Cross Balance

Four Biblical leaders

Tim LaHaye, in his book,
emphasises how the key to becoming more Christ-like
is to allow the Holy Spirit to keep on filling us,
overcoming the weaknesses of our temperaments
and building on the strengths.
He gives examples of each temperament – in his words:  

“The apostle Peter is a good example of a Spirit-filled sanguine.
After the day of Pentecost, Peter used his lips to preach Jesus Christ in power.
There was an apparent consistency  and control in Peter’s life from that point on,
and absolutely no self-seeking tendencies.
He was still a leader,
but his conduct in Acts 4 shows a Spirit-dominated restraint foreign to his nature.
His life was used greatly to glorify Christ because he was spirit-filled.

“The Apostle Paul is probably the best illustration
 of a Spirit-filled choleric to be found in the Bible.
We first see him in Acts 8
‘consenting’ to the murder of the first Christian martyr, Stephen.
In chapter 9 we find him
‘….breathing out threatenings and slaughter against the disciple of the Lord’.
If ever there was a description of a raw choleric, this is it.
Yet Bible students are thrilled to find this man so dynamically transformed
 that the very study of his post-conversion conduct has been used by God
to lead many to acknowledge the supernatural power of Jesus Christ
as the only explanation of his behaviour.

“The Apostle Thomas is a good New Testament example
of what God can do with a Spirit-filled melancholy temperament.
He is known as the doubting disciple because of his famous statement,
‘Except I shall see in his hands the print of the nails,
and put my finger into his side,
I will not believe’
(John 20:25)
That is blatant unbelief induced by Thomas’ doubts.
Blatant because the words were spoken
in spite of  the Lord’s oft-repeated promise to rise again
and the ten disciples’ assurance ‘that we have seen the Lord’….
Humanly such a man was doomed to failure
but such was not the case with Thomas.

After being filled with the Spirit,
Thomas went out to serve the Lord faithfully…
and was led of the Spirit to India where he braved all kinds of dangers
and preached Christ in power (and was eventually martyred).

“A good Bible illustration of the work of the Holy Spirit
in the life of a phlegmatic
is easy-going, good-natured Abraham.
This great patriarch was dominated most of his life by fear.
In fact, twice in his life he was so selfishly fearful
that he denied his wife and tried to palm her off as his sister.
She was such a beautiful woman
that he thought Pharoah and later Abimelech would kill him to marry her.
This cowardly man was later transformed so much by the gift of faith
it was said of him:
‘Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness’.
(Galations 3:6)