PIVOT to Character Formation

Churches and institutions need assessment tools. Not to measure “success” of numbers — butts in pew, baptisms in the tank, bills in the donations, buildings on the campus — but to measure growth in Christlikeness. Christoformity is hard to measure, but there are some tools that are used to assess character. The exercise of power, as you know, derives from the character of the one using power. So, we designed a tool that we hope can generate conversations in Christian organizations about character. In today’s post I offer to you the Tov Tool. It’s not a social scientific test but a conversation starter that we think will also provoke some realities that deserve attention.

An excerpt from Pivot: The Priorities, Practices, and Powers that can Transform Your Church into a Tov Culture.

VIRTUE, OR CHARACTER, has more lasting influence than giftedness or skill. As Noah Webster, one of America’s founders, said,

“The virtues of men are of more consequence to society than their abilities, and for this reason the heart should be cultivated with more [diligence] than the head.”

Issues of power will always be at the center of a pivot away from toxic to tov. That’s why it’s important to understand that character is what matters most in the use of power, in the transformation of a culture, and in all the practices we discuss in this book. Power tied to lack of character leads to spiritual abuse. Power wedded to godly character produces a Christlike church culture.

Character formation, if implemented in the church, would create a revolution more than a reformation. Revolution is the right word because it would turn the current reality on its head. For too long, churches have measured and valued and glorified who gets stuff done, rather than who exhibits godly character. Especially in the past fifty years, too many churches have hired on the basis of talents and skills and the capacity to “bring it” for weekend services. Churches by and large do not hire on the basis of character. Somehow, we have equated ability with character. But when ability replaces character, we get toxicity in the boardroom and in the pulpit, and those toxicities corrupt the entire culture, whether corporate or church. If you examine the job descriptions used in searches for pastors, associate pastors, and church staff (as we have), you will find (as we did) an absence of expressed interest in character and a profusion of terms connected to skills. Job descriptions, even for senior pastors, have devolved into can-do lists.

[The authors who have written about character formation today] did not win the day, and character formation has yet to become the heart of what most churches do. What Foster, Willard, and others explained so clearly has not become central to ministry job descriptions. The result? We find ourselves right back where we were. We value the highly skilled, the most talented, the most magnetic . . . and what do we get? Talented, magnetic people. As for character, it may come with the package, but it’s not necessarily required or found. We don’t value good character highly enough. Because we’re more interested in great platform speakers, talented musicians, and attractive leaders, we wind up with skillful people who leave behind a wake of broken relationships. They lack significant character, because character often “doesn’t platform well.”

Maybe the platform is the problem?

Churches that want to transform their culture away from platforming to character formation must reshape their priorities toward tov. They must begin to work from new foundations. Culture transformation is possible, but not without transformation of character.

Let’s start with a brief definition:

“Character denotes the particular set of qualities, both natural and acquired, that serves to identify a person or community. These qualities . . . will be manifest as a consistency of action that can be termed ‘integrity.’”

The authors of this definition, Michael Cox and Brad Kallenberg, continue in the same vein:

“Accordingly, in the context of Christian ethics, character names an established disposition (or set of dispositions) with respect to the particular conception of the human good exemplified by Christ. Such character is developed over time and, as such, can be formed either toward or away from virtues, understood as those intellectual and affective habits that enable the pursuit of excellence.”

Our shorthand way of expressing the “good exemplified by Christ” is tov. Christian integrity measures how consistently a person’s words and actions align with his or her character, as compared to the life of Jesus.

Christian character, therefore, looks like this: One’s basic personality, shaped or unshaped over time by virtue or vice, resulting in consistent moral traits exhibited by that person.

We should be asking whether our churches prioritize character formation or place a higher value on performance. Though in practice the answer fluctuates between the two ends of the spectrum, from our many conversations with pastors and congregants over the past three years, we are convinced that retooling most churches to prioritize character formation takes more than a mere shift or change. It requires transformation—a revolution rather than a reformation.

THE BIBLE AND CHARACTER

Jesus taught that a good tree (good character) produces good fruit. Bad character eventually reveals itself as rotten fruit, while good character over time will manifest itself as a sweet, juicy peach. Hear the words of Jesus:

By their fruit you will recognize them. Do people pick grapes from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? Likewise, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, and a bad tree cannot bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Thus, by their fruit you will recognize them. Matthew 7:16-20

Though this isn’t hard to understand, some go too far with it. No human always produces juicy peaches, any more than someone always produces rotten fruit. Even as Christians, we don’t always behave in good ways. Therefore, Jesus, who was always tov, exhorts his followers to examine themselves and others. That is, he wants us to become “fruit inspectors.” Jesus also talked about character formation using the term heart. Again, consider his words:

The words you speak come from the heart—that’s what defiles you. For from the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, all sexual immorality, theft, lying, and slander. Matthew 15:18-19, NLT

Though Jesus didn’t use the word ethos (character), so central to the philosophy of Aristotle, what he teaches is similar: Our behavior expresses our character. That is, within reasonable limits, what we do tells others who we are. In the writings of the apostle Paul, the indwelling of the Holy Spirit becomes the central reality of transformation. For instance, consider Romans 5:5:

“Hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us.”

Further, in Romans 8:9, Paul says,

“You . . . are not in the realm of the flesh but are in the realm of the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God lives in you. And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, they do not belong to Christ.”

And in 1 Corinthians 3:16, Paul indicates that this Spirit-in- us is working not only individually or personally, but in the church corporately:

“Don’t you know that you yourselves are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in your midst?”

Jesus and the apostles all believed in the inner work of transformation, or character formation, which produces good fruit, or what we often today call virtue. Paul captures the essence of this virtue in 2 Corinthians 3:17-18:

Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And we all, who with unveiled faces contemplate the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his image with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.

The ultimate virtue is Christlikeness. The Spirit in us transforms us into the image of Christ.

Cox and Kallenberg offer a practical observation of how this transformation takes place. We urge you to read this slowly:

Discipleship entails the transformation of the self, effected through the repetition of particular practices—for example, the Eucharist, prayer, evangelism, hospitality, care for the poor, confession, forgiveness, worship—which, when properly undertaken, help to fashion the Christian’s character in the likeness of Jesus.

Though we like this statement very much, we want to draw out the phrase “when properly undertaken” (and thus anticipate the “energy source” of transformation we will discuss in part 3).

Even excellent habits and practices won’t transform us into looking like Jesus if we don’t tap into God’s grace and the power of the Spirit. Neither can we ignore the powerful influence of models in our congregations or relationships. Good practices and wonderful models are not enough; we need the grace of God in the power of the Spirit. Character matters more than culture. Character matters more than strategy. It is character that determines the very substance of where we’re headed. As one pastor friend said to us recently, “The question is, ‘Who are we becoming?’” If character matters this much, then we must ask: Where do we begin? How do we kick-start a transformation of church culture with a deeper concentration on character? It takes a lifetime (and beyond) to fully form Christlikeness in us, but we can see progress by looking at four categories of transformation: (1) know yourself; (2) learn the virtues; (3) develop personal character; and (4) cultivate character within a congregation.