Being Inperfect

Be perfect therefore as your heavenly Father is perfect. Matthew 5:48
For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. Romans 3:23

Every Sunday and some days in between, I see or think about our church logo. We are “the inperfect church for inperfect people.” Yes, the misspelling is intentional. There are very good reasons why our pastor needs to make that declaration, why he needs visitors to kind of “get” us before they even walk in the door. This doesn’t mean that we are some new age, anything goes type of place. To the contrary, we are an Anglican church with our roots in some very old, very deep beliefs and practices. As far as how our service looks there is a nice balance. We are presented with ancient teachings in a lighter, freer way. The real rules certainly apply. They not only apply but are revered. A lot of the man made trappings, however, are missing. That’s okay. We’ve sorted out the things that draw us to God from the things that separate us. It’s a lovely mix of ancient and current. I like our church. It isn’t perfect, no one who goes there is perfect. That can be said of every church I’ve ever attended or heard about. The difference is we know it and we aren’t afraid to admit it.

Week after week we go over our core convictions. In my mind they make a bit more specific the words of Scripture, to love God and love our neighbor. (Deuteronomy 6:5, Luke 10:27) These core convictions were put together by the “inperfect” people who started this church. The people are imperfect but the ideas are stellar. There are six, lined up as an acronym that spells CHRIST. As simple and obvious as they seem when we say them, much like the idea of “loving” God and our neighbor, it can get complicated very quickly. We are after all, inperfect or imperfect or both.

We are, at our church, flawed people and we know it. I love that! The truth is there is not a church in this world that cannot make the same statement. There is no perfect church. I wonder so often how far we have actually come from what Jesus had in mind.

I’ve attended a few churches in my life, some of them, with some of the same people who I see every Sunday now. Those churches weren’t perfect. The difference is they weren’t quite comfortable admitting it. There is a freedom in having said right up front, we aren’t what we ought to be, yet.

Although we are called to “be perfect” I think it’s pretty clear we aren’t going to make it this side of heaven. What we do need to do is recognize our foibles and work to correct them. Even when we fall short if we’re acting out of love for God and love for our neighbor we’re pleasing God. None of us should get comfortable in our imperfections. We shouldn’t do the whole, “that’s just who I am” dance. We should all strive to be more and more like Jesus, to get closer and closer to perfect all the while being realistic.

Our church is perfect for imperfect people because admitting that we aren’t perfect creates an environment of growth and isn’t that a big part of what church is about?