Our scripture this week is Matthew 5:43-48.
Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.
Matthew 5:48
You’ve asked some really difficult things of us, Lord. “Love your neighbor as yourself”. “Love your enemies and bless those that curse you”. These are hard but really now – “be perfect”? That’s just not possible.
God knows how hard this is for us because He knows how imperfect we have become. He sees our struggles and wants us to know His love and that there is a better way, not the easy way but the way He had intended for us all along. God knows we can be perfect because He made us to be perfect.
God created us in His own image, a true reflection of His glory. Through our failings that image has been marred and obscured, but through His love for us that image can be restored. When Christ asks us to be perfect, we can answer “Yes Lord, with Your help” and begin to renew the image of the Father within us.
Gracious God, we are sorry for the many ways we harm each other and dishonor Your creation. Show us the way to be made whole again through Your love. Amen.