“Set a watch, O LORD, before my mouth; keep the door of my lips.”~ Psa. 141:3
“Watch your temper,” we were warned from childhood. But newborn Christians, even mature ones, need to be reminded, “Watch your temperament.” That is, our natural disposition we inherited at conception. Being saved does not change one’s temperament, though it can be improved drastically by the Spirit’s control in our lives.
When the Bible states that when one becomes a Christian, “…all things are become new,” it does not mean things have changed, but that we have changed, and as a result look at everything differently. Sin is still sin, and godliness is still godliness. Neither has changed. But now we see them through a different light.
We must be careful not to read the Scriptures “through our own specs,” but make every effort to see them through God’s glasses, so to speak. For example, an outgoing sanguine can justify his or her external gleefulness, and lack of seriousness, by saying it’s the joy of the Lord. On the other hand, the serious minded melancholy points to texts on soberness to vindicate his lack of Biblical cheerfulness.
I think it was one of the old philosophers who came up with the idea of four temperaments. I personally do not know about that. But I do know each of us fall into a limited list of categories that make us distinctively different from the others. I was asked once if there are four temperaments, which did Jesus, have. My answer was, since He was representative man, all four. Therefore He knows each of us and our personal needs. Our individual temperaments were given to us by God, and when He is in control of them, we are no longer a burden to ourselves or others. It is then we become a blessing.