Does The Bible Say We Should Be Perfect?
If you found the Ten Commandments challenging, here’s one more. Good luck.
Years ago, as a young father, an entrepreneur and clinical counselor, I remember attending a church service, listening to a pretty uplifting sermon, when I heard something that shocked me. In his sermon, the minister said, “Be perfect, as God is.” He said that’s what Jesus told us to do. Be perfect? “Geez!”, I thought. God was supposed to love us the way we are.
Professional counselors are taught that perfectionism is a toxic behavior, and even career and personal development programs teach business clients that unconditional positive regard is necessary for a person to reach their full potential. Perfectionism needs to be given up. It hurts our self-esteem and limits us. We need to be able to tolerate being imperfect without judging ourselves unworthy. We need to accept imperfection to be satisfied with reality.
Now, here, from a pastoral counselor, I hear that the Bible says we should be perfect! It did not sound right to me so later, I looked it up, and there it was in the Bible, “Be perfect.” (Matthew 5:48). It gave me another reason to be suspicious of preachers and their religions.
Perfectionism is a disorder. Needing to be perfect can’t be a good thing.
Perfectionism is a common affliction, with lots of suffering. Perfectionists are never satisfied with themselves or their creations. There is always something to be corrected, something to be improved. The job is never finished. There is no rest. Faultfinding becomes a painful obsession. They see only what’s imperfect, though others may marvel at their form and function. Perfectionists are robbed of the joy in appreciating what others find beautiful or wonderful. They are compelled to keep seeing and fixing the flaws that others do not see, sometimes because they are not really there.
Recovery from this affliction is in the acceptance of what they had been judging imperfect. Deciding, dammit, “I’m OK the way I am”, “It’s OK the way it is.” Getting well and recovering from perfectionism is a matter of consciously deciding that God’s creation is beautiful, “flaws” and all. It’s a matter of accepting that we and our creations don’t need to be perfect “as God is”, to be acceptable.
In my work helping people solve their weight problem, perfectionism has prevented many clients from succeeding. It had demanded that they be “good” (as in perfect) to succeed. When they messed up, the failure caused them to give up their dream of success. The pain of the failure was too much to bear. Deciding to quit trying was the way to avoid the feelings of failure and self-hate, or so they thought. But it didn’t work. They still felt like failures and they hated it.
My way is different. I teach people that perfection is not required, that success is good enough. My way works. My clients succeed. They are not perfect, but they are successful. And success is good enough, believe me. Success is great.
Perfectionism can keep us from being happy with ourselves, even lead us to hate ourselves. It can keep us from sharing our works with the world because they are never ready to be unveiled, never ready to market, even though they would be relished and fought over in the marketplace.
The cure for perfectionism is in the acceptance of reality, loving it, and nurturing it.
So, mediocrity is OK?
No. However, for a lot of people, mediocrity has become their “good enough”.
I find that today, people from all walks of life are doing mediocre work, or, let’s face it, lousy work. Their work is sloppy, careless, unfinished. Doctors, painters, wait staff, policemen, retail clerks, lawyers, city workers, dentists, psychologists — people from all walks of life produce mediocrity. And many people accept it as normal.
When I point out what needs to be corrected, these “mediocre-is-normal” people will just look at me and make a half-hearted effort to look like they care. They may sigh and roll their eyes. What they produce is mediocre or worse, defective, and they expect you to accept it because they accept it.
Painters leaving drips and missed patches, social workers pretending they made calls they did not make, policemen in disheveled uniforms, doctors giving examinations without even touching the patient — the list is endless. It’s gotten so it’s unusual when I encounter someone who genuinely cares about doing a good job. I’ve become accustomed to people doing mediocre work, and when I’ve pointed out what needs to be done better, many people are surprised that someone expects them to do quality work. Mediocrity has become normal for them. Mediocrity has become their goal.
Mediocrity leads to decay, and you know where that leads.
We do not need to be perfect, but we do need to thrive, to succeed. We cannot be satisfied with mediocrity if we want to survive, thrive, succeed, and be happy.
What is your standard, your goal?
If your goal is perfection, you are doomed to fail in reaching your goal. No matter how many times you review and correct what you think needs to be improved, you’ll never reach perfection. If you are satisfied with nothing less than perfection, you will never be satisfied, a horrible prospect. Perfectionism is a losing proposition.
I take exception to the minister telling his flock to be perfect. They are apt to think of themselves as failures and unworthy if they do not live up to his directive. And they will surely fail at being perfect.
However, to accept and expect mediocrity, making it our goal, is a path to self-decay and destruction, the opposite of thriving. What then is our goal if we want to succeed, to thrive instead of decay? What should we be satisfied with? If not perfection, what is the “good enough” that leads to success?
Winston Lord and Henry Kissinger’s establishment of a reasonable standard.
In the early 1970’s, the United States Secretary of State, Henry Kissinger, directed the Ambassador to China, Winston Lord, to write an important foreign policy report regarding the new, world-changing relationship between China and the United States.
Ambassador Lord delivered the report, and recalls: “He called me in the next day and said, “Is this the best you can do?” I said, “Henry, I thought so, but I’ll try again.” So I go back in a few days, another draft. He called me in the next day and he said, “Are you sure this is the best you can do?” I said, “Well, I really thought so. I’ll try one more time.” Anyway, this went on eight times, eight drafts; each time he said, “Is this the best you can do?” So I went in there with a ninth draft, and when he called me in the next day and asked me that same question, I really got exasperated and I said, “Henry, I’ve beaten my brains out — this is the ninth draft. I know it’s the best I can do: I can’t possibly improve one more word.” He then looked at me and said, “In that case, now I’ll read it.”
When Lord submitted his first draft, he had decided it was good enough, but when asked if it was the best he could do, he agreed it was not. After nine revisions, he finally submitted what he decided was the best he could do.
Lord’s definition of “good enough” shifted. Now, “good enough” had changed from average, mediocre, to the best he could do, his most excellent work.
Be excellent. Demand excellence.
Stop accepting mediocrity. We don’t need to be perfect, but we do need to thrive, to succeed, and to be happy. So does the rest of the world. Make excellence your standard, your goal. When we do our best, it creates excellence. With that, we, thrive, succeed, and we are happy with that. Mediocre is unacceptable but perfection is not required. Success and thriving is good enough. Be excellent. Stop accepting mediocrity.
William Anderson is a Licensed Mental Health Counselor, the author of “The Anderson Method of Permanent Weight Loss” (paperback and Kindle at Amazon, audiobook at Audible). He was obese until his early thirties when he found the solution. He lost 140 pounds, has kept it off for 35 years, and has taught thousands to successfully manage their weight.
(P.S. Jesus did not actually say we should be perfect. He didn’t speak English. The original text says he said something else.)
