Day 29

In his reflection on ‘The Jesus way’ Peterson turns to the Old Testament and draws insights into living the ‘the Jesus way’.

From the story of Abraham he reflects on the great patriarch taking his son, Isaac, to offer him as a sacrifice on Mount Moriah in obedience to a command from God. It is a story that is difficult to fully comprehend, but thankfully has a happy ending. Peterson makes the point that Abraham’s life was one of repeated sacrifices. The testing on Mount Moriah is ‘embedded in a life of faith and unbelief, obedience and disobedience, horizontal travel and vertical prayer’. The question that Peterson suggests arises from this story is, ‘are we using God or letting God use us?’ ‘Is God a mystery of goodness whom we embrace and trust or is God a formula for getting the most out of life on our terms?’ On the Jesus way, our faith is bound to be tested and tried. How will we react to such tests and trials, remembering Paul’s encouraging words at 1 Corinthians 10:23?

Peterson draws the final words of Moses into this conversation. Here it is back again to the importance of words. Moses' words on the plains of Moab were his final words to the people he had led through the wilderness. He would not go into the promised land with them. Peterson suggests that a healthy community needs a healthy language and he notes the communal nature of these words. These words are of and for a community of faith. From within the words Peterson notes the use of names, rooting the language in the personal. He also points out the use of story and suggests that a name is like a seed germinating into story and as he continually stresses, a story invites us to participate.

Peterson then goes on to suggest that ‘perfectionism’ is a most ruinous deviation from the way Jesus. He even calls it a ‘perversion of the Christian way’! He considers that this is made clear in the life of David who was from a start to finish far from perfect. He describes David as ‘a complicated character, a labyrinth of ambiguities and not a model for imitation.’ But his story is one of God working with the raw material of life. Peterson particularly reflects on 7 penitential Psalms and suggest that in them we catch a glimpse of the ‘inside story of David’s life’.

Sin does not disqualify us from ‘being on the way’. But it does make life more complicated for us and for others. Sin needs to be dealt with by God.

I struggled a bit with this chapter. For there is the danger, of course, that we begin to make excuses for our conduct - it is the way I am or we think it acceptable to behave in certain ways. The life of David contains some spectacular moral lapses which are certainly not to be admired or used to excuse our conduct.

But ‘perfectionism’ can drive a wedge between ourselves and others( those who are obviously in our view not as ‘spiritual’ or ‘committed’ or ‘ knowledgeable’ as we are). I think that is a major part of what Peterson is driving at here.

Surprisingly he doesn’t draw in the words of Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount - Matthew 5:48, ‘Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.’ Words which might seem to contradict what he is suggesting. A broad range of scholars point out that the word ‘perfect’ is a word that means ‘ mature, fit for purpose, fulfilling the purpose for which a person or an object is created’. New Testament scholars also point out that it is vital to note that the words of Jesus here come in a section where he is reminding his hearers of the gracious love of God for all people.

I think the words of Walter Wink express what Jesus was driving at in this startling saying –

"Placed in its context within the rest of the paragraph, Jesus’ saying about behaving like God becomes abundantly clear. We are not to be perfect, but, like God, all- encompassing, loving even those who have least claim or right to our love.

Jesus does not call for “wholeness,” though that would have been a better translation than “perfect.” For wholeness places all the focus on us, and Jesus points us away from ourselves to love our enemies. All-inclusive love is his goal, even if broken, contaminated by elements of our own unredeemed shadow, intermittent.

Jesus is not urging us to a perfection of being in ourselves, but to abandon all dreams of perfection and to embrace those we believe are least perfect, least deserving and most threatening to our lives. And we are to embrace all of that within ourselves as well."

Much food for thought!