Perfection

Perfection in Scripture is not abstract flawlessness but a relational completeness — a heart whole toward Yahweh, a life conformed to his commandments, a work brought to its proper end. The Old Testament word stands behind men who are called perfect with their God, and the New Testament word stands behind those who are full-grown in Christ. Both senses live together in the Bible's witness, qualified at every turn by the candid admission that "there is not [a] righteous man on earth, who does good, and does not sin" (Ec 7:20).

God's Perfection

The starting point is divine, not human. "The Rock, his work is perfect; For all his ways are justice: A God of faithfulness and without iniquity, Just and right is he" (De 32:4). David repeats the confession after his deliverance: "As for God, his way is perfect: The word [Speech] of Yahweh is tried; He is a shield to all those who take refuge in him [trust upon his Speech]" (2Sa 22:31; cf. Ps 18:30). The same God girds the believer with strength, "And makes my way perfect" (Ps 18:32). Divine perfection is also exhaustive in its work: "I know that, whatever God does, it will be forever: nothing can be added to it, nor anything taken from it; and God has done it, that men should fear before him" (Ec 3:14). And his word answers in kind — "I have seen an end of all perfection; [But] your commandment is exceedingly broad" (Ps 119:96).

Christ's Perfection and Sinlessness

The perfection of God is the perfection of Christ. "And the Speech became flesh, and dwelt among us, and we saw his glory, glory as an only begotten from a father, full of grace and truth" (Jn 1:14). Pilate, three times in this gospel, finds "no crime in him" (Jn 19:4). Jesus' own challenge stands unrebutted: "Which of you⁺ convicts me of sin? If I say truth, why don't you⁺ believe me?" (Jn 8:46). Isaiah had foreseen as much: "they made his grave with the wicked, and his tomb with the rich; although he had done no violence, neither was any deceit in his mouth" (Is 53:9). The apostolic witness makes the negative explicit. Paul: "Him who knew no sin he made [to be] sin on our behalf" (2Co 5:21). Peter: he was "a lamb without blemish and without spot" (1Pe 1:19), and "did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth" (1Pe 2:22). John: "in him is no sin" (1Jn 3:5).

Hebrews names the high priest "holy, blameless, undefiled, separated from sinners, and made higher than the heavens" (He 7:26), one who "has been in all points tried like [we are, yet] without sin" (He 4:15), who "through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God" (He 9:14). The Son loves righteousness and hates iniquity (He 1:9). Yet the same letter speaks paradoxically of Christ being "made perfect" — not from imperfection, but brought through suffering to the fullness of his saving office. "It was fitting for him… in bringing many sons to glory, to make the author of their salvation perfect through sufferings" (He 2:10); "and having been made perfect, he became to all those who obey him the author of eternal salvation" (He 5:9); the word of the oath appoints "a Son, perfected forever" (He 7:28). Christ's perfection, in Hebrews' idiom, is consummated through his obedience unto death, and in that perfection his people are made perfect — "by one offering he has perfected forever those who are sanctified" (He 10:14).

Perfection Ascribed to Men

The Old Testament does not flinch from calling men perfect. Of Noah it says he "was a righteous man, [and] perfect in his generations: Noah walked with God" (Ge 6:9), and the verse before grounds the phrase in grace — "But Noah found favor in the eyes of Yahweh" (Ge 6:8). Balaam, against his own intent, declares of Jacob, "He has not seen iniquity in Jacob; Neither has he seen perverseness in Israel: [The Speech of] Yahweh his God is with him" (Nu 23:21). Of Job: "There was a man in the land of Uz, whose name was Job; and that man was perfect and upright, and one who feared God, and turned away from evil" (Job 1:1). David remains the standing comparand for kings — Solomon's heart "wasn't perfect with Yahweh his God, as was the heart of David his father" (1Ki 11:4), and Solomon "did not go fully after Yahweh, as did David his father" (1Ki 11:6). Of Asa it is said, "the heart of Asa was perfect with Yahweh all his days" (1Ki 15:14). And in the gospel Jesus greets Nathaniel as "an Israelite indeed, in whom is no guile!" (Jn 1:47).

These ascriptions are not contradicted by the candid record of the same men's lapses. Abraham, called to walk before God and be perfect (Ge 17:1), passed Sarah off as his sister (Ge 20:2). Moses and Aaron failed to sanctify Yahweh in the eyes of Israel (Nu 20:12). Solomon, though loving Yahweh, sacrificed in the high places (1Ki 3:3). Jehoshaphat walked in his father Asa's way but did not remove the high places (1Ki 22:43); Asa himself, late in life, "did not seek to Yahweh, but to the physicians" (2Ch 16:12). Jonah fled from the presence of Yahweh (Jon 1:3). In the gospels, the disciples James and John want to call fire from heaven (Lu 9:54), and the Twelve dispute "which of them was accounted to be greatest" (Lu 22:24). Even Barnabas is "carried away with their hypocrisy" (Ga 2:13). Job himself protests both his integrity and its insufficiency: "I am perfect; I do not regard my soul" (Job 9:21), and "Though I be righteous, my own mouth will condemn me: Though I be perfect, it will prove me perverse" (Job 9:20). Solomon's prayer is realistic: "If they sin against you (for there is no man who does not sin)" (2Ch 6:36). The biblical "perfect" is therefore not sinlessness but wholeness of heart — a singleness of orientation Yahweh-ward that absorbs and outweighs the lapses without denying them.

The Duty of Striving

To this kind of perfection the people of God are constantly summoned. Yahweh to Abram: "I am God Almighty; walk before me, and be perfect" (Ge 17:1). Moses to Israel: "You will be perfect with Yahweh your God" (De 18:13); "you⁺ will not turn aside to the right hand or to the left" (De 5:32). Joshua at the end: "be⁺ very courageous to keep and to do all that is written in the Book of the Law of Moses, that you⁺ don't turn aside therefrom to the right hand or to the left" (Jos 23:6). Solomon to the assembly: "Let your⁺ heart therefore be perfect with Yahweh our God, to walk in his statutes, and to keep his commandments" (1Ki 8:61). David to Solomon: "serve him with a perfect heart and with a willing soul" (1Ch 28:9), and his prayer was that God would "give to Solomon my son a perfect heart, to keep your commandments" (1Ch 29:19). David vows it of himself: "I will behave myself wisely in a perfect way… I will walk inside my house with a perfect heart" (Ps 101:2). The wisdom literature widens the call: "Mark the perfect man, and look at the upright; For there is a [happy] end to the man of peace" (Ps 37:37); "the law of his God is in his heart; None of his steps will slide" (Ps 37:31); "the upright will stay in the land, And the perfect will be left in it" (Pr 2:21); "Blessed are those who keep justice, And he who does righteousness at all times" (Ps 106:3). Psalm 119 opens on the same note: "Blessed are those who are perfect in the way, Who walk in the law of Yahweh… they do no unrighteousness; They walk in his ways" (Ps 119:1-3); "Then I will not be put to shame, When I have respect to all your commandments" (Ps 119:6). Sirach concurs: "The paths of the perfect are straight, [Even] so are they stumbling-blocks to the presumptuous" (Sir 39:24).

The New Testament carries the same charge into Christ. The disciple "when he is fully trained will be as his teacher" (Lu 6:40). Paul speaks wisdom "among those who are full-grown" (1Co 2:6) and pleads, "let us cleanse ourselves from all defilement of flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God" (2Co 7:1); his prayer is for the readers' "restoration" (2Co 13:9), and his closing word, "Be restored; be comforted; be of the same mind; live in peace" (2Co 13:11). The pastoral gifts are given "until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a full-grown man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ" (Ep 4:11-13). Paul's apostolic aim is "that we may present every man perfect in Christ" (Cl 1:28); his prayer for the Philippians, "that you⁺ may be sincere and void of offense to the day of Christ" (Php 1:10), and "that you⁺ may become blameless and harmless, children of God without blemish in the middle of a crooked and perverse generation" (Php 2:15). Epaphras, of his own people, "always striving for you⁺ in his prayers, that you⁺ may stand perfect and fully assured in all the will of God" (Cl 4:12). To the Thessalonians: "night and day praying exceedingly that we may see your⁺ face, and may provide that which is lacking in your⁺ faith" (1Th 3:10); "to the end he may establish your⁺ hearts unblamable in holiness before our God and Father, at the coming of our Lord Jesus" (1Th 3:13). To Timothy: "be strengthened in the grace that is in Christ Jesus" (2Ti 2:1), "that the man of God may be complete, furnished completely to every good work" (2Ti 3:17). Hebrews: "let us press on to perfection" (He 6:1); the God of peace "provide you⁺ with every good thing to do his will, working in us that which is well-pleasing in his sight, through Jesus Christ" (He 13:20-21). James: "let patience have [its] perfect work, that you⁺ may be perfect and entire, lacking in nothing" (Jas 1:4). Peter: "the God of all grace, who called you⁺ to his eternal glory in Christ, after you⁺ have suffered a little while, will himself restore, establish, strengthen, [and] firmly set [you⁺]" (1Pe 5:10). Christ's own word to Sardis is the same charge made stark: "Be watchful, and establish the things that remain, which were ready to die: for I have not found your works perfected before my God" (Re 3:2).

Paul's own self-description sets the tone for all such striving. "Not that I have already obtained, or am already made perfect: but I press on, if also I may lay hold on that for which also I was laid hold on by Christ Jesus. Let us therefore, as many as are perfect, be thus minded" (Php 3:12,15). To be perfect, in this idiom, is to know one is not yet perfect and to press on.

The Essential Elements

Faith, love, and obedience are named as the substance in which perfection comes to be. James: "faith was working with his works, and by works was faith made perfect" (Jas 2:22); "if any doesn't stumble in word, the same is a perfect man, able to bridle the whole body also" (Jas 3:2); "he who looks into the perfect law, the [law] of liberty, and stays [with it]… this man will be blessed in his doing" (Jas 1:25). John: "whoever keeps his speech, in him truly has the love of God been perfected" (1Jn 2:5); "if we love one another, God stays in us, and his love is perfected in us" (1Jn 4:12). Paul names love as the binding term: "above all these things [put on] love, which is the bond of perfectness" (Cl 3:14). And the Johannine claim is the sharpest the New Testament offers: "Whoever is begotten of God does not sin, because his seed stays in him: and he can't sin, because he is begotten of God" (1Jn 3:9; cf. 1Jn 5:18). The same passage frames the claim ethically: "anyone not doing righteousness is not of God, neither is he who is not loving his brother" (1Jn 3:10) — perfection here is not the denial of every lapse but the new birth's incompatibility with a settled life of sin (1Jn 3:6-10).

In Christ Made Full

The believer's perfection is finally not self-generated but received in Christ. "In him dwells all the fullness of Deity bodily, and in him you⁺ are made full" (Cl 2:9-10). Christ "has reconciled in the body of his flesh through death, to present you⁺ holy and without blemish and unreproveable before him" (Cl 1:21-22). And on the priestly side, "by one offering he has perfected forever those who are sanctified" (He 10:14). Sanctification and perfection are two faces of one work — the work brought to its end by the perfect Rock whose word is tried, accomplished by the Son perfected through suffering, and applied by the Spirit through the patient striving of those who, knowing they are not yet perfect, press on.