ASSUMPTIONS ABOUT PERFECT FAITH
Christianity isn’t about perfection. Lots of us hold onto the fallacy that faith means we’re supposed to reflect perfection in some way by means of our belief in God. There’s a reason that’s fallacious—spoiler alert: we never achieve perfection here in this life. The goal is to strive to draw nearer to the perfect nature of the God we believe in, through our faith in Jesus Christ. What’s important here is that we don’t surmise that missing the mark at any point during our lifetime means we don’t get into heaven, or that our life was a failure. That’s not how faith operates, nor is it the purpose of faith.
ALL ARE CAPABLE OF SLIDING BACK TO SIN
Faith in Jesus doesn’t make us perfect people; it makes us more humble, honest, loving people (when it’s genuine). Jesus didn’t command us to judge others for their lack of faith, nor did He tell us to condemn others based on the maturity of their faith due to where they are on their personal walk with Him. Secondly, the strength of our faith doesn’t indicate that we’re closer to perfection than anyone else. We’re all capable of sliding into sin—of being attacked by demonic oppression and having doubts, worries, or temptations. We’re not here to point fingers, to condemn, or to compare. We’re taught to love, forgive, to teach, and to serve God. There’s no room in there for playing God, ourselves.
GROWING IN CHRIST AUTHENTICALLY
Believing in Jesus as Lord is the first step to take in the direction of pursuing God’s kingdom of heaven. It’s the first step of many, many steps over the course of the rest of our lives. But that isn’t to say that it’s about starting as early as we can either. For one, we’ll always be working on our faith walk even if we were born into the church. Furthermore, God works differently in each believer; some grow faster, while others grow slower. There’s no “right” pace, it’s just each Christ-follower on their own journey. That’s why we don’t call Christianity a race, because it’s a “walk”—for a reason.
Slow down. It’s not about “getting there first,” nor is it about looking better or worse than others on our walk. It’s about growing in Christ genuinely, wholeheartedly, and obediently.
UNFRUITFUL CHURCH EXPOSURE
Perhaps many of us, including myself, were exposed to a church atmosphere at an age where we needed more color added to the picture of faith in order to understand what it all meant in real life (that is, life outside the church’s four-plus walls). In addition, perhaps many of us were exposed to church in such a way that the people in the community didn’t help us grow like we could have. Maybe our particular exposure only reflected light on faith as a process for which we try to earn a good grade (or good rapport) for attendance and Bible knowledge. Maybe that exposure missed the mark and didn’t help us understand and grow into the knowledge that our relationship to Jesus is more important than religious semantics, such as those.
UNHELPFUL RELIGIOUS SEMANTICS
Let’s not misunderstand what I just wrote. Church attendance is a religious semantic—on its own. Bible knowledge, apart from understanding the context, its historical narrative, the Good News, and its deeply applicable wisdom, is also just religious semantics. But in context, and without religiosity, attending church and knowing our Bible are both critical aspects to our faith walk as believers. It’s putting them into their own category for the sake of checking a box that causes them to lose their intrinsic value in being part of the bigger picture of Christianity.
THE WORLD HAS CHANGED; NOT THE BIBLE
As I’ve grown older, I’ve learned a lot more about faith and have come to deeper understandings about it than I did while I was younger. And as I’ve gotten older, the world has changed, but the Bible has not. Society has changed, but the Bible has not. Cultures have changed and have grown more easily offended and aggressive, but the Bible hasn’t changed at all.
The world continues to try fighting for sinful lifestyles that were judged by God in the Bible, and the world continues to try to justify these lifestyle choices with the same sinful motives people did back when the Bible was written, but the Bible’s message has never changed, to this day. It’s still about putting God first, placing faith in Jesus; seeking God’s kingdom above all else, loving him with all our heart, mind, soul, and strength and loving our neighbor as ourselves. These commands have never changed. Just the world has.
WEREN’T WE WARNED?
What should we take away from the fact that the world has changed so much in 2,000+ years, but the Bible hasn’t changed at all? Doesn’t the Bible warn about this? Doesn’t the Bible tell us that people will grow cold in the last days (Matthew 24:12)? Doesn’t it say that family will be divided and turn against other family for the sake of the name of Jesus (Matthew 10:21-23)? Doesn’t it talk about adversity and having trouble (John 16:33)? Doesn’t it remind us not to worry (Matthew 6:25-34), to pray continually (1 Thessalonians 5:17) and to cast our anxiety onto Him (1 Peter 5:7)?
So, why are we so overwhelmed by the world and its own distractedness, instead of remembering Jesus told us about all of this beforehand? We were given a heads up, a couple thousand years in advance. Perhaps, just perhaps, we need to return to our Bibles, get on our knees, and submit to the Lord again. None of us are perfect, so maybe our surrender shouldn’t be about seeking to be the perfect Christian, but rather, striving to be an obedient one.
CHARACTERISTICS OF THE CHRISTIAN WALK
Maybe we need to trust in God more, to improve it one day at a time. Maybe we need to read our Bible more so we can learn to teach and evangelize more openly and with scriptural foundation. Maybe we could be more loving through how our speech, thoughts, and deeds act as reminders that Jesus loved us all first, and that God commands us to do the same for one another. We could work more on the delivery of our love in interactions with people, catching ourselves in moments where we’re tempted to show off or compare, and instead, responding with humility, kindness, and a sense of intentionality for the kingdom of heaven.
IT ALL POINTS BACK TO JESUS
Maybe we need to return to the reason why the Bible says what it does: it’s all pointing back to Jesus. Why? Jesus was chosen before the creation of the world to come die for us in our place; to pay our sins’ wages (1 Peter 1:18-20). God knew. He didn’t need to think about whether we were worth it. He chose to send His only Son to die because there was no other blood sacrifice (life sacrifice) that could atone for the sins that were going to be committed. Jesus was there, all along. The Old Testament references Him in advance, and then the New Testament boldly writes of ripple effect Jesus had on our world.
LEARNING OUR OWN NARRATIVE
The reason we have a Bible is for God to tell us our own story. We’re sinners, we chose ourselves instead of God. We chose our own way, instead of God’s way. We learned that the only way towards life is God, and the only way to God is through Jesus (John 14:6). The Bible is that blueprint, that narrative, and that history: our history.
God is the only one who’s perfect. We aren’t perfect. We won’t be until we’re with God in heaven, but for now, for those who place their faith in Jesus as Lord, we have the Holy Spirit. He is perfecting us, day-by-day, and we’ll screw up along the way. He already knows that. He’s looking for mercy, humbleness, obedience, love, and faith (not necessarily in that order). Not perfection.
THOSE WHO BELIEVE, AND THOSE WHO ONLY CONFESS
It might sound like a lot, but really, when we genuinely receive Jesus into our hearts, these really do come more naturally.
The outpouring of the Holy Spirit is a beautiful gift from God and graphically delineates the authenticity of the faith of the person who confesses; differentiating those who truly believe from those who confess, but don’t believe.
IT’S ABOUT HEART POSTURE
If God was looking for perfection, this is how we would know for sure: He wouldn’t have sent Jesus to die while we were sinners (Romans 5:8). We were far from perfect back then too! But He still came. God doesn’t expect perfection, but He expects us, once we’ve confessed with our mouths and believed in our hearts that Jesus is Lord—to practice a lifestyle of surrender and obedience to His commands; to repent; to own up to the parts of ourselves that need Him by confessing them to Him and seeking His restoration and forgiveness. It’s about heart posture, not perfection.
GOD’S TRUE NATURE
Stop being so hard on yourself. Stop listening to the devil’s lies. Open the Bible and remind yourself of God’s promises for the lives of all those who trust in the name of Jesus Christ as Lord. Remember that God loved His children first, and doesn’t require us to be or do something amazing before He shows us His love. He is slow to anger. He is a God of justice, but that just makes Him that much more trustworthy and good as the one, true God. God is faithful to forgive us our sins, and His love is forever (Psalms 136:1-9).
A SIMPLER, CLEARER PICTURE OF CHRISTIANITY
Our sin does matter, our choices do matter, our growth does matter… so that is why God sent Jesus to die and rise again for our sakes. He gave us the Bible so we could know all about that historical narrative, and He gave us the Holy Spirit so we could grow in faith by receiving it through God’s grace. He commands us to repent and be born again in the spirit. He doesn’t invite us to be lazy, but He doesn’t invite us to live in fear and anxiety, either. He tells us to take heart, to pick up our cross and follow Him (Matthew 16:24-26).
START LIVING LIKE THE NEW PERSON YOU ARE
Not perfection. Just obedience. Love Him, love others, follow His commands. Get involved in community. Find support. Don’t lose hope and don’t be so hard on yourself. Serve others, let go of the hurt. Let go of the resentment and the bitterness. Let go of the self-criticism. Forgive and let go. Take steps towards extending forgiveness to someone who needs it, or seek it where it’s safe to do so. Heal. Be made new, and be a testimony of the work of God in your life. This life is short, make it count. You’re not alone.
I pray you receive this with hope and joy, relief and inspiration. Be blessed, in the mighty name of Jesus! Amen!
Image by Karlaage Isaksen from Pixabay
Excellent essay. Reminds me of a book’s title which I am hoping to read on this very topic. https://spiritualarchive.org/biography/etexts/ironside/holiness.pdf
I’m not sure if the topic relates because I haven’t yet read the book, but I posted the link anyway because it seems certain they do.
But I read Romans or Galatians every day for several years because I needed to. And I have come to the conclusion that I can’t become good. Goodness is just the result of my interaction with the Holy Spirit. Yet even with Him I fear I am lacking goodness. But forcing it into my life makes its achievement unlikely.
Anyway, this has somewhat disappointed me. Many people say it has brought them relief, but I feel like the game is rigged. And I don’t know what to do about that.
At any rate, I liked your essay because you revealed to me that I may be being too hard on myself and judging God Himself, too harshly. He puts up with so much evil from people, that one must shake his head and wonder why He allows it all.
Hoping to do better but realizing that that may take some time. Perhaps even punishment. (Who can say?) Thanks again for the article.
Thanks for sharing Anthony! I agree with you that we can’t become good. And it’s okay, because the journey of being a Christ-follower is denying ourselves daily, picking up our cross and following Him, right? If that’s true, then we couldn’t be perfect, because we wouldn’t need to pick up a cross if we were perfect. But Jesus tells us that in order to follow Him, that’s what we must do: die to ourselves. Jesus also said that no one is good but God, and I believe the humbling aspect of what He was conveying by saying that was that God resides in those who love Him, which means the only goodness people have in them is Him. In others words, our goodness is not actually ourselves or anything we do, but simply a reflection of the process of Jesus refining us, day-by-day, through our faith and obedience.
There is no need to have fear of lacking goodness. God doesn’t want us to fear anything but Him, but that kind of fear is reverential (not terror). Rather than fearing your lack of goodness, I would encourage you to live into your gratitude for the gift of the Holy Spirit. By living, or leaning into gratitude, we take our attention away from the fear of anything we’re lacking, and instead, we place that focus into surrendering all that we are to the process of God perfecting us, one day at a time, until His return. Have patience with yourself, as God has patience with you. As 2 Peter 3:14 says, and don’t miss the end: “So then, dear friends, since you are looking forward to this, make every effort to be found spotless, blameless AND AT PEACE WITH HIM.” (italics mine) Don’t forget your peace! 🙂
I assure you, there is no game, and therefore nothing is rigged ;). Really, it’s a spiritual war taking place (which might make more sense of why Paul tells us to put on our “armor of God” in Ephesians 6:10-18, right?). The Christian life is challenging because we are still human and susceptible to the ramifications of sin. Satan would have us believe anything that would distract us from our Christian walk by feeding us thoughts and feelings of doubt, confusion, and disappointment. It’s meant to keep us from spiritually growing. That’s why it’s so critical to stay in the Scripture and build our spiritual discernment so we can call the devil out before we get trapped in one of his many lies. Lies like: your lack of goodness is a disappointment; or that maybe you’ll need to be punished for not doing better. Remember, God doesn’t punish us for not being perfect. He disciplines those whom He loves, as Hebrews 12:6 says. Recall how God rains on the righteous and the unrighteous alike (Matthew 5:45). But He punishes the evil and the unrepentant. And their punishment isn’t “a hard earthly life.” Their punishment is hell. You aren’t being punished by anything other than demonic oppression telling you lies to try to get your faith to weaken. Don’t listen to the lies! Only listen to God’s Scriptural promises for you, my friend. 🙂
There are certainly many questions we all have for God on the day we meet; not to question His integrity, but to seek clarity over His big picture plan. He has reasons for everything, but it’s sometimes impossible for us to even imagine what those reasons could be based on the level of suffering we endure in this life. God is VERY patient. We need to be grateful and take the time we have to build our faith all the while supporting the faith journey of others.
Truly, I hope these words help in some way. Be blessed, my friend! Thanks again for reading these articles!