The Spirituality of Imperfection

Romans 8:1-3

There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the life-giving Spirit in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and death. For God achieved what the law could not do because it was weakened through the flesh. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and concerning sin, he condemned sin in the flesh.

Several years ago I had a conversation with a long-time friend who had spent several years as a college pastor at a large southern California church before moving from college ministry to plant a church in Lake Havasu Arizona, a small resort community most famous for being the home of the London Bridge. He told me about his experiences in planting a church and all that was involved. One part of the story has remained with me all these years. He said that although Lake Havasu was a small community, it had several churches and two ministerial associations. As a way to get acquainted with his fellow pastors he started attending the ministerial association meetings, both the evangelical association and the liberal association. You must understand that my friend is a staunch conservative evangelical, yet he told me he joined the liberal ministerial association. "Why?" I asked him. The answer, "The liberal pastors were real people, with real struggles. They shared these and supported and cared for one another. It was a safe place to be real." In the conservative association everything was always great. The Lord was blessing. And there was a competition to see who was growing the fastest.

I filed this story away with many others over the years, and measured it against my own experience as having grown up in the fundamentalist/evangelical community, and gone through my own struggles. I came to the conclusion that in much of our community, while we rightly hold to salvation by grace through faith in Christ alone, our understanding of the Christian life falls short of the biblical teaching.

1. Why is it that my friend felt more safety in a liberal environment than in a conservative environment?
2. What is it about conservative evangelicalism that makes other evangelicals seek other fellowship?
3. Could it be that grace is close to the lips of evangelicals but rarely finds its way into the halls of our churches?
4. Finally, what can we do to change the perception?

I am going to present a short history lesson to help us answer some of these questions. History buffs, will most certainly be excited, but those of you who may not peruse the tables of the saints of the past with such enthusiasm, hang with me and you will surely see the relevance.

Relationship to God
As Protestants our heritage is founded in the Reformation of the 16th century. If we know anything about church history we probably know about Martin Luther and that he nailed his 95 theses to the door of the Cathedral in Wittenberg on October 31, 1517. That action precipitated the Reformation.

Luther had spent years as a monk trying to gain God's approval. He understood God as utterly holy and righteous and the judge of all sin. He confessed his sins for hours every day because he was convinced that even one sin would separate him from God's holy presence and condemn him eternally. He was so earnest in his confession that his confessor finally told him in exasperation "Go out and do something worthy of confession! Stop bringing me these little peccadilos." He tells us that he hated the righteousness of God because it was that which condemned. But one day when he was studying Romans he discovered Romans 1:17 "The righteous man shall live by faith." He tells us that this verse opened his eyes to understand that the righteousness of God was not found in his condemnation of humanity, but was instead a gift he gives to those who believe.

Martin Luther rediscovered Paul's teaching that our acceptance by God and our relationship with God is based upon a work of God himself, a work in which we need only to trust-in short: justification by faith. Our righteousness and acceptance before God is not based upon works we do to please him (or to keep from displeasing him), but is a free gift received by faith in Jesus' finished work. This insight became the foundational truth that defines us as Protestants in contrast to Roman Catholics.

The shift to Holiness theology
But there was a shift in teaching on the Christian life beginning in the early 1700's. Much of American Protestantism adopted teaching about our day to day ongoing relationship with God that affirmed God's absolute holiness but departed from the teachings of Scripture and the insights of the Reformers. While they would seldom admit it, most believed that we were saved eternally by grace through faith, but maintained relationship with God through obedience-works.

Sin and perfection
Sin Redefined. The goal for the Christian's fellowship with God often became sinless perfection. To be sure this perfection was to be achieved through the power of the Spirit. But the important thing was that the standard was absolute sinlessness. A tall order to say the least! How were mere mortals to achieve this standard? The answer was to redefine sin. From the early church up to the 1700s sin had been defined in as a lack of conformity to God's law, or lack of conformity to God's moral character. The new operative definition became "a conscious act of willful disobedience to known law." (This falls far short of the biblical concept of sin and involves only one type of sin that which the OT calls a sin of a "high hand" for which there was no atoning sacrifice.) If one did not consciously sin he or she was perfect/holy/spiritual/filled with the Spirit. If one did sin one was carnal/unspiritual/out of fellowship.

All or Nothing mentality. Notice particularly in this understanding there are only two options: in or out, yes or no, spiritual or carnal. It is all or nothing. We are either holy/spiritual/in fellowship with God, or we are unholy/carnal/out of fellowship.

The effect of this perfectionistic spirituality spread through nearly all American Christian teaching on spirituality/holiness and godliness was often reduced to a formula that was unrelated to the fruit of the Spirit.