Christian Life 2 - How to be Perfect (in 10 easy steps)

    My atheist friends are allowed to take today off.  This one is strictly for Christians. And, Christian friends, go get a cup of coffee and a bagel.  It's a long one.    

    This is not the post I intended to write this morning, and I don't even know how I'll finish it as I will be describing a conversation that is still ongoing.  Let me begin at the beginning.

    A few days ago, I inadvertently started a fairly lively discussion on Facebook.  I'm rather happy about that; most of my Facebook posts go unnoticed.  I will type the conversation to date verbatim except for the elimination of any identity markers and a few minor grammatical corrections.

ME: "I came up with this in Sunday School this morning, the topic of which was Pride.  My lovely bride said it wasn't my best effort, but I'll let you decide:

I think of pride as spiritual table sugar; ordinary sucrose.

1. It tastes really, really good.

2. In large doses, it can lead to all kinds of health complications from cavities to gout and diabetes.

3. There is NO amount of it that's actually GOOD for you.

Thoughts?"

A: "A lot would depend on pride for you or others?"

ME: "Not sure.  The longer I study the subject, the more I question the benefit of ANY sort of pride, especially as compared to the great benefits of abject humility.  No conclusions here, just a lot of questions."

B: "Taking pride in doing a good job has merit.  Wearing your pride like a badge of honor does not have merit or value."

C: "Aren't you proud of your kids or proud of what you have accomplished? Pride, like all things, in moderation."

ME: "That's rather my point.  Pride is a sneaky sin; it doesn't even seem like it ought to be a sin at all.  Why shouldn't you be proud of your kids?  Why shouldn't you take pride in your work?  Makes sense, right?  But Christians are supposed to dedicate EVERYTHING to God, not just the parts we're NOT proud of.  Again, it gets sticky, and I'm left with more questions than answers.

    "I suppose it's possible that pride, like sugar, may or may not be particularly harmful in small doses, but what I'm wondering is: is there any dosage at which it is actually beneficial, or do we simply tell ourselves that it is because, like sugar, it tastes really, really good? Especially considering that any amount of pride carries with it the possibility of interfering with our ability to glorify God?

    "Am I glad that some of the projects to which I have turned my hands and brain have culminated in successful results?  Am I glad that my children have grown into adults who tend to make good moral decisions and have found ways to occupy themselves that allow them to be self-sufficient?  Of course I am!  But I sometimes think that to elevate that gladness to a point of pride tacitly means to take a certain amount of credit for these things [or giving credit to others], and that means denying at least some of that credit to God."

D: "I have worked with God a lot on this.  Due to my skewed upbringing, I used to think that feeling good for accomplishments was pride.  I have since learned that this is very black-and-white thinking.  God created in me the ability to have the feeling of accomplishment.  He wants me to feel good when I do something hard.  If I didn't, there wouldn't be limited internal rewards for working hard.  I think that pride takes over when the source of that accomplishment is ruled to be totally me apart from God..."

    The conversation actually goes on a bit from there, but the gist has been presented, and the reason I moved the conversation to this blog was because I got tired of typing.  That seems like enough to get the point across, so let us move on.

    My dear Facebook friends, all of whom are people I actually know and love in real life, make sound, thoughtful arguments, and I very much appreciate all the comments (including those that I've not reproduced here).  This sort of intellectual intercourse is the very reason I even have a Facebook account and continue this blog.  Their participation greatly warms my soul.  From their comments, though, I wonder if I had solidly made my point, as they appear to be uniformly dodging it.  Let me try again here.

    Matthew 5:48 tells us that during the Sermon on the Mount, just after reciting the Beatitudes, Jesus tells the crowd something incredible: "Be perfect, even as your Father in Heaven is perfect."  This is a stand-alone statement, one that I have not taken out of context.  The surrounding Scriptures contain no caveats, clauses, addendums, provisos or riders.  "Be perfect." That's it.

    Well, nobody's perfect, as we are so fond of reminding one another, especially when we are attempting to excuse some infraction or slight.  And it's true; nobody is perfect, or is ever likely to be.  So why would our Lord make this admonishment to thousands of people if obedience was impossible?  Makes you go, "Hmmm...," doesn't it?

    The Book of Acts tells us that, following Pentecost, the apostles were able to perform many acts that we would call miracles; healing the sick, raising the dead, etc.  We don't see that sort of thing happening much today and, on those rare occasions when we do, we can almost universally attribute it to charlatanism.  One might say that this is because the last 500 years of advancements in science has provided us with perfectly natural, material explanations for much of what 1st century people would have considered miraculous.  This is a perfectly reasonable explanation and I enthusiastically endorse it.  However, let me propose another hypothesis, one I think is equally valid from a spiritual perspective if not an entirely rational one.

    We don't try.

    I propose that those 1st century apostles were men and women of great faith who took Jesus' command to "be perfect" extremely seriously and personally.  The idea that "nobody's perfect" wasn't part of their mindset.  As a result, they really were able to do things that we may still consider miraculous even today.

    For the last three years, I have been on a personal quest to become perfect as my Father in heaven is perfect, one that I have intensified over the last several months.  Guess what?  I haven't made it!  So far, I have not once turned out the light, crawled into bed, mulled over my actions during the previous day and thought to myself 'well, that wasn't too bad on the perfection scale.'  No, I lie there cataloging the many ways in which I've screwed up. I try not to feel too bad about it, though.  The only person about whom I have read that people seem to agree came close - Brother Lawrence - admitted it took him ten years to feel like he had made any headway at all.  So, maybe I've still got seven years to go?

    I have developed at least one insight though: Perfection is both exhausting and frustrating!   To even attempt it requires a total focus of 525,600 minutes per year, and even that doesn't guarantee success.  No wonder so few people - so few Christians - are really committed to trying.

    That probably also explains why, in Western culture, we tend to celebrate concepts like pride and greed as virtues, rather than condemn them as sins.  It saves us from the excruciatingly difficult work of trying to rid ourselves of them and allows us to embrace them instead.  As my Facebook interlocutor said, what's wrong with taking pride in your work?  What's wrong with being proud of your kids?  Sounds pretty virtuous, right?  I submit that it even goes rather far in explaining the current social and political climate in which we find ourselves wherein pride, avarice and lust are all considered qualities by which we choose our elected officials, often over things like knowledge and experience and certainly over something outrageous like humility!

    It also has the additional benefit of allowing us to more easily point out the splinter in our neighbor's eye while eliminating the need to do anything about the log in our own.  What log?  That's no log!  That's supposed to be there!

    I say that it's too bad.  I know from my own experience that, while I don't think I've achieved perfection - not even to the extent of eradicating my pride - the attempt itself has brought me more joy, more peace, more serenity, more ecstasy than I ever would have guessed and far more than I could have possibly experienced otherwise.  By not even acknowledging our need for perfection, much less try to do anything about it, by throwing in the spiritual towel as it were, we are left rather more empty for the lack of effort.

    "Look, I'm a Christian, I don't buy any of what you're saying, and I'm perfectly happy."  That may well be the case.  But it may also be that what you're mistaking for happiness is merely smug self-satisfaction and, more debilitating still, self-righteousness.  Again, I say "too bad."  It's as if we all know that we have a final exam coming up at end of term, but we're only putting forth the effort to make a C when, with a bit more prayer, a bit more meditation, a bit more study and a bit more critical self-examination, we could easily earn an A.

    Many will read this and say that I'm being too hard on myself.  Indeed, many people to whom I have expressed these ideas have said exactly that.  I accept that as a distinct possibility.  I also consider equally likely the possibility that I am not being too hard on myself, but that they are being too easy on themselves.  Spend all the time you want hanging out at the SUB and attending the football games.  As for me, I'm hoping to someday stand before the Pearly Gates and get my paper back with a giant red "A+" across the top.  Then I might allow myself a little bit of pride!  But, by then, I doubt I'll need any.

Pax