Jennie and I are pursuing a series on self-knowledge in the context of godliness and ministry, and we have been looking at personality tests as a kind of ‘idiot’s guide’ example—a way to begin cultivating the kinds of non-biblical (but not anti-biblical) knowledge and thinking that will promote a good understanding of ourselves. Last time around, Jennie looked at some of the strengths of such tests—the kind of issues they can flag for us, and hence the kind of resources they can offer.
However, it is one of the perennial features of sinners like us that there is no gift that God gives, however powerfully good or however prosaic, that we cannot pervert and turn into fuel for further sin. And personality theories, like more serious psychology in general, often generate certain characteristic abuses of what is offered. These are the weaknesses of personality theories, and without a serious engagement with the problems inherent to personality theory, one cannot use the tool properly; one has to understand the limitations and problems, as well as what it can do, to have any chance of using it in the service of the glory of God.
So over my next couple of posts, here are a bunch of weaknesses to do with personality theories—again, not an exhaustive list, but a list designed to prompt the kind of thinking that makes us self-aware about the limitations to the self-awareness that such tests can offer.
These are going to err on the long side (not that anyone who reads my posts will be surprised by that by now). Pointing out a positive can be done fairly quickly, and needs little extra work to make that insight constructive. But criticism is not inherently constructive. Once the problem is pointed out, the critic then needs to offer some pointers of what to do with the criticism, unless they just enjoy smashing things. (Which, having a small boy, I can begin to appreciate. There is something fun about smashing apart—something that daddy took time and effort to put together.)
So here are some thoughts of dangers these tools can have, as well as thoughts about how to use even those weaknesses to promote godliness and wise living.
1. ‘I’m like this. Deal with it.’
Even without personality tests, we do this. But having a neat little printout of our strengths and weaknesses means that we face an added temptation to make other people bear the burden of our sin under the handy guise of our personality, rather than repenting. Personality tests, with their inherently secular and non-moralistic orientation, tend to discuss strengths and weaknesses in a non-moral way.
Are you somewhat inflexible, and find change stressful? Do you find organizing yourself, being tidy, and using time well a struggle? Do you avoid conflict? Do you see people as primarily resources to be used to accomplish great things? None of these are moral issues that you need to work on for your sake and the sake of others; they are all just part of what it means to have your personality ‘type’, and are as intrinsic to you as your hair colour and accent.
What should be a flag to identify for us the intransigent aspects of ourselves that we are going to have to keep working on throughout our lives, can easily become a justification to merely ‘accept’ this as a natural part of us, and to require others to put up with it as the price of having a relationship with us.
Personality theories identify sets of traits, and groups them together. But the Christian still needs to do the hard work of prayerfully working out what godliness looks like for a ‘type A’ alpha male or for an ESFJ. Just because it is a tendency that people with your personality have does not mean that it should not be something to be constantly repenting from.
2. ‘That’s just their personality’
This is fairly obviously a brother or sister to the first weakness, and is equally inexcusable. Just because something is ‘natural’ to someone does not mean that it is good or even neutral. All of us find there are things that we are tempted to that are wrong, but that seem to just be desires that come ‘naturally’ to us; we never sought those desires out. The fact that they are ‘natural’ and even that they often come as part of a package that contains other good and neutral features does not mean that they okay.
Deciding wrongly that something is just somebody’s personality and so is not a moral issue is a failure to love the person. In itself, it is wrong because it dehumanizes them. Human beings are unique in that we are moral creatures to whom God addresses his commands, instructions, exhortations and rebukes, and over whom God passes judgement. That moral dimension is part of what it means to be human. Even as sinners who face God’s condemnation, there is still something good about being a moral agent that is lost when we treat someone as primarily a victim of their personality (or culture, or generation or family background). The degree to which we treat someone as not a moral agent (relating to them as though they are just helplessly expressing a fixed personality) is the degree to which we treat them as something other than a genuinely human being. To be human is to make moral choices and to be held accountable for those choices. It’s not all there is to being human, but it’s pretty important, and saying “They’re just being a Myers-Briggs Perceiver” is to deny something good about what God has made.
While disastrous in itself, this leads to a further unloving act: we disengage because the person is too hard. Sometimes this means we draw back completely from any kind of significant relationship, keeping them at arms-length and using the rules of courtesy and polite conversation to prevent any kind of significant relationship developing. But even when we continue or pursue friendship, we pursue friendship by ignoring the moral significance of “That’s just who they are”. And so we don’t call them to account for their sin because we know it is part of their wiring and so on. But we always owe a debt of love—especially to those close to us. We always have to keep trying. We always have to work in their best interests even when another person bewilders us.
In this, Proverbs 13:24 (“Whoever spares the rod hates his son, but he who loves him is diligent to discipline him.”) and Proverbs 27:6 (“Faithful are the wounds of a friend; profuse are the kisses of an enemy.”) highlight the positive and negative of this critical aspect of love in family and friendship. Because we are moral agents, and because we are sinners, love often requires us to stand against those who are close to us for their own sake. To neglect to do this is to not love them—however much it may preserve peace in the relationship.
To justify sin (ours or another’s) as personality (or race, generation, class) is to step back from love. Personality theory may indicate some of the kinds of sins a person might struggle with. But with such an insight comes the perennial problem: thinking that because something is ‘natural’ for someone, it is ‘just them’ or ‘just me’, and of no moral consequence.
All this means that personality theories need to be subjected to the concerns of morality, because this is part of what it means to use them in the service of love.
Hi Mark, Still loving this thread, and one of the Sola Panel’s I ALWAYS read (what does that say about my personality lol).
I do keep trying to work on things in my personality that may be sinful, but it’s hard. Often the rebukes have been intensely wounding and incredibly painful.
Any ideas of ways to gently “calling account for sin” in others?
I was going to respond to your thread but I couldn’t russle up the animosity – think I might be sanguine. Or is it because I am phlegmatic. (Terrible stuff phlegm – cough, cough)
Dear Georgina,
I have, over the last couple of days, been mulling over your request for some ideas on how to gently “calling account for sin” in others. I am very bad at giving generic ideas – I work by developing a large group of key ideas and thoughts that govern how I deal with an issue, and then work out the concrete and particular ‘hows’ on a case by case basis. I tend to reinvent the wheel regularly for new situations.
I think what I probably need to do is write up what I think is involved in challenging someone and submit it to Sola Panel as a blog (or two-part blog). A kind of worked example of some of what this series looks like in one area. I’ll try and do that this week or next before returning to the next entries in the ‘main series’.
In the meantime, here are a few concrete ideas that I think are useful most of the time.
1. Make sure the person has a reason to trust what you are saying. Calling on someone to change, especially by confronting their conscience is a Big Deal to that person. They will generally be open to what you are saying to the degree that they have confidence in you. Either you have to give good arguments, have respect as an authority in the field (e.g. be on staff at the church), be the kind of person that people trust because you’re seen as genuine and good natured, or the like.
The trick here is not to tell them why they should listen to you. You can’t summon respect. You need to earn it. You don’t need to earn huge amounts – just enough to warrant listening to the point you want to make. So don’t hold back ‘because you don’t have the right’: genuine concern expressed with just basic sensitivity is usually more than enough.
2. Most Christians challenge others ‘cheaply’. It doesn’t cost the person making the challenge much. It puts the onus on the person being challenged to hear it well – little effort is taken to make sure it is said in a way that makes it easy to hear it well. The challenge comes down from lofty heights.
To the degree that you are asking them to do something hard and personally confronting, it should take the same cost from you. Otherwise you aren’t bearing one another’s burdens – you are just handing an extra one to someone without really doing anything costly to yourself to help lift it. Calling someone to repent is very serious – and that should make demands of you in the way you go about it. Make it your aim to make it hard for you so as to make it easier for them.
3. Listen well. Work hard at listening. It goes to point 1 – if you have nothing else going for you, people will tend trust someone who they feels have ‘heard’ and ‘gotten’ them.
It also makes it far more likely that you will saying something genuinely useful, genuinely confronting and in a genuinely gentle way. A person who makes a serious effort to listen is someone less likely to misunderstand the situation, why it has arisen, and what needs to be done to change it. Bad listeners are generally bad pastors.
The more emotions are likely to be engaged beyond the point where they are helpful (the heat overshadowing the light) they need to be dampened down so as to allow meaningful discussion to take place. You working hard at listening does that, because it offers no ‘hard surface’ for the emotions to build up on and be reinforced through feedback. Someone has to work hard to get more and more angry with someone who is genuinely listening to them.
4. Have a sense of what repentance is going to look like, but prepared to adjust it in light of what the conversation reveals.
Is this something where there has to be a big ‘all or nothing’ change right now (“I really think you shouldn’t be planning to murder the church organist”), or is it something that is going to happen in small steps (“why don’t you aim to only insult five people each day, rather than everyone you meet”).
Does the person need an action plan on how to change? Do they need to be reminded of how the behaviour is either incompatible with our salvation in Christ, or how our salvation in Christ makes it possible to change that thing?
What does repentance look like for this person? Greed will be different for the student, the businessman/businesswoman, the blue collar worker, the stay at home housewife. Repentance will look different as well.
5. The best context for positive change is one where unconditional acceptance is partnered with very high demands. So the grace that teaches us to say no to ungodliness needs to be both the content of challenge, and the substance of our manner in making the challenge. The person should feel simultaneously safe and being called on to do something hard.
I think those five are right up there on my list of ‘practical how tos’ in calling someone to change.
Is that what you were looking for? To get more specific still, I think I might need some scenarios to respond to.
Hi Mark, that’s very helpful. Sorry – I read it earlier in the week but didn’t respond. Don’t want to get specific at this stage. I especially like your point about making sure the person has a reason to trust you.
Hi Georgina,
That’s fine – my internet involvement is sufficiently erratic due to what’s going on in the real world, that I’m not going to complain about tardiness in someone else.
Glad you found it helpful, will be praying for your conversation.
I think, unless you have strong feelings otherwise, I might not go ahead with the post on how to challenge someone at this stage. I think I’d rather finish this series properly first, and maybe do something like that on it’s own, or in connection to a broader range of ideas than just this series.