As a child, I used to skip church to watch Popeye cartoons.

Go ahead and judge.

In all fairness to my 10-year-old self, it wasn’t just Popeye.  It was the whole Popeye and Friends show, featuring George of the Jungle and Super Chicken.  This was, as far as I know, the only place to see Super Chicken and his sidekick Fred, and they were well worth seeing.  And the show was hosted by Tom Hatten, who took little squiggles that kids mailed in and turned them into cool cartoons.

Up against all that, church didn’t stand much of a chance.  Let’s just say that my walk with Christ lacked a certain intensity in those days.

I did, however, gain an important piece of wisdom from my bandy-legged, spinach-munching hero.  It was a Scripture verse, though I didn’t realize it at the time.

And you didn’t even realize that Popeye the Sailor Man was a believer, did you?

Popeye’s verse—I’m assuming his life verse, went like this:

“I yam what I yam and that’s all what I yam.”

I’m sure you recognize this as a slightly, uh, personalized form of 1 Corinthians 15:10a, which reads, “But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace to me was not without effect.”

This verse has been popping into my head a lot recently.  It’s Paul speaking, and he has just finished telling folks that he considers himself the least of the apostles. He says he doesn’t even consider himself worthy to be called an apostle, yet he recognizes that God is still at work in him and through him.

Hmmm…

There are various aspects of my personality with which I have been struggling for years.  You now, character traits that just aren’t part of who I want to be.  As I pull 40 with a longer and longer rope, I’ve been starting to wonder if I will ever win the Battle of Michael.

Here are a few lessons that have arisen from my ponderings.  I doubt that they apply to you, since you seem to have it all together.  Still, you’ve read this far; might as well finish…

First, I have to stop trying to fundamentally change my character.  If I’m to believe God—and if I’m not, what’s the point of all this—then I am fearfully and wonderfully made.  God formed me and knew me in the womb.  He is shaping me as the potter shapes the clay.  Each aspect of my personality was chosen for me by the One who loves me most.  To try to change that—to try to be someone other than the one he has created—is sort of a slap in his face.  It’s telling him that his plan is not good enough, that his creation is not good enough.  Time to accept that I yam what I yam.

Second, character traits are neither good nor bad…they just are.  A sharp blade can be a tool of evil in the hand of a murderer.  It can be an instrument of healing in the hand of a surgeon.  The same is true of our personalities; each aspect can be used for harm or help, depending upon who is at work.

The character that produces temper by the flesh produces Godly passion when submitted to the Holy Spirit.

By the same Spirit, weakness becomes gentleness

Laziness becomes contentment

Legalism becomes the pursuit of Truth

Stubbornness becomes strength

Sarcasm becomes insight

The loner becomes independent

The needy, clingy person becomes a faithful friend

The brutally honest person speaks the truth in love

The perfectionist seeks excellence for the glory of God.

The difference?  God’s grace.

It’s always his grace.

Which brings me to the third thing I’ve realized: God’s grace is at work in me.  I am God’s workmanship (Ephesians 2:210), and he who began this work will carry it on to completion (Philippians 1:6).  Until that day comes, I have to rest in the fact that I yam what I yam.  This is not an excuse; it’s an acknowledgement.  I will fail sometimes, not because I’m a failure, but because I’m learning and growing and trying.  So sometimes I will fall.

Sometimes I will stand.

I will never win the Battle of Michael.  And I don’t have to.  God has already won it; my job is to walk in that victory.  I am who I am.

I will never be perfect.

I will always be his.