You don’t have to take a survey to find out that most people in our society have no earthly idea what character —true character—is. Just take a good look around and you’ll see the symptoms of a character-less society.

That’s why people today walk around wondering, Why do bad things happen to good people? Well, bad things happen to good people and bad people alike. Bad things are in the earth.

What makes the difference in this whole picture, however, is character.

Character by description, not definition, is doing what is right, doing it because it’s right and then doing it right.

Character does what is right when there is no one around to see you do it. – Kenneth Copeland

Character is developed by doing what is right, even when you don’t feel like it. It is developed in you when you do what’s right, and you do it for only one reason —because it’s right. You don’t do it because you will receive a reward, or because someone will see you doing it.

Character does what is right when there is no one around to see you do it.

For instance, let’s say you’re in a public restroom—maybe at church, at a restaurant or at work—and after you wash your hands, you take the paper towel you used to dry your hands and throw it in the trash can…but you miss and it lands on the floor.

Do you stop and take the time to pick up the paper towel and drop it in the trash can?

Or, do you just keep on heading out the door, leaving the paper towel on the floor for someone else to pick up thinking: Well, I was in a hurry…. Besides, they pay people to clean up the bathrooms.

Never mind the fact that you heard that “still, small voice” in your spirit say, Go back and pick it up—and wipe off the sink where you splashed water all over, while you’re at it.

Ephesians 3:16 tells us that we can be strengthened with might by God’s Spirit in our inner man. In other words, we can build character inside our spirit with the strength and might of the Spirit of God.

We see in 2 Corinthians 10:4 that “the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds.”

The Greek word translated as mighty here, means “capable of accomplishing anything, whether possible or impossible.”

There is enough power inside each one of us to put the devil in his place. There is enough power in our spirit man to believe whatever God has promised us. There is power in us to enhance our lives to the point that we should never go around bawling and squalling when something in life goes bad.

That’s character. That’s strength of character.

Don’t Cross the Line
The connection between your character and God’s divine protection in your life may seem like a far stretch. But let’s go back to 2 Corinthians 10 and uncover this important link.

Remember, Paul said, “For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war after the flesh: (For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds;) Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ” (verses 3-5).

Going back to our illustration, picking a paper towel off the floor is not a hard thing to do. It’s just not that physically taxing for most of us.

The hard part is the thought of it.

“I’m in a hurry…let someone else do it…I don’t want to do that… I’m too important to be cleaning up a bathroom….”

And every time we choose to do the right thing and do it right because it’s right, our character is strengthened. – Kenneth Copeland

Those are all imaginations—high things—trying to exalt themselves against the knowledge of God. Those thoughts are in disobedience to Christ.

We have enough sense in God to know what we should do—what the “right thing” is.

Yet, it all comes down to a decision. A choice. And every time we choose to do the right thing and do it right because it’s right, a spiritual process begins deep inside our spirits. Our character is strengthened.

It’s no different than our physical digestive system kicking into action the moment we decide to eat something. The whole digestive process begins even before we open our mouths to take a bite of food—at the smell of food our mouths start salivating, digestive enzymes and chemicals start flowing, and so forth.

Every choice of obedience to that still, small voice inside us strengthens our character in our inner man.

So, where does the protection come in?

The Lord once asked me, Didn’t you promise to obey the laws of the land when you got that driver’s license you have?

“Yes,” I replied, “I signed that little paper.”

Then He told me, I can take care of you when you are driving 150 mph, just as I can when you’re going 65. But the moment you went over the speed limit, you stepped over into a lie.

What was He saying to me?

Character.

Character was the issue.

I had committed to “obeying the voice of the law.” But when I made the decision to disobey that law by breaking the speed limit, I stepped outside the bounds of protection under that law.

It didn’t matter how good a driver I was. It didn’t matter how experienced I was, or how long I had been driving or who I was.

What mattered was doing what was right…doing it right…and doing it because it was right—whether or not there was a police officer around to stop me and give me a ticket.

Don’t cross the line of character. It’s there to protect you.

“Your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour” (1 Peter 5:8).

Strengthen your character to where you can hear God when He speaks to you. Don’t let it get all muddled up with a bunch of flesh—”I don’t want to do this…I don’t want to do that.”

Character is the issue. It’s the difference between life and death.

Excerpt permission granted by
Eagle Mountain International Church, Inc.
aka:  Kenneth Copeland Ministries