Wikimedia Commons<\/a><\/em><\/p>\nWhy is \u201c10\u201d a sign of perfect physical beauty? Why is 100% the perfect number for \u201cgiving it your all\u201d? \u201cNot a hair out of place\u201d might be the sign of a perfect haircut or perm.<\/p>\n
In a \u201cperfect\u201d world, shouldn\u2019t there just be one sign of perfection?<\/p>\n
I hear \u201cperfect\u201d so often casually used to describe all kinds of spiritual exercises and religious practices. I hesitate to ascribe perfection to anything we do, labeled \u201cspiritual\u201d or \u201creligious\u201d. I hesitate because \u201cChristian perfection\u201d is so different from what we assume it is.<\/p>\n
I invite you to consider this radical thought: At the deepest level, we are already \u201cperfect,\u201d but we either don\u2019t know it or don\u2019t even believe it.<\/p>\n
John Wesley speaks of us \u201cgoing on to perfection.\u201d But how do we know when we\u2019ve arrived at \u201cperfection\u201d? In the game of golf, \u201cperfection\u201d has an end-point \u2013 the ball is in the hole.<\/p>\n
\nWhat do you imagine the end-point of Christian perfection to be? The pious, orthodox answer we usually give is, of course, \u201cheaven.\u201d<\/p>\n
But as I read Wesley\u2019s words in his little book \u201cA Plain Account of Christian Perfection\u201d, I see him emphasize an earlier, earthier experience of perfection. He spoke of having the mind of Christ, helping us walk as Jesus walked. That\u2019s an earthly image, folks. Heaven can wait!<\/p>\n
Wesley spoke clearly about loving God with all our heart, and loving our neighbors as ourselves. Hmm\u2026<\/p>\n
That\u2019s sounds vaguely biblical. It should. Beginning in Mark 12:30, a scribe asks Jesus what the greatest commandment is. Jesus reminds people of the \u201cShema\u201d (Hebrew for \u201chear\u201d) in Deut. 6: 4-9.<\/p>\n
\u201cHear, O Israel. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and might.\u201d Then Jesus adds, \u201cAnd you shall love your neighbor as yourself.\u201d This, my friends, is what \u201cgoing on to perfection\u201d is all about! Heaven can wait!<\/p>\n
Let\u2019s try this from another angle. The Greek word teleios is used almost 20 times in the New Testament to describe our word \u201cperfect.\u201d \u201cBe perfect as our Father is perfect.\u201d \u201cPerfect love casts out fear.\u201d And so on.<\/p>\n
But that word isn\u2019t talking about moral perfection, friends. In fact, Jesus challenged Jewish religious leaders for their fanatical pursuit of religious and moral perfection. (I think we stand under the same judgment when we nit-pick our way through the moral morass we sometimes reduce \u201cchurch\u201d to being.)<\/p>\n
Biblical perfection, teleios, has more to do with our effort to be the human beings that God created us to be from the beginning. A perfect hammer is a tool that is used to pound nails and extract nails from wood\u2026but a perfect human being? That\u2019s more difficult for most of us to describe.<\/p>\n
Jesus simplified the formula for us. Or did he? Love God with all your heart, soul, and might; and love your neighbor as yourself. Simple? As a formula, maybe. As a daily practice, not so much. It is so often too difficult for us to love God and others as we love ourselves.<\/p>\n
So we settle for something supposedly easier: the pursuit of moral perfection. (At least it\u2019s easier to expect of other persons than of us.) So again, let\u2019s remember Jesus challenges us to strive after moral perfection. Why? Maybe because it leads so easily to separating people into \u201cmoral\u201d and \u201cimmoral\u201d. We celebrate God\u2019s Incarnation at Christmas. This is our reminder that Jesus\u2019 humanity intends to remind us what being human is really about.<\/p>\n
He showed us how we are more perfectly human, more complete as persons. It doesn\u2019t happen in those moments when we push each other away. It happens when we reach out to each other in love as perfect as we can offer in those moments. We do what we can, and leave the rest to God. Perfect!<\/p>\n
\nMark 12:30 NRSV<\/strong>
\nYou shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength.<\/em><\/p>\nDeuteronomy 6: 4-9 NRSV<\/strong>
\nHear, O Israel: The Lord is our God, the Lord alone. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might. Keep these words that I am commanding you today in your heart. Recite them to your children and talk about them when you are at home and when you are away, when you lie down and when you rise. Bind them as a sign on your hand, fix them as an emblem on your forehead, and write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.<\/p>\n
\nThe Rev. Paul Graves serves as the chair for the Commission on Older Adult Ministries for the PNWUMC.<\/em><\/center><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"“A perfect hammer is a tool that is used to pound nails and extract nails from wood\u2026but a perfect human being? That\u2019s more difficult for most of us to describe.” – The Rev. Paul Graves on how we perceive the idea of Christian ‘perfection’. Nurturing Elders & Others: Imperfect Signs of Perfection By the Rev. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":51,"featured_media":5808,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[111,142],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-5807","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-channels","8":"category-older-adult-ministries"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/12\/INSIGHTS_NurturingElders_hammer1.jpg?fit=700%2C357&ssl=1","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2l75j-1vF","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5807","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/51"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5807"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5807\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5815,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5807\/revisions\/5815"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5808"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5807"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5807"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5807"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}