Mark Rutland - Character Matters: Nine Essential Traits You Need to Succeed

CHARACTER
MATTERS

NINE ESSENTIAL TRAITS
YOU NEED to SUCCEED

MARK RUTLAND

CHARACTER MATTERS by Mark Rutland
Published by Charisma House
A Strang Company
600 Rinehart Road
Lake Mary, Florida 32746
www.charismahouse.com

This book or parts thereof may not be reproduced in any form, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form by any means electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording or otherwisewithout prior written permission of the publisher, except as provided by United States of America copyright law.

Unless otherwise noted, all Scripture quotations are from the King James Version of the Bible.

Scripture quotations marked ASV are from the American Standard Version of the Bible. Public domain.

Scripture quotations marked NIV are from the Holy Bible, New International Version. Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984, International Bible Society. Used by permission.

Cover design by The Office of Bill Chiaravalle | www.officeofbc.com
Cover photo by Photodisc

Copyright 2003 by Mark Rutland
All rights reserved

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Rutland, Mark.
Character matters / Mark Rutland.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references.
ISBN 1-59185-232-3 (Hardback)
1. Character. 2. Conduct of life. 3. Christian life. I. Title.
BJ1531.R88 2003
179'.9--dc21

2003014550

ISBN-13: 978-1-59185-232-2

08 09 10 11 8 7 6 5 4 3
Printed in the United States of America

Dedicated
to
the students and alumni
of
Southeastern University
Lakeland, Florida

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Behind every successful man there is a surprised mother-in-law. Likewise, behind every published book there are a multiplicity of eyes and hands and minds, other than the authors, whose contributions were indispensable. Though my name alone appears on the jacket, and, indeed, I wrote every word of it, I feel it is only fitting that they who assisted should have to share the blame.

My wife, my Alison, who patiently lets me read to her what I write, whose editorial suggestions are invaluable, must be thanked first. I am as sane as I am, or perhaps I should say, I am no more insane than I am, because her beauty, balance and brains keep me from drifting out to sea. My high school sweetheart, the smartest woman I know, and the love of my life, she is in and behind every word.

Because I remain, in this cyber age, a belligerent Neanderthal, unable to type, let alone use a computer, my undying gratitude belongs to Dr. Gordon Miller and Mrs. Glenna Rakes for their help in editing and preparing the manuscript. I take a salacious delight in watching an empty page fill up with my handwritten words, but their ability to decipher the meaning of that scrawl is nothing short of miraculous.

Barbara Dycus and all her colleagues at Charisma House do not escape responsibility. They also contributed greatly to this effort and did so deliberately with grace and good humor. So that Barbara cannot later deny involvement, her name is also recorded here with my thanks.

CONTENTS

CHARACTER:
THE ENGRAVERS ART

A mans character is his fate.

HERACLITUS

T HE ENGLISH WORD CHARACTER IS from a Latin root that means engraved. A life, like a block of granite carved upon with care or hacked at with reckless disregard, will, at the end, be either a masterpiece or marred rubble. Character, the composite of virtues and values etched in that living stone, will define its true worth. No cosmetic enhancement, no decorative drapery can make useless stone into enduring art. Only character can do that.

A nation having squandered its character may well have so damaged itself that attempts at reclamation prove futile. Long before that final collapse, however, redoubts can be built and buttressed against the invading armies of the night. Virtues can be revisited, rethought and retaught. From a nations pulpits and podia, in its businesses and on its forts, a corporate voice calling for character may turn the tide.

Children can be taught courage. Executives, suckled on the milk of Gordon Geckos greed, can be reminded of honesty and frugality. Modesty can be learned, valued and lived where a nation will find its voice and teach it once again. For now we are reaping the bitter harvest of character destruction, but it is not too late.

Character embraced, even popularized and freshly articulated in our literature and movies, will produce leaders upon whose lives words like honesty, gratitude and courage have been engraved with faith and hope. It is not too late for character. We have the right as a free people to expect it, even demand it, in our leaders. We have the responsibility to cultivate it in ourselves, to teach it in our schools and to praise and reward it in others.

What we engrave or allow to be engraved upon us is what we must live with. Talent, attractiveness and intellect, too long overvalued, have proven incapable of re-firing our national hope. The Bill Clintons of this society have chipped away valuable and irreplaceable granite. Now we need more modest athletes, meeker leaders, honest executives and more diligent workers.

A new national character, new only in the narrowest of historical views, can be, and must be, engraved. The granite of us, worn and pocked as it is, can still receive the well-guided stylus. Character matters, and now is the time.

Why Enron? Why the whole Clinton-Lewinsky quagmire? Why any of it?

The problem is, those are actually the wrong questions, both wrong and easy to answer. Scandal, crime and wickedness in high and low places are in the fallenness of us. Sin is. That is the simple and terrifying answer to both the murderous mayhem in our streets and the shocking deceptions in our board rooms.

The real question is, How can character be added back into an American soul adrift on a Sargasso Sea of postmodern relativism? It is not that there have never before been scandals. From the Hamilton-Burr duel to the Teapot Dome to Watergate, the highway of American history is littered with trash. In the past, however, scandal was, at least, well, scandalous. Now little, if anything, is fixed, absolutely wrong or absolutely right. Our ability, as a people, to be scandalized by anything is being frittered away.

Not the movies, not the art or the music or the literature, but the character of a culture is its defining nexus, that which holds it together, the place where all its dots connect and make it what it is. When the character of any culture loses its grip on the essential virtues that hold the whole thing in place, the scandals still happen, but the culture is no longer outraged.

Indeed, in the Clinton-Lewinsky debacle, the background music of the presidents defense was that his ability as a president combined with a good economy made perjury and adultery non-issues. Likewise, when the Enron disaster burst open, we could hardly bring ourselves to even speak of the greed and dissembling. The greater issue was perceived to be the financial loss to employees and investors.

In other words, the inescapable conclusion is that when there is no substantial financial loss, it is not a real scandal. This was even stated by one speaker who said, The real sin is not the presidents sexual habits, but the money Ken Starr spent on the prosecution.