So Let it Grow

Have you ever wondered how it would feel to be perfect?  I think it would be pretty great. I would never be wrong. I would never do anything less than capably, correctly and with great quality. If I was perfect I would never say the wrong thing, never make a bad decision and be an amazing wife, mother and friend all the time. I would be perfect! Life would be perfect! 

In the book of James, God has something to say to us about perfection, and frankly, it dims the glow for me just a little bit:

“Dear brothers and sisters, when trouble comes your way, consider it an opportunity for great joy. For you know that when your faith is tested, your endurance has a chance to grow. So let it grow, for when your endurance is fully developed, you will be perfect and complete lacking in nothing.” (James 1:2-4)

Ah. So perfection, at least the biblical variety, comes through trouble, testing and endurance.  There are actually people who enjoy endurance…they are quite often runners, and usually do things like train in the rain for a marathon, or enter mud runs and other crazy races. They have the ability to withstand hardship and stress. They know what it is like to persevere.  I am struck by the way James says (about endurance) “So let it grow!!!!”  As for me, I feel like the four (added) exclamation points are necessary. It is like he is saying, “Bring on the perfection! Let adversity and the testing of faith begin! I want to complete and lacking in nothing.”

Hebrews 6:11, 12 “And we desire that each one of you show the same diligence so as to realize the full assurance of hope until the end, that you may not be sluggish, but imitators of those who through faith and patience, inherit the promises. “ Could it be that being perfect is not about a flawless life, but that being perfect and complete means we inherit the promises of God?

The good news is this. Even if you are not the world’s best wife and mother, if you sometimes say the wrong thing, and if every task you take on is not accomplished in the way Martha Stewart might do it, as a believer in Christ your are perfect and complete and lack nothing because of Christ and his work of completion in your life.  This ongoing work of completion will certainly include hardship, trials and tests.  But we know the outcome: perfect in the sight of our heavenly father. And that is all that matters.  “So let it grow!!!!”