WOULD YOU CONSIDER yourself to be a perfectionist? If so, in what way?

I’ve used that word of myself to say that I often put exacting standards on my creative work. In my writing, I will rework sentences and paragraphs over and over again. Even after the words are published, I might read them and say to myself, Shoot, I should have said it this way instead. A piece of woodwork has to be sanded until it’s absolutely smooth to the touch. And there have been times when I’ve spent hours sculpting a clay Christmas ornament only to mash it back into a lump and start over because it wasn’t taking shape the way I had envisioned.

All of this means extra work when, realistically, it was possible to quit sooner and say, “It’s good enough.” But to me, the extra effort is worth it, because I take great pleasure in a finished product that fulfills my hopes and expectations, from a well-turned sentence to a delicious plate of food.

This is different from the kind of anxious perfectionism in which one’s sense of worth or even safety is tied to performance. It’s less about taking pleasure in a job well done, and more about the fear of failure — with “failure” being defined as anything that isn’t flawless.

Children, for example, can be pressured by their parents to get straight A’s in school; eventually, they may internalize that standard to the point that they no longer need to be hounded to excel. But the anxious emphasis on performance can take the joy and curiosity out of learning. And no matter how many times they ace a test, they may never be free of the worry that the next test will be the one on which they’ll get a lowly B and suffer the pain of disapproval or rejection.

Imagine, then, the people who sat to listen to Jesus as he preached what we know as the Sermon on the Mount. The Jews among them would have been dismayed to hear him say that if they wanted to enter God’s kingdom, they would have to be more righteous than the Pharisees. How much more righteous? Jesus went on to teach what many in the centuries since have taken as an impossible ethical standard, culminating with the most stringent requirement of all: “Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matt 5:48, NIV).

If we hear those words with the ears of an anxious perfectionist, Jesus is saying, “If you want God’s approval, you have to be as perfect as he is. Nothing less will do.”

Or: we can hear them as an invitation to a goal utterly worth striving toward, a kind of righteousness more beautiful than what the people had been taught by the scribes and Pharisees. What Jesus means by “perfect” is not a demand to be morally flawless right now. It’s a vision of becoming more and more mature and complete, of being the child of a loving heavenly Father and growing up to be like him. And when the apostle Paul speaks of the Colossians being perfect, that’s what he means, too.

. . .

PAUL HAS JUST spoken of the “glorious riches” of God’s mysterious purposes, now revealed in the gospel: “Christ in you, the hope of glory” (Col 1:27). The Colossians are not only in Christ, but Christ is in them through his Spirit. Jesus is the center of Paul’s preaching and teaching:

He is the one we proclaim, admonishing and teaching everyone with all wisdom, so that we may present everyone fully mature in Christ. To this end I strenuously contend with all the energy Christ so powerfully works in me. (Col 1:28-29)

The wisdom Paul teaches about Jesus is for everyone in the church. Indeed, he uses the word “everyone” (literally, “every man”) three times in verse 28, although the New International Version only translates it twice. Paul admonishes everyone and teaches everyone so as to present everyone mature in Christ. Again, it’s as if to say that wisdom isn’t just for the few and fortunate, but for all. There’s no place for spiritual elitism in the church.

Moreover, Paul sees his apostolic calling as continuous with Christ’s work on the cross. In verse 22, he wrote: “But now he has reconciled you by Christ’s physical body through death to present you holy in his sight.” As I suggested before, we are already holy in God’s sight, but the work is not yet done; the day will come in which we will be presented to God as spot-free and blameless.

How do we get there? In part, through the apostolic teaching. The end goal of Paul’s ministry is to “present everyone fully mature in Christ”; the verb is the same as the one he used to speak of how we are reconciled to God through the cross and presented as holy before him. And as you may already have guessed, the phrase “fully mature” is the same word translated as “perfect” in Matthew 5. We are to be perfect as God is perfect, and that means being in Christ and growing up to be increasingly like him.

That’s the goal, the future vision toward which Paul strives, or as the NIV has it, the “end” toward which he “strenuously contends.” The verb pictures being in an intense contest, whether war or athletic competition. Paul does like his athletic metaphors: he can speak of the Christian life in general and his apostleship in particular as a race or even a boxing match (1 Cor 9:24-27). It requires discipline, training, and strenuous effort. But in the end, the prize is worth it.

. . .

PAUL IS ABOUT to wind up speaking about himself and why he does what he does, so he can transition into his specific instructions for the Colossians. He’s concerned that they’re listening to the wrong people, being enticed by the wrong ideas. That’s how he’ll begin chapter 2.

But as we finish chapter 1, I want to remind us again of the importance of recognizing both the already and the not yet. Because of Christ, we are already holy in God’s sight, even as we are becoming holy; we are already in Christ, and Christ is already in us, even as we continue to grow in maturity.

The race is long and we’ve got a long way to go. But we can run the race with the freedom of knowing that it’s not about competing for God’s love and acceptance; it’s competing in the security of that acceptance to become more like the Father who already loves us.