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PERFECT ON PURPOSE

What the Bible Actually Means When It Says "Perfect"

If you've already read Nobody Is Perfect, you've survived the first swing of the hammer.

There, we dealt with the slogan.
We watched "Nobody's perfect" masquerade as humility while contradicting a God who calls real humans "perfect," "blameless," "upright." We named it as what it is: a cozy, well-trained pet doctrine that lowers the bar until disobedience feels normal.

This essay is the next step.

If "Nobody's perfect" is the lie we hide behind,
this is about the truth we've been dodging.

When God says "perfect," what is He actually after?

The Word We Turned Into a Monster

For a lot of believers, perfect lives in the same category as:

So when Jesus says:

"Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect."
— Matthew 5:48

…our nervous system hears:

"Attain functional deity or live in permanent guilt. Those are your options."

Given that imaginary choice, most of us do the psychologically sane thing:

The problem is: Scripture doesn't talk that way.

The Bible keeps:

Not as a taunt.
As a plan.

If the first essay tore down the cardboard cutout version of "perfect" we invented, this one asks:

What if God meant something far better — and far more possible — than the monstrous standard we made up?

Anchor Text: Perfect and "Throughly Furnished"

Let's start somewhere wonderfully un-dramatic:

"All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness:
That the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works."
— 2 Timothy 3:16–17

Slow it down:

  1. Scripture is given to:

    • teach,
    • reprove,
    • correct,
    • train in righteousness…

  2. So that the man of God may be:

    • perfect,
    • throughly furnished (fully equipped),
    • unto all good works.

That's not mystical. That's very practical.

Picture a workshop:

"Perfect, throughly furnished" is like saying:

"This worker has everything he needs to do the job right — nothing missing, nothing out of place."

Not a demigod.
Not sinless omniscience.
Just fully trained, fully equipped, fully available.

That's one of Scripture's main pictures of "perfection":

Complete and ready for every good work God assigns.

Jesus' "Be Perfect": Context Actually Matters

Now circle back to the verse that gives everyone hives:

"Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect."
— Matthew 5:48

Read the therefore.

Jesus has just said:

Why?

"That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust."
— Matthew 5:45

The "perfection" in view is the completeness of the Father's love:

So when Jesus says "Be perfect," He's not saying:

"Achieve metaphysical flawlessness or burn."

He's saying:

"Let your love be whole like your Father's.
Stop loving only the people who are easy to love.
Grow up into the fullness of His goodness."

In other words:

Perfect in Matthew 5 = grown-up love that reflects the Father's heart.

Still confrontational.
But not insane.

Paul's Strange Way of Using "Perfect"

Paul does something fascinating with the word.

"Not as though I had already attained, either were already perfect: but I follow after…"
— Philippians 3:12

He says: "I'm not already perfect."
Then a few verses later:

"Let us therefore, as many as be perfect, be thus minded…"
— Philippians 3:15

So which is it?

His logic goes like this (paraphrased):

"I haven't arrived. I'm not done. I haven't fully attained what Christ has for me…
But if you're mature, you'll think the same way — always pressing forward."

Here, perfect = mature — not finished, not flawless, but grown-up in how you think, respond, and pursue Christ.

That same pattern shows up all over the New Testament:

Across these passages, biblical perfection looks less like:

"I never do anything wrong,"

and more like:

"I am no longer half-built, half-committed, or half-equipped.
I belong wholly to God, and He has made me ready to obey."

Even Jesus Was “Made Perfect”

If Paul using “perfect” two different ways doesn’t dismantle our cartoon version, Hebrews kicks the legs out from under it.

Scripture says two things about Jesus that most of us hold without flinching:

We quote the first part gladly:

“[He] was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin.”
— Hebrews 4:15

But the same book also says:

“…to make the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings.”
— Hebrews 2:10

And again:

“Though he were a Son, yet learned he obedience by the things which he suffered;
And being made perfect, he became the author of eternal salvation unto all them that obey him.”
— Hebrews 5:8–9

Now pause and be ruthlessly honest:

If perfect means “morally sinless,” then “made perfect” must mean “He used to be sinful.”

Functionally, you only have two options:

So what is Hebrews talking about?

The writer is not saying:

“Jesus used to be flawed and finally fixed it.”

He is saying:

“Jesus was brought all the way through the path of suffering obedience, and by finishing that course, He was fully fitted to be our High Priest and Savior.”

In other words:

And notice how that lines up with everything we’ve already seen:

In every case, perfection is about completion, maturity, readiness, nothing missing for what God intends.

If that’s how Scripture dares to talk about Christ Himself —
sinless, yet “made perfect” as our completed High Priest —

then we have no business shrinking “Be ye therefore perfect” down to “Try hard, fail daily, and make nervous jokes about it.”

The problem was never the word.
The problem was the shrunken, guilt-soaked definition we stuffed into it.

A Working Definition: Wholehearted, Mature, Fully Equipped

If we gather all those threads, we can say:

To be "perfect" in Scripture is to walk with God in wholehearted obedience, integrity, and maturity — fully equipped by His Word and Spirit to do every good work He asks of you, with nothing knowingly held back.

That's the positive picture.

Perfect at Your Stage, Not Beyond It

Think about it in human terms.

We would never look at a newborn and say,
"Pathetic. Can't drive. Can't pay taxes. Totally imperfect."

We don't judge them by a standard that belongs to a different stage. We ask:

Biblical "perfection" works the same way.

God is not asking a spiritual newborn to act like a seasoned elder in Christ.
He is asking that, at whatever stage you are, nothing is being knowingly held back from Him.

Perfection is not "skipping the process."
It's being whole and honest and fully yielded at your current place in the process — and refusing to dig your heels in when God calls you deeper.

When you're ready, let's look at What Perfect Looks Like in Real Life.