's why the mission of Christ's Church is critically important!

Verses 3 and 4: “When King Herod heard [the Magi’s belief that Messiah had been born] he was disturbed, and all Jerusalem with him. When he had called together all the people's chief priests and teachers of the law [Herod had to get all his key advisors together in the Situation Room to face this crisis], he asked them where the Christ was to be born.”

Herod himself wasn’t Jewish and he wasn’t a descendant of David, which Israel’s kings were supposed to be.

He had been given his throne by the Romans.

In the later years of his life--and Jesus was born sometime not too long before Herod’s death--the paranoid Herod killed off potential rivals.

The news of a newborn King of the Jews disturbed him.

But Matthew says Jerusalem was in an uproar too, people in their pious religious moments would have insisted that they were pining for the coming of the Messiah who would bring God's kingdom to people in need of Him.

Why? Maybe because sometimes God gets too close for comfort. We resist Him.

I shared my faith in Christ with a friend once. Nothing pushy. “That’s fine for you, Mark,” he told me. “But I really don’t need God right now.”

Another guy told me his plan: He would wait to let Christ into his life until he was on his deathbed. Until then, he intended to do without Him. Guess no one ever told him, death isn’t always that tidy or predictable.

Neither are all the other unplanned events where we need the God of the universe and Redeemer of our souls by our sides!

But, isn’t ironic that the Magi were more excited about the birth of the King of the Jews than “Jerusalem,” by which I think Matthew meant official Jerusalem, was.

They were comfortable with their perks and power and ease.

They didn’t want the Messiah messing things up.

This should remind us to never get too comfortable with the things of this world. If we’re not careful they can become so important to us that we gain the world but lose our souls!

In verses 5 and 6, the scribes and chief teachers of God’s Law cited Old Testament passages--Micah 5:2 and 2 Samuel 5:2--to show that the Messiah was to be born in Bethlehem, the hometown of Israel’s greatest king, David.

Verses 7 and 8: “Then Herod called the Magi secretly and found out from them the exact time the star had appeared. He sent them to Bethlehem and said, ‘Go and make a careful search for the child. As soon as you find him, report to me, so that I too may go and worship him.’" 

The Magi followed the star to the house where Jesus lived with Mary and Joseph in Bethlehem. Matthew says the Magi “were overjoyed.”

Do you remember how it felt when you first realized that the God of the universe loved you, then died for you and rose for you, so that you could turn from the death and sin of this world and receive life with God as a free gift?

Maybe it wasn’t a realization that came upon you all at once.

And hopefully, it’s a realization that hits you at deeper and deeper levels as you grow and mature in your relationship with Christ.

But this must have been something of what the Magi felt at that moment.

God’s unseen hand, His Holy Spirit, had used the star to lead them to the Child and they reacted  as we do when we realize for the first time or once again the depths of God’s commitment to us despite our faults and sins.

Verse 11: “On coming to the house, they saw the child with his mother Mary, and they bowed down and worshiped him. Then they opened their treasures and presented him with gifts of gold and of incense and of myrrh.”

The gifts they brought were ones commonly brought to kings. But what strikes me is that they bowed down and worshiped Jesus.

The Magi, never identified by Matthew as kings, were nonetheless, as their gifts attest, wealthy men. They were important in their society. They might well have seen themselves as important people deigning to give their approval to Jesus, in effect legitimizing Him by their gifts.

Sometimes, you know, we can get caught up in thinking what wonderful people we are and how lucky God is to have us on His side. If thoughts anything like that ever cross our minds, we should look at the Magi.

The word translated as worship here is in the Greek in which Matthew wrote, proskuneo. It can be translated as give homage or honor, like you might give to a queen or a president. We stand when presidents enter the room because they represent the sovereignty of our nation. People bow to royalty for the same reason. The Magi may have simply been acknowledging their belief that this Child, living in the home of an impoverished couple, was, despite all appearances, a king.

But virtually every time Matthew uses this word, proskuneo, he means more than simply paying honor. It’s almost always the gesture of people who realize that when they come into the presence of Jesus, they come into the presence of God. They worship Jesus.

This, of course, is precisely the claim Jesus makes for Himself.

“I and the Father are one,” Jesus says in John 10:30.

And in John 14:6-7, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me. If you really know Me, you will know My Father as well. From now on, you do know Him and have seen Him.”

That must have been what the Magi saw when they looked at the Child with awe and gratitude.

Two things I hope you and I will take away from Epiphany Day, 2014:

One, God’s love knows no bounds. God wants all people to know  Jesus, the Light of the world.

And two, God wants to use you and me to extend His invitation to others, not to come to Church, but to know Jesus.

In 2014, may we learn to know Jesus better and learn to rely on the Holy Spirit more, so that when we have the chance, like the star, to lead others to the Light that darkness could not snuff out, we will be ready.

As we begin this new year, let’s make it our common prayer to seek God’s help in growing not as church members, but as disciples of Jesus Christ, so that call all who don’t yet know the Messiah or the life God gives in His Name to join us in following Him.

Listen: The brightest light that shone on the first Epiphany wasn’t in the sky; it was on the earth beneath, where “the Word made flesh” brought the way of salvation to all peoples!

God be praised!

Reputation versus Character

I've been hearing a lot lately about an outfit called Reputation.com. It's in the business of "reputation management," which their web site describes as "the practice of making people and businesses look their best on the Internet."

There must be a place for such a business these days, I'm sure. Anyone who's ever found themselves the focal point of gossip or unfair misconstructions of their actions or beliefs, can understand how, with the Internet, which allows lies to fly a million times faster than the truth, will know this.

But sometimes managing a reputation in itself often entails a little misconstruction, a little fudging of the truth, doesn't it? It seems that many today are more concerned about looking good than they are about being good.

None of us is perfect, least of all me! I am a sinner saved by the grace of God in Jesus Christ. I wrestle with temptation and sin every day of my life. I am quite conscious of my faults and sins and occasionally reference them in my preaching and teaching. (By the way, I wouldn't be wrestling with temptation and sin if I weren't a Christian. The closer we seek to follow Christ, the more conscious we are of the evil that resides within us and the evil that lures us. Christians who claim they don't wrestle with their own sins and temptations are either liars or deluded.)

But what all of us need more than someone to make us look our best--a reputation makeover--is someone to help us be our best, to help us boost our characters after we've fallen into evil or when we allow ourselves to be lured by it.

So, out of curiosity, I did a Google search. I looked for a Character.com and found that such an outfit actually exists! It sells kids' clothes that have the logos and images of fictional characters like boy bands, wrestlers, and movie and comic book heroes. Nothing wrong with that, of course, but I had something different in mind.

Fact is, I already know a character-builder. (You knew I'd get to that, didn't you?) His Name is Jesus and He has shown a facility for rebuilding the characters of the most unsavory characters you can imagine.

For example: A man named Saul, a persecutor of Christians who approved and facilitated their punishment and murder, became Paul, a name meaning small or humble in Latin. The change in name wasn't about image. (In fact, in an era that valued arrogance, Saul/Paul's name change was bound to cause most people to look down on him, not look up to him.) The name chance was about a change God was making on him from the inside out. From being a guy who was certain of his own righteousness, he became a guy certain of his own faults and sins, but more certain still that the God he came to know in Jesus had died to atone for Paul's faults and rose to give Paul an eternity with God he didn't deserve. By His forgiving love, Jesus transformed Saul/Paul's character.

A woman who slept around and was shunned by others met Jesus and became an evangelist, spreading the news of the forgiveness and new life He brings to those who repent and believe in Him. By His forgiving love, Jesus transformed the woman's character and her daily life.

A thief on a cross saw Jesus being crucified next to Him, understood Jesus was faultless, and asked, in repentance and faith, that Jesus would remember Him in His kingdom. Jesus told the thief that that day, when he died, he would be with Jesus in paradise. Jesus used that man's repentance and belief to change his character, even if the man's reputation as a ne'er do well remained intact for the crowds watching his execution.

In the Old Testament, we're told about how God sent the prophet and priest Samuel to anoint a new king for Israel. God had revealed to Samuel that the new king would come from the family of a man named Jesse. When Samuel caught sight of Eliab, one of Jesse's older sons, Samuel thought to himself, "This must be the guy!" Eliab looked like a king.

But Samuel sensed God telling him, "Do not look on his appearance or on the height of his stature, because I have rejected him; for the LORD does not see as mortals see; they look on the outward appearance, but the LORD looks on the heart." (1 Samuel 16:7)

Reputation--how others see us--can be built up, torn down, and even built back up again by us, by other human beings.

But character--who we are on the inside--is something altogether different. We can tear it down ourselves readily: by our thoughts, words, and actions, by the company we keep, by the thoughts we allow to govern us, by the gods and godlets we choose to give dominion over our lives. But only God can build up our characters. Only God can help us be our better selves. God gave Jesus Christ as "the way, and the truth, and the life," to amend, rebuild, and make new our characters. "If anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation," Paul writes in 2 Corinthians 5:17.

Let the God we meet in Jesus Christ go to work on your character. No one else may notice it. But as you follow Christ, you'll be set free from the opinions of others, from the norms of society.

A good reputation is a good thing. Proverbs 22:1 in the Old Testament says: "A good name is to be chosen rather than great riches, and favor is better than silver or gold." But reputation purchased at the expense of our character is worthless, even if it lines our wallets with cash. Jesus asks, "For what will it profit them to gain the whole world and forfeit their life?" (Mark 8:36).

In the end, there's a bigger, eternal payout for focusing on character--daily submission to the forgiving God we see in Jesus--than there is for looking good to a world that is lost and rudderless anyway.

Jesus is the only real character.com.