When character is tested: what trials reveal

We have already considered the different situations in which character is tested: when we are wronged, corrected, tempted, ignored or entrusted with power. This chapter brings those tests together. Trials do not create character out of nothing. They reveal what has been developing within us and give us opportunities, by God’s grace, to choose a different way.

A character that has never been tested is largely theoretical. We may believe ourselves to be patient until someone makes us wait. We may believe ourselves to be forgiving until someone deeply wounds us. We may believe ourselves to be humble until someone criticises us. We may believe ourselves to be generous until generosity costs us something. We may believe ourselves to be faithful until faithfulness becomes inconvenient. Testing reveals what has been developing beneath the surface. James says:

My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience.

Trials can therefore become part of God’s classroom. Paul draws a line that uses the very word of this book:

And not only that, but we also glory in tribulations, knowing that tribulation produces perseverance; and perseverance, character; and character, hope.

Tribulation, perseverance, character, hope. The word translated “character” here describes tested, approved quality. It is the character that has come through the fire.

The fire reveals the gold

Gold is tested by fire. The fire does not create the gold. It reveals and purifies it. Peter uses the image of the genuineness of faith, “much more precious than gold that perishes, though it is tested by fire” (1 Peter 1:7). Trials can work similarly in the Christian life. A difficult season may reveal impatience. A financial crisis may reveal fear. A conflict may reveal pride. An insult may reveal anger. A disappointment may reveal our dependence upon human approval. A temptation may reveal an area we have not surrendered. These discoveries can be painful. But they can also become opportunities for growth. Job, in the middle of his suffering and without any answer, said:

But He knows the way that I take; When He has tested me, I shall come forth as gold.

Do not waste the test

When something difficult happens, our first question is often, “Why is this happening to me?” Sometimes a better question is, “Lord, what are You trying to teach me through this?” Perhaps the situation is not God’s punishment. Perhaps it is simply the consequence of living in a fallen world. Perhaps someone else’s choices have created the problem. But even then, God can work in us through the experience. Paul wrote:

And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose.

Notice that Paul does not say all things are good. Some things are terrible. Some things are painful. Some things are unjust. But God can work through them.

Paul himself prayed three times that a “thorn in the flesh” would be removed. God did not remove it. He answered:

My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness.

Paul did not conclude that God had ignored him. He concluded that the power of Christ could rest on him in his weakness. Some trials are not removed. They become the place where grace is learned.

The character we build in the valley

It is easy to praise God on the mountaintop. Character is often built in the valley. When prayers seem unanswered. When people disappoint us. When the future is uncertain. When our plans collapse. When we are misunderstood. When obedience costs us. Those are the moments when faith becomes more than words. We discover whether we trust God only when life makes sense, or whether we trust Him because He is God. That kind of trust is part of righteous character.

Christ’s character under pressure

The clearest picture of tested character is not found in our own experience. It is found in Jesus. Christ lived in a world filled with injustice, violence, misunderstanding and rejection. Yet He did not allow the turbulence around Him to take possession of His heart. He could be deeply moved by human suffering without becoming controlled by anger or revenge. Calmness did not mean indifference. “But when He saw the multitudes, He was moved with compassion for them, because they were weary and scattered, like sheep having no shepherd” (Matthew 9:36). His heart remained tender while His character remained steady.

This gives us an important distinction. Meekness is not weakness. Self-control is not emotional numbness. Patience does not mean that injustice does not matter. Christlike character means that our emotions are brought under the government of God rather than allowed to become the masters of our choices. When we are provoked, we may feel anger. When we are hurt, we may feel grief. When we are treated unfairly, we may feel the desire to defend ourselves. Those feelings are real. But they do not have to determine our response. Through grace, we can bring what we feel to Christ and choose what is right.

Temptation and an involuntary thought or feeling are not, by themselves, the same as choosing sin. Hebrews 4:15 presents Jesus as truly tempted yet without sin, and James 1:14-15 describes how temptation can lead to sin. Fear, grief, intrusive thoughts, disability and trauma responses should not automatically be treated as moral failures. We can bring them to God, seek compassionate support, and ask for strength to respond faithfully according to the light and ability we have.

Jesus showed us this most clearly in Gethsemane:

Father, if it is Your will, take this cup away from Me; nevertheless not My will, but Yours, be done.

Tested character is not the absence of strong emotion. It is the surrender of the will to God in the presence of strong emotion.

The gospel is more than a list of don’ts

There is another danger in a study of character. We can become so focused on what we must stop doing that Christianity begins to sound like a list of prohibitions. The gospel is more positive and more powerful than that. Christ does not merely tell us what not to become. He gives us His Spirit and begins to form something new within us. The Christian question is therefore not merely, “What must I stop doing?” It is also, “What is Christ seeking to grow in me?” Instead of hatred, love. Instead of bitterness, forgiveness. Instead of pride, humility. Instead of dishonesty, truth. Instead of selfishness, service. Instead of uncontrolled desire, self-control. This is the positive work of sanctification. We are not trying to manufacture Christlike character by ourselves. We are surrendering to the One who can produce in us what we cannot produce by our own strength.

A life-saving test of character

Sometimes the meaning of character becomes clearest when we see what it costs. The Bible gives us people who faced that cost. When Pharaoh commanded the Hebrew midwives, Shiphrah and Puah, to kill every Hebrew baby boy at birth, the Bible says:

But the midwives feared God, and did not do as the king of Egypt commanded them, but saved the male children alive.

They had no army and no authority. They had a conscience formed by the fear of God, and they used it at the cost of risking the displeasure of the most powerful man in the world. When Jezebel was killing the prophets of the Lord, Obadiah, who managed Ahab’s household, quietly “had taken one hundred prophets and hidden them, fifty to a cave, and had fed them with bread and water” (1 Kings 18:4). These were ordinary people who did what was right when it was dangerous.

One of the most remarkable examples from modern history is the story of Chiune Sugihara, a Japanese diplomat whose decision to act according to conscience helped thousands of Jewish refugees escape the Nazi threat during the Second World War.

United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.

In 1940, Sugihara was serving as Japan’s consul in Kaunas (then Kovno), Lithuania. Jewish refugees, many of them having fled German-occupied Poland, gathered outside the Japanese consulate, desperate for a way out. A route through the Soviet Union and Japan offered one of the few remaining possibilities of escape. Sugihara asked his government for guidance, and Yad Vashem records that when he was instructed to limit the visas, he ignored those instructions and issued transit visas to the refugees who came.

This was not a theoretical test of character. There were real people standing in front of him. There were families. There were frightened children. And there was a cost attached to doing what he believed was right. According to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, in the weeks of July and August 1940, before the Soviet authorities closed the consulate, he issued more than 2,000 Japanese transit visas, including visas that covered family members and children. The exact number is debated: Yad Vashem says that in the short time before the consulate was closed he provided between 2,100 and 3,500 transit visas, which is why different books give different figures. Those visas enabled refugees to travel through the Soviet Union and Japan to places of safety.

Sugihara chose compassion, courage and integrity. He did not know the full outcome of every visa he issued. He could not see the future lives that would grow from those decisions. He simply faced the person in front of him and chose to help. Yad Vashem later recognised him as one of the “Righteous Among the Nations”, an honour given to non-Jews who risked their lives to save Jews during the Holocaust. Two dates are commonly given for this honour, and both are correct in their own way. Yad Vashem’s own record states that it recognised him on 4 October 1984. Many publications give 1985, because the honour was presented at a ceremony in Jerusalem in 1985, which his wife and youngest son attended because Sugihara was too ill to travel. He died in July 1986.

The personal cost was real. After the war, Sugihara left the Foreign Ministry and supported his family by working for an export company. Yet he did not regard his decision as a mistake. Yad Vashem records that he told his wife that he might have to disobey the government, but that if he did not act, he would be disobeying God.

Whether or not we share every aspect of Sugihara’s faith or understanding of God, the moral lesson is striking: character is revealed when doing what is right carries a price. In moments of crisis, character can determine what we do with power, what we do when nobody is watching, what we do when obedience is costly, and what we do when another person’s welfare is placed in our hands. One visa may appear to be only a piece of paper. One signature may appear insignificant. Yet behind every document stood a human life, a family and a future.

And this brings the lesson much closer to home. Most of us will never stand behind a diplomatic desk with thousands of desperate refugees outside our door. Our tests will usually be much smaller: whether we tell the truth when a lie would benefit us; whether we return something that does not belong to us; whether we forgive when we have been hurt; whether we admit that we were wrong; whether we remain faithful when nobody applauds; whether we obey God when obedience costs us something. Those moments may look ordinary, but they are not insignificant. They are the places where character is revealed and formed. We cannot know how far the consequences of a kind word, an honest decision, a faithful act or a refusal to participate in wrongdoing may reach.

If human character can become the means by which lives are protected in a temporal crisis, how much more seriously should we consider the character Christ is forming in us for eternity? The point is not that our character saves us. It does not. Salvation is found in Christ alone. But the character Christ forms in a surrendered life affects how that life treats others, responds to trials, handles responsibility and represents the character of its Saviour. Sugihara’s story therefore belongs in this study not because he earned salvation by his actions, but because it illustrates a principle Scripture repeatedly teaches: character matters most when it is tested.

Historical sources: United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, “Chiune (Sempo) Sugihara” and “Polish Jewish Refugees in Lithuania: Unexpected Rescue, 1940–1941”; Yad Vashem, “Chiune Sempo Sugihara, the Righteous Among the Nations” (yadvashem.org, Righteous Among the Nations stories).

The preparation is happening now

We have travelled a long way from our opening question. What will you take to heaven? We now understand that the answer is not a suitcase filled with possessions. It is not our bank balance. It is not our reputation. It is not our earthly accomplishments. What matters is what Christ has been forming in us. And that work is happening now. Not someday. Not after death. Not when Christ returns. Now. Every day provides another opportunity to surrender. Every trial provides another opportunity to trust. Every temptation provides another opportunity to choose Christ. Every failure provides another opportunity to repent. Every relationship provides another opportunity to love. Every correction provides another opportunity to become humble. Every act of service provides another opportunity to become less self-centred. This is preparation for eternity. Every day matters. Every choice matters. Every surrender matters. Because character is being formed.

A sobering thought

One day, the opportunity to develop character will end. There will come a time when the opportunity to respond to God’s invitation will end. There will come a time when Christ returns. There will come a time when the journey ends. And at that moment, we will not suddenly have time to become what we refused to become throughout our lives. The direction of our lives matters. The choices we repeatedly make matter. The relationship we cultivate with Christ matters. Therefore Scripture says:

Today, if you will hear His voice, Do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion.

Today. Not tomorrow. Not someday. Today. Because character is not something we can pack at the last minute. It is something God is forming in us now.