What kind of temperament does God use?

by Dan Phillips

Ah, the joy of being someone else. Don't we all see traits in others that we wish we could make our own? (Watch out for the ones who answer "No.")

I'm inclined to constant self-doubt, second-guessing... and third, and twelfth, and forty-second; to protracted inner debates; and to endless introspection. (Every post of mine that you read, as a rule, has gone through a dozen or two re-writes, and I am still re-working my sermons the morning I am to preach them, no matter how long I've been laboring over them, or how many times I may have preached them before.) Vulnerability to melancholy and bitter regret is a constant battle. I hope that those for whom I'm answerable profit from my thorough worrying and quadruple-checking, but it's a wearisome way to be.

I envy men I've known -- and there have been, and are, quite a few -- who never seem to doubt or second-guess themselves. Ever. They always have The Answer, and they have it instantly. Further, they have absolute confidence in everything they say. It doesn't matter what the topic; they make a pronouncement, and that's it. In the Bible, not in the Bible, no matter. They just know. Every notion is Canon. They're seldom wrong, or if they are, they're seldom much troubled about it. I imagine such men sleep very well, never agonizing in the dark hours of the night over this or that decision, past or anticipated.

I recall a pastor I knew. He felt he actually heard God speaking to him. He was able, without blinking, to tell folks in and out of his church exactly what to do with their lives. If they didn't follow his counsel, he was ready to see them punished. Last I knew, it worked out really well for him: nice family, nice ministry, everything going just great. Maybe not so great for some of those left in his wake.

Is that the way to be? What kind of temperament do you have to have, to be pleasing and useful to God?

If I were to ask you to name a great, effective, model leader, I bet I'd hear "Nehemiah" before long. Beyond question, he would be a great choice. Chuck Swindoll isn't the only one to do worthwhile studies of the good governor's abilities. He was one of those sorts who I wish I resembled more closely. Passionate, decisive, proactive; knew the Word and his own mind; had a sense of himself and his mission. And when he found out that the folks he led had sinned, no miserable, corrosive, self-digesting introspection for Nehemiah. No, he exploded, berated them severely, and even pulled out their hair (Nehemiah 13:25)!

Don't try this at home, by the bye.

Surely Nehemiah should be our model, right?

Ah, but if so, what of Ezra? Ezra was also principled and proactive, but he was of a very different temperament. He, too, faced terrible failure on his people's part. But where Nehemiah exploded, Ezra imploded, and pulled out his own hair (Ezra 9:3).

Which one had the right temperament? Which one was used by God?

Consider the prophets. What kind of man did you have to be to be an effective prophet? Surely Ezekiel is our model here. I think of him as the Clint Eastwood of the prophets: stoic, dogged, imperturbable. God tells him to cook his food over cow dung, and he says in effect, "Okay -- oh, wait: won't that defile me?" God says he can use cow dung instead, and Ezekiel shrugs. "Mm-kay," he says, and soldiers on (Ezekiel 4:12-15). God tells him not to mourn his wife's sudden death. "Mm-kay," Ezekiel says, and soldiers on (24:15-18).

Surely Ezekiel should be our model.

Ah, but if so, what of Jeremiah, "the weeping prophet"? His style is beautiful, and it is emotional and passionate. He is a man of intensive and vivid feelings, and his emotions are out there for all to see and hear.

The prophet makes the most astonishing complaint in Jeremiah 20:7-10. It almost sounds blasphemous. He cries out to God that God had overpowered him, that He had given Jeremiah a message that was overwhelmingly negative and offensive, and that it brought him nothing but heartache. What's worse, Jeremiah can't even bear to stop, for if he forbears, the Word is as fire in his bones, and cannot be held in.

So which kind of prophetic temperament was pleasing to God -- Ezekiel's, or Jeremiah's? It is, or should be, a silly question. Time would fail me in laying out other Biblical temperament contrasts, playing Peter against Thomas, Paul against Barnabas, or Timothy against John Mark.

We can turn from the Bible to the pages of church history. Who served God more effectively, fruitfully, enduringly? Charles Haddon Spurgeon, or Jonathan Edwards?

I have tried and tried to connect with Edwards, and I just can't seem to do it. I've read Edwards himself; I've read Murray on Edwards; I've listened to Murray, to Packer, to Piper and others on Edwards. Piper! -- you can't pick up a book of his without his going on about how marvelous Edwards is. And I'm sure to people better than I, Edwards is Da Bomb.

To me Edwards is correct and he's pithy, but he's distant, he's bloodless, he's passionless, he's made of alabaster. Over and over, I read about how great he is, then I go back to the man himself with renewed determination to connect -- and it just does not happen.

Ah, but Spurgeon! His writings and his preachings live and breathe. He was a man who suffered greatly, felt deeply, lived and loved the Lord largely and with a robust spirit. Whereas Edwards labors to phrase his thoughts precisely to his own satisfaction, Spurgeon labors to communicate his thoughts to living persons, men of flesh and blood. I feel that I know him. A sentence of Spurgeon's connects with me more profoundly than every word I've ever read from Edwards.

But which one was a profitable servant? Whose temperament was more useful to God -- the robust, hearty Englishman, or the austere, pallid New Englander?

Surely these are all silly questions. God made the daisy as surely as He made the Indian Paintbrush, the grain of sand as surely as the diamond, the chip of ice as surely as the blazing furnace of our sun.

And so He made men and women with different grids, different default settings, different temperaments. Edwards was used mightily of God, and though he doesn't connect with me, he surely connected with John Piper, and John Piper has been used by God in my life. But Spurgeon speaks directly to me; and, hard as it is to believe, there are actually good folks who just don't connect with him. Yet somehow they get something out of what I write and preach.

It does not matter what kind of heart we have -- bold or timid, extroverted or introverted, naturally happy or naturally somber. Each mindset, each temperamental cast, has its strengths and its weaknesses. The always-positive, always-certain man may get a lot done -- but he needs to learn to judge himself, to suspect his own heart (Jeremiah 17:9), to distinguish his plans from God's, and his ideas from Scripture. He needs to humble himself before God and others.

Equally, the more melancholy sort needs to learn to grasp God's wondrous promises, to preach the truth to himself (Psalms 42-43), to point himself to God's person and word, to be of good courage, and to get going in His service (Joshua 1:6-9).

None of us should subscribe to a cookie-cutter mold of personality development, or of leadership style. It does not matter so much what kind of hearts we have. What matters is what we do with our hearts.

What matters is that our heart be wholly God's (Deuteronomy 6:5f.; 2 Chronicles 16:9; Psalm 86:11; 1 Peter 3:15).

Then the cut of the instrument will matter far less than the skill of the Musician.

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