God reveals through His Creation and through various Scripture texts that His nature is utterly PERFECT! There is no flaw in His character or His wisdom, knowledge, deeds and almighty creative power. No one can justly accuse Him of any wrong doing. He is infinitely and eternally holy, good, true, pure and righteous.
Deuteronomy 32:3-5
“For I proclaim the name of the LORD; ascribe greatness to our God! The Rock! His work is perfect, for all His ways are just; a God of faithfulness and without injustice, righteous and upright is He. They have acted corruptly toward Him, they are not His children, because of their defect; but are a perverse and crooked generation.” (NASB)
Psalm 50:1-3
“The Mighty One, God, the LORD, has spoken, and summoned the earth from the rising of the sun to its setting. Out of Zion, the perfection of beauty, God has shone forth. May our God come and not keep silence; fire devours before Him, and it is very tempestuous around Him.”
Psalm 19:7-8
“The law of the LORD is perfect, restoring the soul; the testimony of the LORD is sure, making wise the simple. The precepts of the LORD are right, rejoicing the heart; the commandment of the LORD is pure, enlightening the eyes.”
Isaiah 25:1
“O LORD, You are my God; I will exalt You, I will give thanks to Your name; for You have worked wonders, plans formed long ago, with perfect faithfulness.”
Philippians 1:6
“For I am confident of this very thing, that He who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Christ Jesus.” (Emphases added.)
Because of His perfect nature, God is flawlessly righteous, holy and pure. Everything He does flows from that perfect nature, including His Judgment of Sin. When He judges Sin in anyone, the judgement is perfectly in line with the utter perfection of His nature and His perfect standards of righteousness. He does not judge according to our views, opinions, perspectives or intentions. He judges all things according to the infinitely righteous perfection of His nature.
Knowing this is chilling and totally dreadful to us humans that are so flawed, imperfect and contaminated by Sin. This realization notifies us that as long as we rely solely on our own efforts and devices, we will never pass the scrutiny of His perfect righteous judgement with impunity. God’s standards are infinitely beyond us! So…we are totally bankrupt before Him!
So what can we do? How can we ever pass through the perfect scrutiny of His Judgment and come through it safely? Well…this is where God’s perfect wisdom saves the day. Despite all our failings, God still wants to become one with us. He wants to be so close to us that He can actually live and abide within us so that we can work as one on the Earth! But how can this be, when His perfect nature won’t even allow a speck of Sin’s corruption to remain in His Presence! How can we approach Him, much less be one and abide with Him with no sense of fear, shame, guilt and condemnation? How can we approach God without being struck dead by His perfect holiness and justice when we know we’ve sinned and are undeserving of His favor in ourselves? Why would God even bother with the likes of us, at all?
Psalm 8:3-4
“When I consider Your heavens, the work of Your fingers, the moon and the stars, which You have ordained; what is man that You take thought of him and the son of man that You care for him?”
The more we observe the beauty, order and vastness of God’s Creation, the easier it is to see how glorious, transcendent and perfect He is. And it’s easier to understand why His judgments against Sin must be 100% perfect, righteous, holy and pure and why He will never ‘cut corners’ or ‘wink at sin’, or ‘sweep even a speck of corruption under the rug’. If he were to indulge in such practices even once, He would not be God! No, He is the Perfect Spirit of Truth. Everything must be brought into the spotlight of His Righteous Truth, Reality and Justice. Everything will be judged and paid for according to God’s perfection. Because He is perfect, it’s obvious that in ourselves we fallen, Sin-contaminated humans will never satisfy His standards. On our very best day we will all fall short of His Glory.
Romans 3:19-26
“Now we know that whatever the Law says, it speaks to those who are under the Law, so that every mouth may be closed and all the world may become accountable to God; because by the works of the Law no flesh will be justified in His sight; for through the Law comes the knowledge of sin.
“But now apart from the Law, the righteousness of God has been manifested, being witnessed by the Law and the Prophets, even the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all those who believe; for there is no distinction; for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, being justified as a gift by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus; whom God displayed publicly as a propitiation in His blood through faith. This was to demonstrate His righteousness, because in the forbearance of God He passed over the sins previously committed; for the demonstration, I say, of His righteousness at the present time, so that He would be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.” (Emphasis added.)
But what is impossible to man, God Himself is able to do. And He has done it! It’s not at all about us. God has done everything needed on our behalf. He is also perfect in His Mercy and Compassion. And He has exercised His perfect Mercy through His living Word:
Isaiah 55:8-11
“‘For My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways My ways,’ declares the LORD. ‘For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways and My thoughts than your thoughts. For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return there without watering the earth and making it bear and sprout, and furnishing seed to the sower and bread to the eater; so will My word be which goes forth from My mouth; It will not return to Me empty, without accomplishing what I desire, and without succeeding in the matter for which I sent it.” (Emphasis added.)
Not only does Scripture reveal God’s Perfection and Excellence, it also tells us that His Word who comes forth from Him is also Perfect in every way. And it is through this Word that God will recreate and fully perfect His Creation after all demonic rebellion and Sin are completely and forever dealt with. It isn’t that God has to lower His perfect standards in order to save those that are so imperfect, it’s the opposite. God requires us to exchange our imperfect lives for the Perfect Life of His risen Son, so that in Him, we can be made as righteous and perfect as our Heavenly Father! We could never meet God’s standards in our own strength, so God has to restore us to our original ‘image and likeness’ of God specifications. His Word must do all the work of saving and restoring us. And the amazing and wonderful news is this: He has already done it!
God has done everything necessary. All that remains is for the fruit of His finished work to be applied to individual people. His Word, His beloved Son, in whom He is well pleased, is our Perfect Redeemer and Blood Covenant Representative and perfect atoning sacrifice and perfect eternal High Priest. He proceeds and comes from God to us. He is one with God; He meets God’s perfect standards perfectly – in our name. He fulfills the requirements of God’s perfect Law in our place. And because God includes those that believe and submit to His Word into His New Covenant, we become as one with Yeshua, the living Word of God that became flesh and who serves as our eternal High Priest and Messiah. God can rightly demand perfect righteousness of us, knowing that His perfect living Word has become to us wisdom, salvation, redemption and righteousness…to His Father’s total satisfaction! Thanks to God’s perfect mercy, we can receive the perfect Lamb of God from God and offer that gift back to Him and know in advance that He is then perfectly pleased and satisfied with us.
Although we have no righteousness in ourselves and can’t attain it by any efforts or devices of our own, Perfect Righteousness can abide within us as long as we believe in and rely upon the Perfect Finished Atoning Work of our indwelling Lord.
Romans 5:8-10
“But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from the wrath of God through Him. For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His Life.”
By the Power of the indwelling Holy Spirit, our Master’s Perfect Humanity and Resurrection Life are actually transmitted into us. In this way His Perfection and Righteousness are imparted to us. Once we forsake and die to our former radically independent self-life and begin to defer to Yeshua, so that He can live and obey His Father from within us, His perfect righteousness and holiness can begin to operate in us and be seen coming from us. Thus His Perfection becomes our perfection. And because we are endowed with all that Yeshua has come to be for us, we have no more excuses. We can be righteous and perfect, just as our Heavenly Father is righteous and perfect because it is not about us and our poor limitations; it is about Yeshua and His glorious Perfection as He gives Himself to us and is revealed in us and through us. That is why the Holy Spirit tells us:
Philippians 2:12b-13
“…work out your salvation with fear and trembling; for it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure.”
And elsewhere, because of this wonderful reality, our Master says to His disciples:
Matthew 5:13-20
“You are the salt of the earth; but if the salt has become tasteless, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled under foot by men. You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden; nor does anyone light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all who are in the house. Let your light shine before men in such a way that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven. Do not think that I came to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I did not come to abolish but to fulfill. For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or stroke shall pass from the Law until all is accomplished. Whoever then annuls one of the least of these commandments, and teaches others to do the same, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever keeps and teaches them, he shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I say to you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will not enter the Kingdom of Heaven.” (Emphasis added.)
And because God Himself lives in us to be what only He can be and do what only He can do, His supernatural life and obedience to God’s standards can now be seen at work within our flesh. So our Master later added this:
Matthew 5:43-48
“You have heard that it was said, ‘YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven; for He causes His sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? If you greet only your brothers, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same? Therefore you are to be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect.”
When we try to be ‘good’ in our own strength, we fail miserably. And even if our external religious appearance and rituals seem to be flawless, the inner motives of our selfish, conniving Sin-corrupted hearts contradict the religious appearances that appear on the surface of the lives of people that do not really have the Spirit of God working in them. When such people strive to be ‘good’ and ‘holy’ on their own, God is not impressed or pleased, for they are committing the sin of Cain (Gen. 4:3-7). Religious striving is on the surface, but the corruption of Sin still prevails within their unrepentant hearts.
Genesis 4:8
“Cain told Abel his brother. And it came about when they were in the field, that Cain rose up against Abel his brother and killed him.”
Jeremiah 17:9-10
“The heart is more deceitful than all else and is desperately sick; who can understand it? I, the LORD, search the heart; I test the mind, even to give to each man according to his ways, according to the results of his deeds.”
When we view the Reality of God’s awesome, perfect, righteous holiness from a self-centered perspective, it is terrifying. It’s like having secret police suddenly burst into our bedrooms, catching us in the most embarrassing and incriminating situations possible. But when we view this truth from the perspective of Christ abiding and living His Life in us, and pleasing and satisfying God in our name, it becomes the most wonderful, liberating good news imaginable. The fact that God is utterly transcendent and completely ‘other’ and ‘beyond’ what we are…the fact that He and His standards are infinitely beyond our reach…lets us know for sure that our salvation, righteousness, sanctification and ability to pass God’s judgment could never be our responsibility. A gnat is better equipped to pay a billion dollars in income tax than we are equipped to perform at a level that would impress, please and satisfy the standards of Almighty God!
When we realize that in His perfect wisdom, God already knows this, and has made provision to cover this necessity, we can rejoice in the tremendous freedom and liberty that the gift of our Messiah imparts to us. Yes we are always highly limited and imperfect in ourselves. But our Master is Perfect Righteousness. And He gave Himself for us…and to us. Now He abides in us to be whatever we, in ourselves, could never be. Thanks to Him, we too are righteous even as God is righteous, even though we remain personally imperfect.
Because our righteousness is a pure gift from God, we never have a right to strut around or crow about our excellence or status. We are born sons of God and co-heirs with our Messiah (Christ), but we did nothing to earn it. It is a birthright. So we have no right to look down on others or assume false positions of superiority over anyone else. We are not sitting with our Master on His Throne in the Highest Heavens because we managed to climb to those lofty heights through our own efforts. We sit with Him because He poured His human life out to the last drop of His blood, even while we were His enemies. He became our way to God. First, in His mercy, He cleansed us; then, after we allowed the Cross to strip away our radical independence from God, His living Word lifted us up to sit with Him at His side, even as He transmits His Righteousness into us.
So we can enjoy airtight Rest and Peace, knowing that the burden and responsibility for our well being and safety is completely in our Master’s hands. We are His responsibility and concern. He is the Perfect Shepherd and we are His flock. And He owns the responsibility for looking to and supplying, all of our needs, Perfectly…Forever! (See Ezek. 34)
Ephesians 1:3-8a
“Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we would be holy and blameless before Him. In love He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intention of His will, to the praise of the glory of His grace, which He freely bestowed on us in the Beloved. In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of His grace which He lavished on us.”
A granite-solid, bedrock foundation of faith in our infinite, eternally perfect God must first be in place before an authentic disciple-life of airtight faith and wholehearted obedience to God can begin to grow and develop within us. We must know how infinitely perfect God really is before we can entrust ourselves and everything about us into His hands. You wouldn’t entrust precious gems or nuggets of gold to your pockets if you knew they were full of holes, would you? Neither can you entrust your temporal and eternal well being to a god that in your mind is imperfect, incapable or capricious.
That’s why it’s so important that we know the real, living God as He really is, in all of his infinite, eternal Perfection. He commands us to believe and rest in Him because He knows only that can give us the peace, rest and joy we must have in order to be His image and likeness. That’s why we must know for sure that He is perfect and eternally faithful to us. We must know that He operates out of infinitely perfect love, goodness, wisdom and Almighty Power so that we can trust in Him rather than in ourselves.
Hebrews 11:6
“And without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is and that He is a rewarder of those who seek Him.”
God is saying that if we could know Him as He really is, in all of His Perfection, we would naturally and automatically rest in total peace and confident assurance in the airtight excellence of His love, concern and provision for us. But since only God can actually know Himself as He really is, our poor little minds can never comprehend all that He is. So we have to learn to trust His Word and live with Him by faith. But He clearly reveals that He is infinitely trustworthy and reliable, so it is right and just and appropriate for us to rejoice and rely on Him at all times and for all things. We can easily afford to be joyful and celebrate in Him, always! And that is why, without faith, it is impossible to please God.
Philippians 4:4-7
“Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice! Let your gentle spirit be known to all men. The Lord is near. Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.”
Colossians 3:15-16
“Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body; and be thankful. Let the word of Christ richly dwell within you, with all wisdom teaching and admonishing one another with psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with thankfulness in your hearts to God.”
It doesn’t matter what our temporary circumstances may be here on Earth. Circumstances always change. They mean nothing compared to God’s awesome eternal ability, love and faithfulness on our behalf. If you see photos that modern technology takes of what is in outer space, you can get an inkling of the incomprehensible vastness, magnitude, depth and enormity of the physical Creation that the Authority of God’s living Word easily put into place and which He lavishly sustains with such amazing perfect order. When we see things from that perspective, the planet Earth that seems so large and overwhelming to us, is seen for what it really is – an insignificant invisible speck hidden amid the vastness of galaxies we could never even begin to count!
When we see that, we realize how great God must truly be. And we realize that God, through His living Word and Holy Spirit, is more than capable of looking after us and seeing to our every need. He is Perfect! Nothing escapes Him; nothing is a problem for Him. There is no need for those that trust Him, to worry or fret…about anything! He has everything that is past, present and future already figured, factored, covered and completely paid for. That’s why He commands us in Scripture, over three hundred and sixty times, to stop fearing, worrying, fretting or being anxious. With a God that is so Perfect and Faithful in every way and on every level, the only proper response is to abide in perpetual rest, peace, joy and to bring all of our needs, cares and concerns, to Him with outrageous confidence.
When Job realized more fully who it was that he was dealing with, he was reduced to awe, silence and worship:
Job 42:1-6
“Then Job answered the LORD and said, ‘I know that You can do all things,
and that no purpose of Yours can be thwarted. ‘Who is this that hides counsel without knowledge?’ Therefore I have declared that which I did not understand,
Things too wonderful for me, which I did not know. Hear, now, and I will speak; I will ask You, and You instruct me. I have heard of You by the hearing of the ear; but now my eye sees You; therefore I retract, and I repent in dust and ashes.”
So then beloved, if the risen Lord of Glory has picked you out from among the crowd and said to you, “Follow Me!”…Don’t be afraid. There is no need to doubt or hesitate. Your peace and hope and well being do not depend on flaky human beings or changing circumstances or on any temporary created thing. When God sends His beloved Son to pick you and call you out from out of the crowd of unbelieving people, a million and one reasons for why you can’t obey His command will naturally rush into your mind. But those doubts are all meaningless, irrelevant and pointless. If He calls you, be assured that God has already factored and covered whoever and whatever you will have to leave behind. Everything will be taken care of by the one who is Perfection itself. He has already figured, provided for taken every detail – past, present and future – into account; because He is utterly Perfect! No demon or unbelieving human will ever be able to stop Him from fulfilling His awesome plans or revealing His Glory throughout every speck of His Creation.
No matter what lies ahead, no matter what will be needed to maintain, protect and supply you, no matter what you’ll have to face in the future, Yeshua, the living Word of God Himself, has already made sure that you and He will be able to finish the course that Father has set before you both.
Hebrews 12:1-3
“Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us also lay aside every encumbrance and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the joy set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. For consider Him who has endured such hostility by sinners against Himself, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart.”
Beloved ones your Master and Shepherd has the wisdom, skill and resources necessary to cover you in this world and also to get every one of us across the ‘Finish Line’ safely, into our eternal inheritance. Notice in the Amplified Bible translation, how pointedly the Holy Spirit reassures those that hesitate to trust in God:
Hebrews 13:4-5
“Let your character or moral disposition be free from love of money [including greed, avarice, lust, and craving for earthly possessions] and be satisfied with your present [circumstances and with what you have]; for He [God] Himself has said, I will not in any way fail you nor give you up nor leave you without support. [I will] not, [I will] not, [I will] not in any degree leave you helpless nor forsake nor let [you] down (relax My hold on you)! [Assuredly not!]”
Instead of being afraid to follow our Master, we should really fear the prospect of living a life apart from Him. The most terrible thing that could happen is for Him to have to leave us behind because of our refusal to obey His call. If we disobey and stay behind, there’s nothing for us to look forward to in the future but desolation. The temporary things we place above Him in importance will sooner or later disappear and we’ll be left with nothing! So may it never be that you would choose to allow the Lord to go on ahead, without you! Be like Moses…dare to look into ‘the burning bush’…dare to stop what you’re doing and look to see why the bush is not being consumed by the fire. Because Moses dared to wonder why and because he turned and went aside to look into the matter…that’s when God called him by name and commissioned him to join Him in His plan to deliver His Chosen People from the iron furnace of Egypt.
The living Word of God that appeared to Moses in that burning bush is the same living Word that has summoned you to follow Him. He called to Moses from within a bush. But He may call to you from within a kitchen sink, or office desk, or a tool box or a machine in a factory or a locker room or a stack of baby diapers. But however He does it, stop what you’re doing and dare to wonder and find out why this is happening. Dare to see what His call means and what it will lead you into. Yes, your past life and its old viewpoints, opinions and comfort zone will have to be sacrificed, but the new life He has for you in the future will never disappoint you. It will fill you with eternal wonder and joy and gratitude!
John 1:35-39a
“…the next day John (the Baptizer) was standing with two of his disciples, and he looked at Jesus as He walked, and said, ‘Behold, the Lamb of God!’ The two disciples heard him speak, and they followed Jesus. And Jesus turned and saw them following, and said to them, ‘What do you seek?’ They said to Him, “Rabbi (which translated means Teacher), where are You staying?” He said to them, ‘Come, and you will see.’ So they came and saw where He was staying; and they stayed with Him that day…”
Beloved ones, those two disciples are still with Him to this day. What they saw and heard on that memorable first day was so wonderful and compelling, that they never left Him! And if you take the trouble to find out more about Him, you too will follow Him and see and experience things you could have never imagined in your wildest dreams! And you too will not be able to help yourself; you too will decide to stay and abide with the Perfect One…forever!