Virtue & Maturity
There is nothing more out of style in the contemporary world than virtue. The concept of virtue is so neglected that not one in a thousand people even knows what it means. At its root virtue is doing what is right and avoiding what is wrong. It is action and activity that is based upon a particular set of values. It requires knowing the difference between right and wrong. Sounds pretty basic, right?
The root of the word is vir (man), from which also comes the word virile, which means manly and often implies reproduction, and the biblical values related to reproduction (truth, honor, marriage, family, etc.). To be virtuous is to exhibit strength, courage, excellence, and good judgment — judgment that knows what is good and what is not. Again, it requires knowing the difference between right and wrong.
Virtue is the lost art of human maturity. Contemporary culture has gone out of its way to blur the difference between right and wrong, particularly contemporary media (TV, movies, radio, print, Internet and their use by the advertising industry)1. What is popular today would be considered to be trashy, in poor taste, and essentially evil during any previous era of American history. But people don't see it because they are blinded by the cultural bigotry that believes contemporary culture is superior to all others.
American social values have been turned inside out and upside down during the last 300 years, with significant acceleration during the last 50. The loss and recovery of virtue (human maturity) is decidedly a religious matter in spite of the fact that the enemies of virtue unanimously agree that it is not.
The central issue is knowing right from wrong. Christianity teaches that right and wrong cannot be understood apart from the Christ of Scripture. The determination of right and wrong apart from belief in and adherence to Scripture can only be done by subjecting God's wisdom to human wisdom. Either God informs human beings about right and wrong or human beings judge God's wisdom to be faulty, and put themselves in the place of God regarding this determination. There is no middle ground, no neutral position.
Morality is either Godly (biblical) or it is not. Yet, biblical morality is always a matter of growth and development and never a matter of perfect conformity. The essential character of biblical morality is improvement, not excellence. Biblical morality, then, is not a matter of moral excellence (which is beyond human ability), but of moral improvement — regular, on-going, incremental, concrete and actual improvement, of increasing conformity to God's biblical standards of morality.
Historically, the most successful companies in the world built their success on the Protestant Work Ethic, the application of biblical principles to business during a time in which those values were more widely accepted and practiced. It is not that greed, opportunism, fraud and dishonesty were not practiced, but that they were less prevalent, less common, not so much "in your face" as they are today.
Virtue, then, is moral growth, moral development, moral improvement, moral maturity. It is the reclamation of truth, honesty and integrity as the values of genuine success, and the repudiation of what mitigates against virtue, against moral immaturity — potty talk and the values of the gutter, dishonesty, deceit, greed, pride and arrogance — regardless of their packaging or popularity.
Virtue is the blossom of hope for a world of goodness, beauty, truth, justice and righteousness that is beyond our human ability to accomplish — or even to fully understand. It is the work of trusting in the One who has provided the vision (outline or plan) for such a world, and the only means of its accomplishment — Jesus Christ.
1. These things are not bad or evil in and of themselves. Rather, they simply reflect and broadcast the values of those who control them. They are nothing more than modern pedagogical instruments in the hands of morally immature people. Advertisers work hard to set cultural trends and tend to aim at the lowest common denominator. They should aim higher.
