Perfection

“Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect (Matthew 5:48).”

In the next few sections of Matthew 5, Jesus cites the Laws of Moses, specifically against murder, adultery, divorce and making false oaths.  He is saying that we cannot be satisfied with “checklist theology.”  The bar that he sets us is perfection.  It is not enough to refrain from murder, we must not carry hate in our heart.  It is not enough to avoid cheating on your spouse, we must not look on another with lust.  Instead of keeping your oaths, just speak the truth.  

And instead of loving our friends and hating our enemies, we are to love our enemies, turn the other cheek, walk the second mile.  If we are serious about following Jesus, we have to admit that he was not just telling us this might be nice to try.  He lived his life this way.  And in following him, we will quickly find that these new takes on old commandments simply cannot be done.  We may struggle with anger and not lust, or maybe we are chronic liars but never get angry.  Or perhaps turning the other cheek doesn’t seem so wise.  But each of us has weaknesses.

If we cannot follow a commandment, why give it?  Anyone who thinks they are perfect or even tries to be perfect will come across as a pompous ass.  The only way to fulfill Jesus’ command is to go back to the beginning.  “Blessed are the poor in Spirit.”  With a humble and contrite heart, we can mourn for our sin and ask God’s Holy Spirit to come dwell in our heart.  “Nothing is impossible with God.”  When we come to the end of our own strength, we call on him. The trick is to call on him all the time.

“What would Jesus do?”  Do you remember that fad with the bracelets, the books and even a movie?  The problem is, everyone seemed to have their own version of Jesus.  And he is hard to get our arms around.  First, he was God incarnate.  Second, he lived so long ago and the world was so different then.  And third, much of his life has become mythologized in movies, books and popular culture, making it hard to tell fact from “embellishment”.  So, while it is essential to read the Bible and, through it, get to know Jesus better and better, I find it hard to do.  

There are a small number of recent, well-known Christians who seem to have gotten close to what I would consider “perfection”:  Eric Liddel, Oswald Chambers and Corrie Ten Boom come to mind.  Each of them exuded humility and amazing faith in God.  I suspect that many others have lived exemplary lives and died in glorious anonymity befitting a truly humble Christian.  But these three I do find more accessible.  They were fully human, lived in the past century and their life stories are fairly well known.  I suspect this is why Paul wrote to the Philippians (4:9), “Whatever you have learned or received or heard from me, or seen in me—put it into practice. And the God of peace will be with you.”  

Perfection in humility, victory in surrender.  Just two of the beautiful paradoxes of the Christian faith.