Real and Imperfect

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A Deep Breath of Life, Alan Cohen, Brian Johnson, divine nature, forgive, imperfection, perfect, perspective, real world, Richard Rohr, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

At this moment we’re closing in on what looks to me personally at some moments like an entire month of wasted time. I wake up each morning and gradually a plan for the day emerges in my mind. As I ready for sleep each night, looking back on the day, I ask myself what I have accomplished and can rarely come up with anything more than a zoom call or two in which I have participated. It’s hard not to be disappointed in myself.

This morning I had the good fortune to read two things that assuaged my conscience and shifted my perspective. Speaking of life and how we live it, Brian Johnson (optimize.me) quoted Richard Rohr – one of his new heroes. Father Richard says the following: “A ‘perfect’ person ends up being one who can consciously forgive and include imperfection rather than one who thinks he or she is totally above and beyond imperfection.” Great insight! My favorite line is elsewhere in the text, however, where he writes: “What a clever place for God to hide holiness.”

Alan Cohen, in his book, A Deep Breath of Life, was talking about “the real world” and our participation in it. Although he didn’t speak of perfection directly, he wrote a lovely paragraph that I saw as related. As he sees it: “The real world is a world of kindness, caring, vision, and service. All these qualities are attributes of our divine nature. As children of God, we can only be what God is, and that is everything that is good. We are born of light, and we return to the light. To live in light is to live in the real world.”

So here’s the message that has been renewed in my consciousness once again: Who we are is much more important than what we do. So regardless of how many or how few tasks are crossed off on my ever-present lists, I can be satisfied in this time-out-of-time to be living an imperfect real life!

David

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Acts of the Apostles, David, faithful frienship, fountainhead, God's love, imperfection, psalm 89, quiet, reflection, sheep, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

When I was young I always thought that if I had a son I would name him David. For no logical reason, David was my favorite name. It sounded both strong and gentle to me; I just liked it – not Dave really, but David. And this was before I ever encountered the famous David of the Scriptures.

All the readings for this morning speak of or at least advert to David in some way. The Acts of the Apostles and Psalm 89 name him, while Jesus just speaks of “my chosen.” That got me thinking of what a complex character David was and how wonderful for the rest of us that he was not perfect – at least for those of us who tend to compare ourselves to others (a very bad habit indeed!).

I think of David in the fields tending sheep and wonder if he was sorry to be called away from that duty. Being alone out in nature with the animals – recalcitrant though they might be at times – in the quiet that allows reflection must have had its appeal for him. I can only imagine the shock of hearing when he was summoned into the prophet’s presence that he was to be King of Israel. No one could have predicted that, it seems, but God.

If one believes that David is the author of all or even a majority of the scriptural Book of Psalms, it’s easy to intuit the ups and downs, the sins and repentance in his life. Noted for expressing every emotion known to humans, they are the perfect witness to his misuse of power, adulterous behavior, deep friendship with and loss of Jonathan and – most of all – his recognition and humble acceptance of God’s deep, all-encompassing love for him. I like to think about David because although he seems in every way larger than life (no event in his life was a small thing) he is also, essentially, like the rest of us: sometimes faith-filled, devoted and well-motivated and sometimes less so. He made big mistakes, was even punished for them, but never gave up on his relationship with God nor did God give up on him. So I sing with the psalmist this morning in gratitude for the example of great love even in imperfection and with confidence that God sees us no differently than this beloved servant.

Your love, O Lord, I will forever sing, your faithful friendship shall be the subject of my song. For I have come to know your love as fountainhead, its ceaseless source not here, but in your high abode. And you yourself have made this oath of faithfulness to us and all of David’s line, a covenant proclaimed to all you chose, a promise made to us that never ends. (Ps. 89:1-4)

 

Power in Weakness

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accept, Corinthians, failure, grace, imperfection, power, rely, rely on God, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, willingness

A friend and I once had a conversation about “structures for failure.” Sometimes, he said, if you’ve been a “good girl” (or boy): successful in school, gifted with good friends, never at odds with parents or other authority figures, etc., it’s difficult as an adult to accept imperfection in yourself. When you make a mistake or fail at something, it feels like the whole world is crashing rather than as if you had just hit “a bump in the road.” Sometimes early “bumps” make us stronger people in the long run.

That point is, I think, the one St. Paul is making when he talks this morning about his “thorn in the flesh” in his letter to the Corinthians (2 COR 12:7-10). When he asked God repeatedly to take whatever it was away from him he finally heard God say, “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness.” That helped him to understand imperfection as a reality check for humility, i.e. knowing and acknowledging the truth of himself. It gave Paul a willingness to rely on other people sometimes and on God always. He says, “I will gladly boast of my weaknesses, in order that the power of Christ may dwell in me.”

We don’t need to long for weakness but rather to accept our foibles as part of our growth and in solidarity with others who are also dealing with imperfection. If recognition of this element of the “human condition” makes us rely more on God than on ourselves while not abdicating our responsibility for our actions, it seems that the purpose has been served and we will know ourselves more deeply as God’s beloved.