I have often heard people say, “well nobody is perfect”.  I want to share an experience I had with an elder mother in the church.  We were in bible class and the Pastor had started a conversation on the corruption in our flesh , “ For in our flesh dwells no good thing”, (Romans 7:18).  From that discuss came the words about being perfect. I said no one is perfect, but my Mother in Christ proceeded to say she was perfect.She and I went back and forth; me telling her she was not perfect and she telling me she was.  It got somewhat heated with me but she was really calm and stood her ground claiming perfection.  I tried to pull the Pastor into the debate so he could tell her she was not perfect but, he kind of chuckled and said he would not get involved between a mother and daughter.  I left the class still very upset with this Mother of mine and was determined never to call her again because she was so for off the script and to sanctimonious to every understand her humanism. 

The next morning I was in prayer asking God for answers to my own problems and I had an unction to call her.  She answered her usual  way with “Praise the Lord”.  I knew right away I needed to apologize for my attack on her the night before.  I asked her to forgive me and then she explained Philippians 3:12 (please read).  This passage of scripture the Apostle Paul wrote talks about the perfection stages a Christian has after giving his life to Christ.  The first being Positional perfection which everyone that repents and comes to Christ receives upon conversion; we do not have anything to do with that after we give ourselves to Christ because his blood was shedding for this reason, to save men’s souls.  Second Relative perfection which is where we began to learn how to put on Christ and grow or mature.  Third and final is Ultimate perfection this is the final stage when a Christian is changed from mortality to immortality from corruption to incorruption and go home to be with Jesus forever.

See, as a young Christian I had never heard of this but, that day I learned by listening and hearing.  As a babe in Christ I had to desire the sincere milk of the word.  We that are in Christ are perfect in him but we must learn to walk upright before the Lord by praying, fasting, reading and studying God’s holy word  that when we open our mouths we will speak with wisdom, power and authority.  We will also know who we are and who we belong to.  We will know we are new creation and old things are passed away.  We can attest to being perfect in Christ and invite others to give their old life to Jesus and he will nail it to the cross and raise them to be a new perfect man in him.

With His Love and mine

Linda J.

Some interpretations is from the New Scofield Reference Bible