I am sure that many of you are familiar with Jesus Christ’s admonition/commandment of being perfect even as he and God are. Yet I have sensed often times that people stray away from this topic. They either obsess over being perfect, and never feel enough, or they try to avoid it altogether knowing that the target is impossible to reach. You actually get to hear quite often the line that ‘it’s impossible for us to become perfect in this life’. Yet, the scriptures also teach us that God will never ask anything of us that we would not be able to deliver, creating an apparent discrepancy between the two.
What if I told you that you are already Perfect?! What would that do for you, how would you view yourself and life around you if you believed and knew that you are perfect?
Before continuing with this argument, I want to share with you a relative new definition of Perfection that I have discovered, which helped see everything in a new light. I think each one of us, as with many other abstract concepts, we have a very different definition of it based on own experiences.
Perfection= to finish, to bring to an end, completeness
Further definitions of perfection, which come from various philosophers, Aristotle being one of them, are:
1. That which is complete – contains all the requisite parts
2. That which is so good that nothing of the kind could be better
3. That which has attained its purpose
4. One that possesses that of which by its nature is capable
5. That which is better to have than not to have
6. That which has allowed the fullness of the qualities possible for it
7. That which is the best
So if being perfect means you’re working towards something more and you make the best of what you’ve been given, still having more to attain, doesn’t it qualify you and me of being Perfect?
I think our error in thinking that perfection is unattainable in this life is seeing it as a final destination that once reached then we can stop. But perfection never stops, and we can reach different levels of perfection, this life being one of them.
And what’s best about understanding perfection in this way, it only encourages me to try even harder rather than getting too overwhelmed by the task that I would give up before even starting it.
