‘In the image of God’… perfect? No, but good. Humanity was never ‘created’ perfect (aside: nor ‘given’ an immortal soul). Such ideas are not formed from the earthy theology of the Bible, but the ‘ideal’ world of the Greeks. The theology that looks for a way out; God is always searching for a way in.
The incarnation. Jesus is sinless, but not ‘perfect’. Or, at least, he is not intrinsically perfect in the sense the word is used of humans in Scripture, the sense of ‘mature’. To arrive at maturity is a process. And it was a process also for Jesus.
It was fitting that God, for whom and through whom all things exist, in bringing many children to glory, should make the pioneer of their salvation perfect through sufferings (Heb. 2:10).
Although he was a Son, he learned obedience through what he suffered; and having been made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him (Heb. 4:8,9).
And Jesus increased in wisdom and in years, and in divine and human favour (Luke 2:52).
A growth in wisdom, a path toward maturity. True humanity, that which Jesus exhibited, is not ‘perfection’ as suggested to us from our infected-by-Hellenistic-philosophy theology, but it is one that embraces mistakes, of holding to a position that has to be later abandoned, and moved on from it. We are all influenced by our culture, the wider cultures and the closer culture of the faith we have embraced.
Jesus learned.
Perfection is not the measure of true humanness, but learning, adapting, changing is the measure.
We know the classic example of Jesus learning from the Syro-Phoenician woman’s response; or when we consider the ‘who knew better?’ question related to Jesus or his mother in John 2! Or maybe the washing of feet of the disciples (John 13) was provoked by the washing of his feet by Mary of Bethany earlier (John 12).
Did Jesus learn in those situations? I reply with a resounding ‘for sure’. For sure, not simply because I wish to affirm his humanity, but because I wish to affirm his (sinless) true humanness.
This post might only be for me… To learn to embrace mistakes, not to see them as ‘sin’, as ‘failure’ but as the door provided to enable me to mature.
One of God’s good gifts to humanity is the ability to make mistakes.
God is God, and sadly we project on to God our humanity. ‘Anger’, ‘slow to forgive without proper repayment and forgiveness’; we tend to make God in our image, or the ‘idealised’ image of humanity (with all our imperfections). The two above examples are classic: wrath, but never are the anger of humans and the anger of God compared… and forgiveness… hence we end up with a transactional cross and a divided Trinity. Then we tend to make Jesus, as human, into ‘our’ God as human, so true humanness becomes something that provokes us to become even less human than we are! As if!!!
In the Garden we were tempted to become ‘as God’… the problem has always been a desire to become like the ‘God’ we perceive! Hence the purification we go through to act with power. The theology that sanctifies getting to the ‘top’.
It is all cut down when God becomes like us, the incarnation. Here is the image of God; here indeed is God.
(And the get to the top ideology is somewhat mocked in the tower of Babel story. The tower will reach heaven… God in heaven has to come ‘down’ to see it. Not so high after all. Hence, all the centres of power are not what they seem, they will all be unfinished, they will not reach the heights they proclaim. The small stone is always more effective than the great image that is created.)
The incarnation. And God in human form learns.
Long live mistakes. (Again written for me.) I guess it is not likely I hit the bulls eye today.
Love this !
Thanks Duncan.
Very reassuring for me thank you Martin. I constantly make mistakes and am having trouble with ‘maturity’ for sure. At the moment I am in the ‘blessed are the poor in spirit’ place and as I struggle here I know that the promise still remains that mine is the kingdom of heaven! It doesn’t make sense in this secular world of meritocracy and even Christian culture of some people claiming or being held up as examples of being on ‘higher spiritual levels’ but Jesus said it so it must be true. So I hold onto that and hope he will eventually help me become more mature!
I am so aware (maybe better, semi-aware) that we have so confused maturity with so many other things that have taken on a value. Not sure I have been very good on the path to maturity, but glad of the many companions I have met on the way.
Thanks Martin. I left the evangelical god years ago. I could not stand him. Found him immoral and abusive. Your description above opens a door back.
There are a lot of gods with an adjective ) / possessing nouns before the noun. Martin’s god is one. There is one that Jesus revealed… I have a post coming up that might interest (spoiler alert): Jesus emptied himself because he was in the form of God, not ‘though he was God, he emptied himself.’
I think we are all finding a door back.
One of the things I have adjusted of late has been my approach to the text and it falls much in line with this post because like Adam the text has been described as “God breathed”…(in-spired)…in that context both the bible and myself have received the breath of God.
I can take everything you’ve stated here and apply it to the Bible…and maybe we should…
Does the Bible learn from its mistakes?
Seems Paul adjusted the text a few times…even warping its meaning to become a lot more inclusive than the original letter would suggest, which kind of suggest that the text itself evolves or “learns”.
Like my friend Brad Jersak says “The Word of God is perfect, and when he turned 18 he grew a beard”
So I like to give myself the same respect I would give the text and give the text the same slack I would give myself…we are after all brothers…this means I need to measure my progress by the light…and not by shadows.
“If we walk IN the light as he is IN the light…” (meaning to me I find communion where Jesus is currently IN the light…I can’t possibly be in ALL the light at the same time, just in the spot of light I currently am in)…
Here’s to the spot of light we are in. I like what your spot has revealed. And Brad with the ‘beard’ comment is pretty smart… though if I am to be very insolent (and hugely tongue in cheek) a masculine comment! The evolution of humanity personal and corporate), of Jesus and of scripture… I need to try and get in board too!
Good stuff, thanks! I am acutely aware of my ‘mistakes’ but I have come to feel that I don’t need fixing so much as maturing. Religion likes to fix mistakes because mistakes need to be avoided so we can fit again and play our part within a model, but I suspect the cycle may well just repeat (thanks for the guilt/shame post a few days back- life giving). Mistakes as a door to maturity is a lot more inviting especially as I have so much material, a road to soften the heart and make us more compassionate a bit more human even.
Thanking God for this post Martin. It is really heart-healing stuff to know we are all on a journey and to be ‘getting there’ is the word of grace I needed to hear. I know many others need that too.