Dear Friend,

We often hear well-intended criticism of perfectionists. These complaints usually describe all perfectionists as being the same: irritable, impossible to please, and generally hard to live or work with. Well, some, perhaps many, are.

But there's a whole other side to perfectionism and we do well to ponder it. Yes, I'm saying perfectionism has gotten a bad rap. Let me explain.

When I hire a surgeon, I want him or her to be a perfectionist. I don't want my surgeon severing the wrong artery, removing the wrong organ, or administering the wrong drug during an operation.

When I fly, I want my pilots, co-pilots, and airplane mechanics to be perfectionists. One pre-flight check missed, one takeoff procedure forgotten, or one crucial screw missing from the engine and I'm going to have a very bad day.

When I hire a tax return preparer, I want my CPA to be a perfectionist. I want to take advantage of every legitimate tax credit available for someone in my income bracket - and don't want an incompetent accountant overlooking it.

When I have my automobile's brakes worked on, I want the mechanic to be a perfectionist. If he's sleepy, sloppy, drunk, or on illegal drugs, I don't want to find out he's not secured the wheels correctly when I'm coasting down a long, steep incline on my beloved Appalachian mountains.

When our government hires military personnel to fill key positions in our nuclear missile arsenal, I hope they have the sense to hire perfectionists who know all the right and wrong procedures and protocols to follow. One slip-up by a slacker could be, well, bad for us all.

By now you get the point. Perfectionism, in its right place, pursued in the right spirit, is not only good, it is absolutely vital to virtually every area of our lives. That said, let's turn our attention to something far more important than the examples above: our eternal souls!

That's where ministers come in. Ministers are religious professionals of the soul.

Therefore, if I value my soul, my relationship to God, my purpose in this life, and my status in the afterlife, I want my pastor, Bible expositor, professor of theology, church counselor, and Sunday School teacher, and yes, prophets, when and where they are truly gifted, to all be perfectionists. Not irascible, unpleasable, impatient, fussy folks who cannot be satisfied, but passionate, patient, persistent perfectionists. And why?

They are dealing with, not our bodies, airplanes, automobiles, taxes, or missiles, all of which are temporal, but our eternal destiny. Our souls will live forever in the exact condition that's birthed, cultivated, and perfected largely by ministers - or left carnal, underdeveloped, or even ruined by them - now in this life. So, ministers should, they must, desire to get things right. Accurate. True. Complete. Unbiased by errant theology. Unswayed by shallow popular fads or public opinion or whatever is the going thing on the Internet.

I want my ministers to be serious pursuers of New Testament perfection - not sinless perfection but spiritual maturity, full spiritual development, spiritual adulthood, consistent spirituality, or simply, Christlikeness. I want them to keep studying, keep praying, keep seeking the answers, until they get it right. Right by the Word and the Spirit, who always agree. Right by the teachings of Jesus, not whatever teachings are circulating through the churches this week, or last month.

This is not to say ministers cannot make a mistake. We all do. We are "men of God," part "of God," or of divinely inspired life and ability; and part "men," or frail, fallible, fallen human stuff. But we must always be ready and willing to correct our errors, quickly and fully, examine how they came about, and be sure we don't repeat them. Not one! Why?

Jesus deserves it and His people's lives depend upon it! Jesus died to get redemption right. When on the cross, Jesus cried, "It is finished!" (John 19:30), it was perfectly right! With no flaws or omissions. And the people He loved enough to die for, born-again believers, desperately need to know the truth - the full, balanced, big-picture presentation of God's Word, the mighty Logos, and also the detailed explanations of its smallest segments! But if we don't care if we tell them the full truth or not, here is something we will care about: one day it will all come out in the open! "There is nothing covered, that shall not be revealed; and hid, that shall not be known" said our perfectionist, prophetic Leader (Matthew 10:26).

For instance, rather than making a full recovery after our ministerial counseling "operations," they will die on our operating table - turning away from Christ, walking out of our congregation, and going straight back to the sins and follies that formerly bound and oppressed them.

Or when speeding their way through the world's highways of university life, business, or professional pursuits, their wheels will come off - and their faith will crash, their personal fellowship with Christ will cease, and His life in them will remain spiritually underdeveloped ... and their destiny ruined.

Or when they're flying high with personal success or popularity, a screw will come loose in their spiritual life - and one seemingly insignificant but actually very significant Bible truth we neglected to tell them (for fear it would offend them) will cause them to crash and burn in willful, open sin, and thereafter lose all desire to know Christ intimately, please Him fully, and serve Him fruitfully.

Or when adversaries attack them, instead of reacting with Christ's grace, they will go nuclear, overreacting and destroying themselves by trying to destroy their adversaries - because we failed to teach them the biblical way to overcome adversity taught by Jesus (Matthew 5:38-48) and Paul (Romans 12:17-21) and practiced by the early Christians.

Sound overblown? Don't believe these things actually happen? My friend, look in every direction. Christians all around you are failing every day and falling into spiritual ruin. Why? In far too many cases, it was because their pastor, or teacher, or Christian mentor, or church counselor, or some prophet they followed, was not a spiritual perfectionist. A quack soul doctor, they didn't know how to get it right, or didn't care. So, those they ministered to didn't get it right. And we don't get a second chance at life: "People die once, and after that they are judged" (Hebrews 9:27, GW).

And if the ministerial malpractice that caused their spiritual failure doesn't come to light now in this life, we may be sure it will at the Judgment Seat of Christ. But then it will be too late, for them or us, to do anything about it. Today, it's not too late. Ministers and congregants can each do what they should do. How?

Christian, you can decide to seek out a minister, fellowship, counselor, or teacher who has a passion for spiritual perfection - for knowing exactly what Christian maturity looks like and how to get you there. And you can commit to follow his or her biblical instruction with a perfect heart of humble, childlike trust and diligent obedience.

Minister, you can examine yourself and your ministry honestly and humbly, and stop telling yourself your mediocrity, ignorance, half-knowledge, apathy, or lack of spiritual passion is acceptable to Christ. If surgeons, pilots, mechanics, CPAs, and military personnel must be perfectionists, how much more must we! Or someone will get hurt. Or spiritually sick. Or become spiritually lukewarm. Or come under divine chastening. Or die in their sins. And disillusion many Christian and non-Christian observers. And disappoint Jesus. And grieve the Holy Spirit ... eternally!

So, begin pursuing spiritual perfection today. Seek the truth God lays on your heart until by prayerful Bible study, and all related research, you get His message right. Seek to discover exactly what's wrong with your troubled congregants, by counsel and prayer. Then by prayer, counsel, and the ministry of God's Word extract their roots of bitterness and hindering wrong attitudes, so they may grow in God's Word and Spirit. Search for God's overarching purpose for His church, the body of Christ, and keep your congregation on track to become what God wants it to become - regardless of what other pastors and churches are doing. Or what they are saying about you.

If you make a mistake, okay, prayerfully examine the cause and eliminate it. But don't sit down spiritually and say you're tired, or no one's perfect, or it can't be done. Never accept imperfection as final and irreversible in yourself or others. Why did God give you His very perfect nature and supernaturally powerful, perfect Holy Spirit if you couldn't get things right? And why did Christ command, "Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect" (Matthew 5:48, NIV), if His grace could not lead us all, gradually but surely, into spiritual perfection?

So, my fellow minister, keep passionately, patiently, prayerfully, and persistently seeking the New Testament standard: spiritual perfection. And don't apologize for it! This world's professionals don't.

Seeking spiritual perfection,

Greg Hinnant
Greg Hinnant Ministries