Chasing Perfection

“God is easy to please, but hard to satisfy.” - George MacDonald

There is an analogy I once read that I carry with me in my head and in my heart as a daily reminder when I fail and want to throw things. It is this: If your ultimate destination is Philadelphia but the time you arrive is of no importance, then it does not matter what happens on the way to Philadelphia. You could run out of gas, get a flat tire, end up stuck in a thunderstorm that forces you to pull over for hours - but none of that is of any consequence if you get back on the road and still continue on in the direction of Philadelphia. It is the same with our journey as Christians.

I have found in the last year that I seem bent on chasing some sort of ideal that I have to be perfect for God. The swearing must stop, as must the needless gossip, negative outlook, impatience when driving and especially the emotional reactions to the things that are out of my control. Being the perfectionist that I am, I of course expect these changes to take place overnight. When they don’t, I shake my fist at God in frustration asking why he even bothers with me, that there must be some mistake because I should be better than this by now.

But there are two crucial things that I am forgetting when these frustrations overtake me. The first is the message of the Gospel - that Jesus came and died because we aren’t anywhere near perfect and we need him. I recall the Apostle Paul’s words with regards to this plainly - that God gave the law to highlight our sin. At first when I read this I was confused. Why would God do that? But then I realized it was to prove the point of the Gospel - God gives the law, and still man cannot follow. Don’t lie, don’t steal, don’t murder, love one another. All of this seems nice, right? Yet we can’t seem to do it, not one of us can follow all of these laws all of the time due to our fallen nature. And thus, an intercessor is needed. Someone to take on those sins, past, present and future, because we have a Creator that knows we cannot get our act together. Enter grace, and the power of free will to choose it, and you have a recipe for transformation that knows no bounds.

The second and equally important point is that the work within all of us is all in God’s timing. Not yours, not mine, not the Church’s. His. It is going to take as long as he sees fit to get us, individually, where we need to be - and I should add here that no one journey is the same as the next. If every one of us was knitted together uniquely by him in the womb, then it stands to reason that every path we take will be riddled with its own unique set of challenges and triumphs. There are things we cannot know, things that must happen to us in order to bring us through to the other side. And during the times where I grow impatient and weary, I remember the following verse:

The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. Instead he is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance. - 2 Peter 3:9

There are a lot of times that I don’t quite understand what God is doing with me and why. If I’m honest, most of the time I feel pretty clueless and think things are moving along too slowly. The sins I assumed he would be quick to convict me on he has, for some reason, remained silent. So I still have a tendency to swear when I get angry, or emotional, or because - let’s face it - it’s Tuesday. But in some of my most hopeless moments when I feel as though I can never measure up, a quiet and gentle voice comforts me by reminding me of one important fact: a year ago, I didn’t care about any of this. I didn’t even notice my own behavior. I paid no attention to the fact that I cursed as much as I did, and I can say with absolute certainty that I was never in the habit of apologizing for my inconsiderate behavior. Now I am consumed with guilt by even the smallest things, like putting grocery carts back where they belong and my lack of patience towards people. Now, instead of holding others accountable for making me angry or sad, the spirit works within me to help me understand how to love them and how to show them that. A year ago, I would have just shifted the blame to someone else. A year ago, I still felt a little squirmy when people spoke so lovingly about Jesus. Because I didn’t understand the love.

Today I do. Today, the need to speak of him and his love flows through me so powerfully that I cannot deny it is something greater than I at work. It is an experience, this flowing need, that I would gladly give my life for anyone, stranger or loved one, to feel for themselves. If my heavenly Father came to me and told me it was time to depart so another could have what He had so graciously given me, I’d joyfully hand it over. Because there is nothing that causes your soul to dance as much as being able to glorify God with your lips, your hands, your heart. There is no other experience, save for being in His presence, that amounts to it. When I think of this, I understand that the change that is happening within me is far different from what I had expected.

We do not come to Christianity because it is easy or convenient - it is neither. Giving your soul over to Him will ensure that you go through a period of refinement that takes the majority of your earthly life to see through. As he begins to increase those rather pitiful parts of you that cannot withstand his holiness will begin to decrease. In other words, some part of you is always dying. It is painful. It often feels like work, and there will be many days where it feels as though nothing is happening at all, however, that doesn’t mean change isn’t taking place. God may indeed be easy to please, but it is also true that he is hard to satisfy. When we meditate on what this means in our own walk we begin to comprehend that he is pleased with our first steps - even if they often end up as stumbles at first. But be prepared, as he will hardly be content with leaving you, or me, in that place. No. Instead, he presses us on towards glory and greatness, knowing that like the making of any true diamond the process to get there requires pressure, and time.

If you ask me if I think we will actually reach perfection in this lifetime before we die, I will only say that I assume those who have chosen to take the train, the bus, the car or walk to Philadelphia will eventually make it there, and not a second too soon or too late.

Because that is the thing about the work of grace - when it comes to perfection, we do not chase it. It chases us.

“Of course we never wanted, and never asked, to be made into the sort of creatures He is going to make us into. But the question is not what we intended ourselves to be, but what He intended us to be when he made us.” - CS Lewis