My friends, there's some examples of character that you need to write down. Why do we call, for example, the alphabet characters? Because A is always A. B is B at 2 a.m. in the morning.
C is still C whether it's in Africa, Asia, or in the Bronx. It doesn't change. That's why we call them characters. Why do we call numbers characters? Because one is always one, and two is always two.
Whether you are using it in the night or the day, it doesn't change. It's character. Why do we call statues characters?
Because, like Victoria, no matter what happens around them, they never change. Why do we call principles characters? Because principles are laws. They never change. You know one of the secrets to my success as a coach of government leaders and business leaders, one of my secrets of being an effective communicator, one of my secrets of being a good teacher is simple.
It's not my education. The secret to my success is I only teach principles. That's it.
You can never disagree with a principle. You can ignore it. You can hate it. But you can never disagree with it.
For example, gravity is a principle. You could fast and pray and speak in tongues, but if you jump off a building, you're going to die. Why? You are violating a principle. Character is that way.
That's why a person with character does not live on what's popular. They live on what is principle. And this is why it's very difficult for politicians to have character.
Because politics is based on popularity. Which means you will literally sacrifice your principles to protect your popularity, which cancels your character, which means you cannot be trusted. There are preachers who are politicians. They would sell their principles. For a pot of porridge.
No character. Character, therefore, is simply that which is unchanging. Write it down. My question is, how often do you change? Who are you?
Are you the same person all the time? Are you consistent? Are you predictable? Leaders must have character.
Why? Write this down. People will not follow you if they don't trust you.
So character attracts loyalty. I want to give a few more definitions of character for you to understand how serious it is. First of all, character is a commitment to a set of values without compromise. What are values?
Values are things you value, that's all. Not complicated. For example, if you value your marriage vow, you will never commit a debt. adultery so when a person commits adultery they don't value their marriage nor their marriage vows so you can't respect them and they lose the trust of their spouse and their children and even their in-laws and perhaps even the church that they are part of see your values will protect you Secondly, character is the dedication to a set of standards without wavering.
What are your standards that you've set for your life? My standards produce my character. I will never violate my standards. You got to say that every day.
I do not tell lies. That's a standard. I do not steal.
That includes stealing time from your job. Telling people you are sick when you are not sick. This is a lack of character. You are a thief. I wonder why you're smiling.
See, you don't understand. Character is so subtle. There's no excuse in life for breaking your standards. You know, I've heard business people say, and I talk to them, I've even, you know, in some of my business dealings and my negotiations for business investments, I sit with people.
Many people come to me, they want to do business with me, and they want me to invest in their companies, and, you know, I do a lot of this stuff. And I hear people say sometimes, honesty is my best policy. Now, whenever you tell me that, I do what Joseph did.
Honesty should never be your best policy. Never. Because best policy means I have second best, third best, fourth best, fifth best. I can't trust you. You have no character.
A person of character would say, honesty is my only policy. Thirdly, character is self-imposed discipline for the sake of moral convictions. Character is what?
Self-imposed discipline. That means a person of character doesn't need the police. They police themselves. A person of character locks themselves up in the prison of their own convictions and they throw away the key.
Do you have character? Are you for sale? See, your future depends on your character, not your charisma. And most leaders, whether they are politicians, preachers, or parents, they try to live of their charisma. They try to live of their talent.
They try to live of their gifts. Your gifts will never protect you. As a matter of fact, your gift will destroy you.
Because the only thing that can protect your gift and your talent is your character. This session is the most important session you've ever sat in in your life because this is where you learn what protects your entire future and it's your character. And you've never been taught this in your whole life. I know you haven't.
Your seminary never had a class on this. And that's why preachers are falling like flies. You know, I think about it.
Character is really what I... call a constant effort to integrate your words your deeds and your actions as one everybody say integrate the word integrate inter great means to become one this is very important write that down to integrate means what to become one so character is When your words, your deeds, and your actions are one. You are not schizophrenic.
A person without character will say one thing, do another, and promise something else. So you never know who you're talking to when you're talking to them. No character.
Now here's a surprise. Number five. Character is sacrifice for principles.
So character means you are willing to sacrifice friendship to protect your principles. You are willing to lose your best friend in order to keep your principles. Do you have character? Who are you with right now that you shouldn't be with?
Think about it. What are you doing right now in secret that you shouldn't be doing? Are you willing to sacrifice that to protect your principles?
Somebody offered to pay your mortgage off if you just sleep with them once. Would you sacrifice to protect your principles? Character. I like this last one.
Character is simply integrity. Everybody say integrity. Now look at integrity and look at integrate. They're the same word. Integrity means you are one with yourself.
Integrity means that you are one with yourself. Do you know when I did some research some years ago, On the word in the Hebrew for holiness, write the word holy down, I discovered that the root word for holy is one. One. The Hebrew concept of holiness is integrity.
One. That means you are one. The number one confession in the Bible about God is the Lord our God is one.
Now some of you don't understand why that's important. If you were to talk to a Jewish rabbi right now in this city and ask him, when you meet them, ask him, when you see them, ask him, what is the most important confession in the Bible? They would tell you, the Lord our God is one.
What does it mean? It means he's holy. What is holy?
You are one. This is very interesting. Holiness means you are integrated. You are not more than one person. You are not a different person on Monday than you are on Tuesday.
You are not a different person in the night at 2 a.m. than you are in the pulpit on Sunday morning. You are one.
You are not multi-personality. When the Bible says be holy, it's telling you be one. Stop being a hypocrite. It's character. The foundation for trust is integrity.
Write it down. Tweet that to somebody right now. What did I say?
The foundation... Of trust is integrity. When you are one, people will eventually trust you. That means your word is always good. You say what you said, you do what you said, and then you act what you said.
That's holiness. So wearing a long dress or a white collar with a purple shirt turned backward with a big chain in your pocket is not holiness. Wearing a long robe with a turban on your head doesn't impress me. I want to know if one person is under that robe, just one.
You can call me... you know you can bring your card to me and show me all your titles right reverend honorable bishop eternal sacred man of god i don't care what you say i still don't trust you i don't because i don't know which one of you i'm talking to That's why the Bible says, know them that labor among you. Don't just bring anyone into your church to preach.
Even if they are on TV. Don't be attracted to charisma. Seek out character.
You know, some years ago my wife and I hosted a marriage conference in our church and I met this guy when I was doing a show for the 700 Club with Pat Robertson in Virginia. Virginia Beach and I was doing a series of programs with him and the people there and I met this guy and he did a show on marriage, you know, and strengthening marriages. It's an older guy and I was so impressed. He had a book and everything and something. sounded good.
I didn't know him. I just met him for the first time. And we were having this marriage conference in our church in the Bahamas. And I said, you know, this guy sounds good.
So I approached him and I invited him to come to the Bahamas. He was so excited to come to the Bahamas. So he came to the Bahamas and he did the seminar with me and it was a wonderful session and everything.
He bought his wife with him. And then two months later, I saw an article where he got a divorce from the woman that was with him, his wife. I was confused.
So I called him up, he was living in Colorado at the time, and I said, I just want to make sure that this article I'm reading is not true. Are you divorcing your wife who was with you when you did a seminar for my people? Who believed you?
And he began to try and explain himself. I said you will never come back to our church and you will never come back to our island. I hung the phone up and called the bookstore.
I said take every one of his books off the shelf because if what he is teaching is not working for him it shouldn't be taught to us. Write this down. Lead with your life. Your life is the weight of your words. What did I say?
Your life is the weight of your words. Tweet that right now to someone. See that's the problem with us.
We think that we are impressed by our language, you know, these deep things we say and how good we can speak and preach and how we can... Hallelujah! Yes, Lord!
Listen brother, you ain't got no life! You know, it's like a guy who sells diamonds but he ain't wearing none. Never trust a salesman who don't use what he's selling.
Clap. I am faithful to my wife so that you could believe my words. I am a good father to my children so you could believe my words. Let me put it this way. There's no such thing as a personal life.
Write it down. There's no such thing as a private life. Write it down. So don't you ever tell people what I do in private is none of your business.
It is my business. Because it determines whether I trust what you say publicly. It's called character. As a matter of fact, I have come to the conclusion that a person of character doesn't need to talk. They don't need to talk.
They just show up. When I first met Nelson Mandela, it was the most overwhelming moment in my life. Private dinner, 16 people. He had just come out of prison.
His first trip was to the Bahamas. He wanted to meet my prime minister. Sir Lyndon Penley, who was the first one to agitate for his freedom out of prison. So he wanted to come and thank my prime minister personally.
So his first trip out of prison was to my country. And the prime minister called me and he invited 16 people to the dinner. And I was one of them.
I don't know. It's such an honor to meet an icon. I think some of you saw the photograph of us together a couple of times. When I, when I, my God, when I saw him, I saw a character on two legs. He didn't have to speak.
do you know why he went to prison for 18 years plus seven and never changed his conviction hey boys they never change that's why you respect him when i come back to new york will you have the same wife Who answered the question? It's just a rhetorical question. I want you to think about it. This is a serious question. How stable are you?
That is why the young people are so confused. You know the Bible says about parenting? The Bible says, fathers, do not exasperate your children.
Now, some of you don't know what that big word means, so I'll explain it to you. The word exasperate means to frustrate because of instability. You tell your child, don't smoke, and you are smoking.
You are creating a monster in your house. You tell your daughter, who is 16, don't get pregnant, and you had her out of wedlock. See, don't feel bad.
I got you today. See, the problem is your daughter could tell you, but you didn't. Everybody say, lead with your life.
Lead with your life. See, your words mean nothing. Character protects your words.
What did I say? You know, I was reading the Bible And I saw this passage here in Genesis 126 and it blew me away. You're about to get some revelation. Sit up straight, take a deep breath. Okay, Genesis chapter 1, my favorite verse in the Bible.
I talk about it every day because this verse is a summary of why you was created. It says, and God said, let us make man in what? Our own image. Remember now the word man is plural, so he's talking about the whole species.
Let us make a species called man out of our own spirit and in our own image. And he will be obviously like us. Us referring to the plurality of God's oneness. Now, what's the next statement?
Let them have dominion. I want you to notice something here. This is very important. Write this down.
Image before dominion. What did I say? Image before dominion.
One more time. Image. Do you remember the definition we gave of character? Do you remember the word image?
Okay, this is important. You see, the word image is the word for character. So every human being was designed to lead.
That's what God gave you dominion for. And leadership was never given over people. It was given really in an area of gifting.
Everyone in this room was born to lead but not to lead people. You were born to lead in an area of gifting and your gifting attracts people. The attraction makes you a leader. Did you understand what I just said? See, you've been taught that leadership is only for a certain group of people.
That's a lie from the pit of hell. He told all of us to have dominion. Everybody is a ruler.
But not all the people. You were created to have leadership in an area of gifting. And your gift is what makes you valuable to the world. The Bible says your gift makes room for you where? In the world and will bring you before great kings.
Not your education, your gift. That's why most people with PhDs are failures. Because you can have a PhD and not know your gift. Most educated people work for people who dropped out of school.
Did you know that? Like Stephen Jobs, Bill Gates. These folks didn't finish school.
But they found their gift. That is probably why you're still broke. Because all you are is employed.
You've never been deployed. Your gift is when you deploy yourself. You are powerful, but you don't know it. Because your culture trains you to get a job, not to find your gift.
So most of you have been miseducated. And your life is miserable. You are 50 years old and still don't know why you were born. Because your culture taught you to get an education to get a job.
And then when they finish with you, they lay you off, they retire you, and they throw you to the curb. Your gift is what you want to find. All of my books that I've written, all of them, I make sure each book has in it how to find your gift.
If you bought a book from me today, you're going to be transformed when you read it. Because if you find your gift, you become very dangerous. You become unemployable. Your gift is your leadership fruit. Write that down.
What do I mean by that? Have you noticed that a fruit tree, when it bears a fruit, it never brings the fruit to you? Let me say it again over here.
These folks look a little wise over here. I said when a fruit tree bears its fruit, it never brings the fruit to you. Is that right? Exactly. It just bears the fruit.
What happens? You are attracted to the tree. Your gift is your fruit that God gave you on the inside to serve the world. That's why Jesus said, if you want to be great, you become a servant to everybody. What do you mean?
You serve them your gift and they find you. This is why true leaders never seek followers. Write it down.
What did I say? Yeah, followers are attracted to true leaders. But they are not attracted to you. Gotta be careful. They are attracted to your gift.
So because people are coming to you doesn't mean they like you. You got to protect yourself from them. They are coming for what? Your fruit.
Tell your neighbor, I don't trust you. You just want my fruit. Somebody clap with me.
Just clap. Praise God. So God made you to be a leader with a gift. Now, that means you were born to dominate in an area of gifting. But now watch God work, okay?
Write this down. Very important. The character is...
very essence of God that's why the Lord our God is one so God himself is character that's why you can trust him he never changes he's the same yesterday today and forever I wonder if you are who are you man are you this person all the time sitting in this room What do you do at 2 a.m. in front of your computer that we don't know about? Character. God is character.
Number two, God boasts that he never changes. Am I right? All through the Bible, he says, I never change. I never change. There's no shadow of turning with me.
I am the same yesterday, today, and forever. The Lord is one. I never change.
He's telling you about character. Therefore, that is why we can trust him. He's stable.
God said, heaven and earth would have to pass away before I break my word. Now that's character. He would sacrifice the universe in order to keep his word.
So. Watch God go to work now. So God is going to create this man and the first gift God gave the man was not power. The first gift God gave the man was not dominion. You know many of you get excited about dominion, dominion.
you know I got dominion hallelujah I got dominion no shut up man that's not what God gave you first read the Bible the first thing God gave you is what he gave you image which means that character is more important than power there are people Who would come to me and say, Dr. Monroe, I want you to pray for me to receive the anointing of God. And I would ask them, do you have the character to contain it? Power will kill you without character.
And God knew it and God says the first thing I must give this creature is character, the image of God. So God's priority is character. God's commitment is that character is necessary before dominion. God is more concerned about your character than your dominating the earth. Character is God's prerequisite for dominion and rulership.
Character is God's foundation for leadership. Because look, before I give you power, let me give you the most important thing. Here's image. What is image? Characteristics.
You are stable just like me. I can trust you with power. Now let me just say this, and those who bought the book on character, it's going to change your life. I'm telling you, 40 years of research.
Write this down. Here's what I discovered. And it's in the book.
I do a whole chapter on it. I discovered this. Three things will test your character.
Only three things. There are three things that will manifest your character. They will tell you whether you have character or not.
Three things. The first one is power. When you give a person power, Their character shows up.
Number two, money. When you give a human a lot of money, their real self shows up. And number three, access to sex. If you give a human access to sex, their character shows up or their lack of it.
Only three things. So if you want to know what a woman really is, give her power, money, and access to sex. You want to know what a man is really like? Give him power, money, and access to sex. And that is why every human on this earth that have ever failed was because of either power, money, or sex.
Period. I wonder if you're gonna make it to the end man. See that's the question. Don't answer the question please. This is serious because you don't know.
The Bible says The race is not to the swift. See, you could be famous instantly, man, but in the kingdom of God, the race is not to the swift. Who gets to the top first?
The race is to him who endures to the end. Will you still be around when I come back 10 years from now, or will you still be the same person? That's the question.
Character. Queen Victoria is still there. 289 years later. She outlived every storm, every hurricane. I wonder if you'll still be standing when all the temptations have passed.
The only way to test character is by temptation. Write it down. The word temptation is not a negative word. Someday I'll come back and teach on it.
But in the book I do a whole chapter on temptation. Because tempering, to temper, write the word temper, to tempt or to temper means to test for weakness. That's all it means. You will never ever have a time in your life when you are free from temptation. Never.
So get over it. Get used to it. Tempting will constantly be in your life to monitor your character.
Your character is as strong as the temptation you fell for. Do you know what made Eve pick the fruit? It wasn't difficult. Satan says, look.
do you want to be like god that was the temptation what is god power of course he lied to her because she was already like god but satan will always tempt you with what you already are so your greatest danger is ignorance of self You cannot tempt me to be what I know I already am. So, somewhere, Eve became ignorant of who she was. So Satan tempted her for weakness. Do you want to be like God?
Well, read the verse. Let us make man in our own image and like us. She already was like God. But ignorance will make you disbelieve yourself.
Character. Number six, God gave character before power. Say it. God gave character before power.
Say it again. God gave character before power. One more time. God gave character before power.
Amen. God created you. And you were given the mandate to dominate earth with God's character.
It's not a difficult thing. You're a king, just like your father. But your territory is earth. Therefore, image is the first thing God gave you. And God gave you that because he knew that without character, the power will destroy you.
You know people say power corrupts and power corrupts absolutely. I used to believe that that's not true. Power does not corrupt. Power simply reveals corruption.
You are already defective. You finally got a chance to show it. Power is pure... character.
So the fall of man distorted the image of God. What is image? Character. So man became a defective character.
And the result of it is that his self-worth fell. Man didn't know how much he was worth anymore. So ever since that, man has been hiring, read my lips, read my lips, image consultants.
Why would you hire an image consultant? Because you ain't got none. You ain't got no image. You lost it.
If you know who you are and you decide to be who you are, you don't need nobody to create another person. An image consultant is someone you pay to create a person that doesn't exist. Politicians hire image consultants. Why? They ain't got no image.
So they pay people to tell lies. Movie stars, entertainers, they hire image consultants. Why? They have no image. So they sell you an image that don't exist and you buy it and then when the real person shows up like that young guy in Florida the other day what's his name Beaver or something Justin Bieber all y'all are shocked I'm not I knew that that wasn't him who was on stage Many pastors are just like that little boy.
Tomorrow morning this city will be filled with performers in the pulpit. They haven't been caught yet, that's all. You know, most people ask for forgiveness simply because they got caught. Character.
Oh, I have 129 slides. This is slide number four. My time is up. You went to Bible school and they gave you a diploma, but they never gave you character. So you could preach, but you ain't got no principles.
You're not going to make it. Your future is predictable. You never worked on character. A guy from a hotel called me the other day, general manager of a hotel. He says, I need to order 80 of your character books.
So I said, why? He says, I just read it. It changed my life as a general manager.
And I'm going to give every staff member in this hotel this book. And I'm going to pay them to read it, he says. He said, this is the only thing that's missing in our lives. Character.
He asked me to come and do a seminar in the hotel now. So, you know, we're going to sign a contract and I'll do some work with him. He said, this is what's missing at all levels.
Managers, supervisors, downline workers, secretaries. People are not stable, cannot be trusted because they never learn character. Let me close with this because my time is gone.
The principal trait of fallen man is unpredictability. You cannot predict a sinner. You don't know what they're going to do next. Am I right?
Some of you are married, one of them. You don't know what they are doing. Humans are struggling with unfaithfulness. They're not stable.
And so I put it to you, my friend. As we take a break before the last segment, which to me is one of the most important. Oh, did I go too fast?
Did y'all go too fast? I'm controlling it, girl. Not them, me. You writing too slow.
Take a photograph of it. Praise the Lord. That's my friend over there.
Come on, right fast, quick, quick, you're holding me up. Oh, they in the way? Move the camera, man.
You guys getting in trouble today. These folks want to get the notes. Don't stand in front of that screen, all right? Is this good stuff today? I came here because I want you to make it.
Thank you. Are you going to make it? Yes.
That means you got to make a decision in this room before you leave. That you are going to get rid of things that can destroy your character. And that might include some friends.
That includes some habits. You are in danger. All that you've built, everything you've built, which your whole life could be destroyed in five seconds, ask Jimmy Swigert. You think you're safe, huh? You better protect your character.
You are as safe as your character. I want to give you these last two slides before we close. What's the source of values? Values, again, remember, they produce character. Okay?
So you got to get your values right. The most powerful component in leadership is philosophy. Why?
Philosophy is your belief system. Your belief system is a result of the things you value. Whatever you value, you believe in.
Your belief system produces your values and your values produce your morals. So morality is really a product of your values. If I value my marriage vow, then morally I will be faithful to my wife.
It's related. And then when my morals are in place, morals inform ethics. So it is unethical for me to sleep with another woman. Why?
Because my morals dictate that I cannot violate my values. So I protect my character. And if my ethics are in place, my ethics produce my character. And my character becomes my lifestyle. Remember I told you?
You don't lead out of your position. You lead out of your life. I want you to remember one thing I say.
You may never see me again. Remember this. There is no private life.
Get that through your head quickly. You must live loudly. A person of character doesn't care if you discover their private life. If you are afraid that I may find out about your private life, you have no character.
You are a character. What's your problem over here? These folks are slow over here. We've got to pray for them.
Huh? You trying to take a picture? Now remember, if you take a picture of my slides, you've got to give me credit when you use it. Otherwise, you are stealing.
And if you've got character, you don't steal. Alright? Every time you use it, you've got to say, Dr. Miles Monroe says. Hallelujah. Here's Desmond Tutu, what a man.
When Messer Mandela was released from prison, they had to deal with some issues with the oppression and Desmond Tutu was really active in that. He had to manage the forgiveness process. You know, I'm moving too fast right now.
Maybe I'll come back next year and do some of this stuff. I just want to give you this last slide. Write this down. Vision without values is destiny without discipline.
No matter how great your vision is, it can be destroyed if you don't have values. So your destiny depends on your personal discipline. Character will always protect your vision.
Samson had an awesome vision. God trusted this man. He was supposed to save the people of Israel. But his private life destroyed his public vision. Whenever you decide to do something and you hope no one finds out, you are in danger.
So never do anything from this day forward that you don't want anyone to find out about. And you'll have character. And that's what they never taught you. In seminary, they never told you that in high school, and now you got a double life. And I used to wonder why men, especially, like superheroes, but I figured it out eventually.
Men like superheroes like Batman and Superman, because they got two personalities. Every Superman has a Clark Clements trapped on the inside. Every Batman has a Bruce Wayne somewhere. Every Samson should have a Joseph on the inside.
I wonder who you are right now. Character. Vision protects values. Sorry, vision is protected by values.
Vision is interpreted by values. And vision and values is the marriage of purpose and principles. Your purpose for your life is your assignment. Your principles protect that assignment.
So don't violate your principles. I am a virgin. I got to protect my virginity.
And I won't sell it to anybody. I got married to my wife at age 25. I was a virgin. So was my wife. Now I used to wonder why God tells us not to have sex before marriage until I figured it out.
My wife and I have no memories that we don't like. So God says, look, do right so you can enjoy your memories. Write that down. Look at your face. Some of you are looking down right now.
Oh, Dr. Monroe, please move on quickly. Yeah, that's why you should live right, so your memories will be happy. God was trying to save you from your memories when he said live right. Character. Gives you good memories.