Forget it.

There is an expression and a teaching in most Christian circles which, I believe, has caused a lot more harm than the good that it tries to do. It is also based on a misunderstanding of human nature and of the omnipotence and divinity of God. 

That saying is, "Forgive and forget."

I'm all for forgiving, when forgiveness isn't a substitute for the real thing. It isn't excusing the person because he was mad or she was having a rough time. It isn't saying it was nothing. It isn't saying that what the person did was okay. And it is definitely NOT forgetting.

I was in my forties before I learned what forgiveness was. When I was growing up, nobody apologized for anything ... and if someone did, the one receiving the apology was expected to pooh-pooh it and make the one apologizing feel better by saying it wasn't anything. Plus, in our family, apologies didn't say, "I hurt you. That was wrong. I'm sorry, and I'll try not to do that again," and leave it at that. No, the apology started with the I'm sorry part, skipped the hurting and the wrong part, and then included an explanation of why the person did whatever it was that hurt them. Or (which often happened) the person didn't say anything at all and just did something nice for the person they hurt.

Photo from Pexels at
https://www.pexels.com/photo/baby-child-close-up-crying-47090/

Only recently have I learned that neither of these is the way to apologize. This is a way to justify the original hurtful action and sometimes even make it the other person's fault. Or in not apologizing, the "good deed" is a thinly disguised bribe, which looking back, seems like the ultimate in avoidance. That realization was hard to accept. Very hard. 

Just as hard to accept for some is that when the Bible talks about forgetting sins, it's not talking about US forgetting them, but it's talking about GOD forgetting them when He forgives. This is not because He is forgetful but because He chooses not to remember them. Let me repeat this for emphasis: forgetting sins is something that ONLY GOD can do. Expecting humans to do it is unfair because it is beyond our capability to remove a memory once it's been made, especially a traumatic one. It might be possible with a mild infraction, I'll grant that. But trauma? Nope. Not happening, because trauma hard-wires itself into our brains; it is a survival instinct to remember in great detail something that will hurt us in the future. 

I have talked before in this blog about what forgiveness actually is: a process that starts with feeling and admitting the hurt, calling it wrong, and choosing not to make the person pay for what he or she did. And sometimes it needs to be repeated (especially in cases of trauma / long-term abuse). Often. Healing is possible. It is. But remembering serves the purpose of being able, once we are healed from the hurt, of being able to walk someone else through that process of healing.

That being said, never has human forgiveness been about forgetting. It is literally physically and emotionally impossible for us to forget being traumatized, unless we lose that part of our brain by accident or disease. And neither of those options is anything we would want... neither brain injury nor dementia is pleasant. "God understands our frame. He remembers that we are only dust."

We can be grateful that God is not like us, and that He chooses not to remember our sins for the sake of close relationship with us. In fact, our sins were ALL forgiven AND forgotten (past, present, and future) thousands of years ago, as all of eternity hinges on the sacrifice of Jesus, which in the spiritual realm sent tsunamis of forgiveness in every direction and in every possible timeline from the moment of the Rebellion in Heaven onward. Not convinced? How about "... chosen in Him before the foundation of the world...."? How about "It is finished!" 

But even though we as humans cannot forgive AND forget, we can be free of the nasty side-effects of holding a grudge... as hard as that is sometimes and as good as holding a grudge can feel (it feeds our pride and justifies our behavior toward that person or people who are LIKE that person). We can be free, I say. We can choose to begin to forgive. Let me explain what I mean.

Forgiveness is a choice, but it is also a process. We needn't beat ourselves up for not being able to let go of the hurt the first time we make that choice. It might take many times, depending on the depth of the hurt and how long it lasted. But forgiveness works best by going through the process I mentioned earlier: (1) not denying that you were hurt, (2) allowing yourself to feel that hurt, and exploring how it has affected you in the present day, (3) placing the blame on the person or people who hurt you and not on yourself, and (4) [and this could take some time], realizing that the person can never repay you what they took from you (for example, your innocence or your sense of safety), so it is time to not try to make them pay, time to stop wishing that they'd apologize or change.  THAT is forgiveness. It doesn't make what the person did all right (because it was wrong), but it does free you to move on with your life. 

And never mind that you can't forget. That's not your job anyway. It's God's.

Author and Finisher

In my last post, "Sacred Cows," I talked about how we compartmentalize and become very protective of those things in our lives that we consider "ours" ... when God's plan is to smash down the dividing walls that separate our relationship with Him from the rest of our lives. 

If, by reading that post, anyone might have thought how vigilant WE need to be, how we need to repent and confess our sinfulness to God, etc., let me be clear. 

Yes, knowing about where we may have been missing the mark can be helpful because at least now we are aware and can listen to and recognize His voice a bit better. But it is GOD who began this new creation. He is the Author of our New Life. And it is HE who will direct the path of our lives so that we bump right smack dab into Him, time and time again. HE will finish the work He started. 

The only thing we need to open our eyes to .... is Him. His passionate Love. His boundless Grace. His endless Patience. His supreme Sufficiency. 

Photo "Daily Planner With Pen" by
BrandonSigma at
www.freedigitalphotos.net

HE wrote the Book. Not only the Book we hold in our hands but also the Book of our lives. HE knows how it turns out. HE made provision for it, for us, for every possible outcome or circumstance. Nothing we have done or ever will do, will EVER take Him by surprise. Nothing we have done or ever will do, will change His constant, unconditional love for us - it won't make Him love us any less ... or any more ... than He always has for all eternity - past, present and future. 

It was HE who conceived the plan of salvation, in Eternity Past, before He even spoke the words, "Let there be light." It was HE who chose us in Him (Jesus, Himself) before the foundation of the world, planned for us (through Jesus) to be holy and without blame before Him (Eph. 1:4,5). At the Cross (and from Ages before the world began) God made Jesus, the Sinless One, to be our sin (ALL our sin: past, present and future) so that He could restore to us the glory we lost in Eden - the righteousness of God - in Him (2 Cor. 5:21). Not to condemn us to a life of slavery (touch not, taste not, handle not - Col. 2:21) but to free us from it (Gal. 5:1). Forgiveness is ours; we don't need to ask for it - it is OURS! He has broken down the walls between us and Him, and will continue to break them down within us so that EVERY aspect of our lives feels the warmth of His presence.

And we? we get to go along for the Ride. He is the conductor, He is the train, and He is the fuel; we are passengers. There is nothing that we can do to guarantee our arrival at destination (that's already been done for us too, see Phil. 1:6). Everything has been planned for, set up, started, is being maintained just fine, and will finish because HE has willed it so. 

We can relax. We can rest in His amazing, all-pervasive love. We can open ourselves to Him, knowing that only a great and supreme Love would reach down and translate us from darkness to light BECAUSE HE CHOSE TO. That's how much He loves. That's how much He plans for us, stays with us, and lavishes His Holy Spirit within each of us. 

There is nothing to prove. 
HE has done it all; HE will finish it all. 
Period.

Reinventing the Wheel

Today before church, a dear brother in the Lord hugged me and said (imitating Louis Armstrong's raspy voice) in my ear, "Ain't nobody love me like my Jesus love me." 

My heart leaped. That's what I've been meditating on for the past month: the love, mercy, grace and forgiveness of God that is mine through Jesus. I've been mulling over in my heart the fact that because of Jesus and His great sacrifice for me and for you and for every person that has lived or ever will live, and through the faith that He gave to believe in that sacrifice as my only way to a relationship with God, ALL of my sins - past, present and future - for all time, are ALREADY forgiven. That He sees me as pure and clean before Him because of what Jesus has already done! That the power of sin was broken on that cross, and the power of death was broken in that tomb. That I don't have to live by a set of restrictions and rules, but just gaze fully on Him, be enthralled with Him, and He will live His life out through me automatically! 

I have been noticing, therefore, that a lot of what we say in the church is a message for those who are NOT believers. The nouns and adjectives we use : sinners, wholly depraved, unclean, impure, need to be cleansed, need to repent and turn to God... all pertain to the unregenerate heart. 

Unregenerate. Not made alive. Pre-salvation. 

The problem is, as Christians living in an unregenerate world, we still feel the weight of sin plaguing us, we still feel unworthy, and somehow it transfers onto us. We get the idea that "we're in the Light now so we had better mind our p's and q's." Nothing could be further from the truth. 

Paul called this kind of "Jesus-and" thinking "falling from grace." (See Galatians 5:4 - "Christ has become of no use to you, you who are seeking to be justified by the law; you have fallen from grace.") 

It's like trying to reinvent the wheel. (Or like trying to build a brand new car from the raw materials of iron ore and sand to make the glass in the windows .... when there is a perfectly good, functioning car in the driveway!) Jesus IS the wheel, beloved. The work has already been done!! He said, "It is finished!" and it was so. There is nothing any less complicated than that. 

Photo "Wedding Day Thoughts" by
Timeless Photography at
www.freedigitalphotos.net

The enemy has deceived the church for so long, bound her up, and made her doubt her position in Jesus Christ. He's driven it home with suggesting (sometimes successfully) unbiblical practices like self-flagellation (that's when people used to whip themselves to purge their own sins or do penance.) Now before you get all superior and tell me that we don't do that anymore, I say YES WE DO. We beat ourselves up all the time!! And the only one rubbing his hands in glee at all this is the devil. He's deceived us ... and this is how: he's warped the glorious truth of the Good News into something about duty and obligation and guilt. It was never intended to be so, dear sisters and brothers. It was meant to be about love and forgiveness and grace ... about gratitude and worship and freedom. 

He's twisted the amazing grace of God into something that must be accessed every time a Christian feels "far from God." He's hoodwinked us into believing that if we don't "feel" right with Him, then it must be us who moved and we need to ASK His forgiveness, some would say even to BEG for it. The truth is that He's already forgiven us, and has declared us as righteous as God!! ("He has made Him (who knew no sin) to be sin for us, that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him." - 2 Cor. 5:21). We who belong to Jesus are clothed in righteousness, dressed in white like a bride. We are indeed "new creations." (vs. 17). Made anew. Regenerated.

The truth is that if we have accepted by faith Jesus' sacrifice for us as our only way for a relationship with God, (through the faith that God Himself provides for us and because God has taken the initiative and drawn us to Himself) God's grace is ALL AROUND us, permeating every part of our existence, as much a part of us as the air we breathe. 

What kind of relationship would a bride have with her groom if she were to say to him on their wedding day, "Just give me the rules and I'll follow them because I don't want you to ever leave me." NO! The groom loves his bride, loves her so deeply that he would die for her. (And Jesus DID, by the way!) In the face of that kind of love, there is no need for rules. Love begets love - fear is gone and freedom has taken its place. There is no desire to look elsewhere; there is no thought of abandonment. 

And that is our relationship with Jesus our bridegroom. Unconditional, passionate, lavish love - far more and far greater than we could ever imagine. 

Why would we go back to a rulebook when we have Him?

Rethinking Reward

As I said in my last post, a young man's sermon got me to thinking about some things, specifically about whether we are good people and whether God is too loving to punish us.

I must say this to preface it all: WITHOUT JESUS humans are not good. Not even close!! And WITHOUT JESUS God will punish humans because He provided the Way and they have rejected it (even if they've put off the decision until "later.") Therefore, their sin has not been covered and they are lost. Though it will break His heart, He will punish those without Christ. He cannot do otherwise and remain holy and just. 

Now. Since most of my readers are Christians, let me tell you that the "lies" are actually "true." 

Because of Jesus, we ARE good people. "He [God] has made Him [Jesus] to be sin for us, who knew no sin, so that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him." (2 Cor. 5:21) "He chose us in Him [Jesus] before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before Him." (Eph. 1:4) "Yet now has He reconciled you to Himself through the death of Christ in His physical body. As a result, He has brought you into His own presence, and you are holy and blameless as you stand before Him without a single fault." (Col. 1:22). 

Because of Jesus, God will NOT punish us for our sin (past, present or future sin!) (See the above verses, as well as the following ones). Hear the words of Jesus Himself: "Anyone who hears My word and believes Him who sent Me [already] has eternal life, and will not come under judgment but has passed from death to life." (John 5:24)  "And this is the will of My Father, that everyone who looks on the Son and believes on Him, may have everlasting life, and I will raise him up on the last day." (John 6:20). "My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, ... and they shall never perish, neither shall anyone pluck them out of My hand. My Father, who gave them to Me, is greater than all, and no-one shall be able to pluck them out of My Father's hand." (John 10:27, 28) "Of those whom You have given Me (see Eph 1:4) I have lost none, except the son of perdition, [and only] that the Scriptures may be fulfilled." (John 17:12). 

But ... I hear you say ... what about heavenly rewards and stars in our crown and all that good stuff? 

If there's one thing I know with all my heart, it's that I don't know all that Heaven will be; nobody can fully describe its wonders. The beloved disciple John tried and was not able to ... and the apostle Paul saw such wonders that it wasn't permitted for him to speak them!! 

However, we do have a few clues about those rewards. 

A few things from the Scriptures come to mind. The first are all the parables Jesus told about what the Kingdom of Heaven was like. (Keep in mind that these are mere facets, viewpoints from different angles, and that understanding one doesn't necessarily give the full picture!) There is the parable of the labourers in the field that the master hired in the morning and throughout the day. This is the story that flies in the face of our human nature that thinks that we can "earn" anything from God. The reward is the same whether we have known Jesus all our lives or only a few seconds. Heaven is the place where God is, the place where we were created for. The ultimate reward is to be with Him where He is! That reward is the same. No doubt about that! We will know perfect peace, perfect happiness, perfect purpose in Heaven regardless of anything we do or don't do.

Another story Jesus told about Heaven and/or judgment rises in sharp contrast - the one about how many will say to Him "on that day" (the Day He's referring to is the Great White Throne judgment, which takes place after the 1,000-year reign and the last battle with the enemy of our souls, after He has cast the devil and His angels into the lake of fire!) ... they will say, "Lord, Lord..." And He will say, "Depart from Me; I never knew you." (Matt 7:21-23) Ah yes. Quite the somber sentence. 

I have talked about this one before. When Jesus says to these people, "I never knew you," it is a keen warning to those who would think that anything that they can DO is reason for admission to Heaven. They have missed the whole point of why Jesus came. It wasn't to give us power over demons, to heal the sick or to raise the dead. It was to make us His children, to lavish His love on us. Moreover, the "I never knew you" statement is also a clue as to what DOES matter - knowing Him, letting ourselves BE known by Him (there's that intimacy thing again...) If we don't GET this, we were never His in the first place. That's why Jesus said "never." I could talk at length about this, but I think that for now, it's enough to say what I've said.

And finally, to finish my talk about rewards, there's that passage in 1 Corinthians 3:11-15. It talks about what has been called "the Judgment Seat of Christ" or what others have called "the Bema seat" - (bema meaning the platform that was used in Roman culture to examine a person's deeds or to put someone on trial.) 

Photo "Mason Hand Spreading Concrete"
courtesy of luckypic at
www.freedigitalphotos.net

Here's what it says: "For no other foundation can anyone lay than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. Now if anyone builds on this foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw; each man's work will become evident; for the day will show it because it is to be revealed with fire, and the fire itself will test the quality of each man's work. If any man's work which he has built on it remains, he will receive a reward. If any man's work is burned up, he will suffer loss; but he himself will be saved, yet so as through fire." 

I bolded the first sentence because it is crucial to our understanding of what the important things are. What is important is the finished work of Jesus for us, and the importance of that for us, every single day. This is because any building that we do (and by saying "we do" I mean that HE does it through us, see Psalm 127:1) MUST be on that ... or it will all have been for nothing. 

I am assuming here that those reading this post will have already placed their entire trust on that foundation of "none but Jesus", because anything less won't withstand the test of God's purity...for "our God is a consuming fire." (Heb 12: 29)

Now I feel that I need to tell one of my famous (if slightly bizarre) stories. Our kids absolutely LOVED a certain cartoon show that was on television back in the 1990s. It was called "The Magic Schoolbus." They never missed an episode. (And therefore, neither did I.) Miss Frizzell and her class went on such adventures (field trips) in a schoolbus that was at times a rocket ship, a submarine shrunk to microscopic size, or whatever it needed to be to teach the lesson of the day. On one of the episodes, (Season 2, episode 8) they visit a "haunted" house which, of course, really isn't. [The show was on the topic of Sound. (Bear with me, there IS a point.)] One of the class members, Carlos, was building a musical instrument to enter into a instrument invention competition. But he was having trouble with the design. When he tried to play his invented instrument, the sound came out all "ploopy." 

Once Carlos learns what sound really is, he sees that putting all the streamers and decorations on his instrument (which he thought were "cool") has actually detracted from the sound it could have made. When he removes all his own stuff and lets the instrument be what it is, when it sings the song it was intended to sing, it sounds wonderful! 

In a sense, this is what the Bema seat does. Only ... it happens after we are in Heaven and we don't have the opportunity to get rid of all the fluff and stuff we think makes our Christian walk more "cool." So ... He does it for us. 

Many will think that their works will survive the fire ...and they / we will be surprised. What the Bema seat will do is to reveal what works Jesus did through us (gold, precious stones, silver) and which ones we did in our own strength (wood, hay and stubble.) It IN NO WAY will determine our eternal destiny. It will simply show us what will remain, and it will allow our instrument (our essence) to sing the way it was meant to. 

Many have talked about "losing rewards" and used this passage as a justification for that kind of thinking. However, I don't believe that's the point. If we are truly in love with Jesus, the rewards won't matter. (I'll touch on this part after I am done with the "so as by fire" stuff.)

So you want a picture of what "he himself will be saved, yet so as by fire" looks like? I can think of one, although it isn't original; it is only one person's (brilliant) imagination. So here, I need to cite a Paramount Pictures classic, Raiders of the Lost Ark, by Lucasfilm Ltd. (1981). At the climax, the bad guys have the audacity to try to open the Ark of the Covenant, and Indiana Jones tells his girlfriend Marian, "Don't look Marian! No matter what, keep your eyes SHUT!" All around them the fire of God swirls. Here is the picture I mentioned. Focus not on the destruction (although in the movie, it is extremely. well. done.) Focus instead on the two people, tied back to back, with their eyes tightly shut, rescued by the skin of their teeth, "yet so as by fire." When the destruction ends and the blazing flame has returned to God, their enemies are gone and they are safe. Even the ropes that bound them together have been burned off their wrists - but they are untouched. And grateful. THAT is the burning - and the purpose - of the Bema seat.

Keep in mind that the fire spoken about in 1 Corinthians 3 will test everyone's work - but the foundation remains. Nothing can touch that. It is Rock solid. "He has made Him to be sin for us, who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him." (2 Cor 5:21) This is not in question.

At the Bema or Judgment seat of Christ, the things we have done in the flesh (i.e., in our own human effort, or [God forbid] for the motivation of reward!) will disappear. Only what He did in us and through us will remain. These are the precious jewels and the gold and silver that quite possibly represent any reward that we might receive. And the Bible does say that there is a reward, though it doesn't say exactly what. If we stay with the standard reward scenario, we will receive a crown and perhaps the jewels that survive the fire will be used to decorate it. 

But it won't matter. It WON'T!! Look at an example of what eventually happens to crowns (and that is even IF this passage refers to us): «The twenty-four elders fall down before Him who sits on the throne, and worship Him that lives for ever and ever, and cast their crowns before the throne, saying, 'You, O Lord, are worthy to receive glory and honour and power, for You have created all things, and for Your pleasure they are created.'» (Revelation 4:10-11) 

We won't WANT the reward. Jesus will be enough. He has always been enough and He always WILL be enough. Heaven IS His pure and holy presence for all eternity.

It is God who is ultimately glorified. We are left breathless, grateful, reward or no reward, realizing that only in Jesus are we able to stand in the presence of God at all. 

Yes, we press onward, and we aim for the prize. But the real prize (according to Paul) is knowing Him. (for more on that kind of knowing, see my previous post.)  Paul said, in his "forgetting those things which are behind" passage (Phil 3:13-14) "...I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus." (Phil 3:14) Just in case you were wondering, exactly how do I know that what this call is, is knowing Jesus? Paul has just talked about it in the previous few verses... "I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish [the KJV says DUNG] so that I may gain Christ, and may be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own derived from the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith, that I may know Him..." (Phil 3:8-10)

Can you see it? Can you see how simple it is?

I close with a quote I often use from General William Booth, which he said just prior to his death. One of his commanders in the Salvation Army was by his bedside and tried to comfort him (or was it himself?) by saying, "Well, General Booth, you will soon be going on to receive your reward."  

At this statement, the old man gave him a piercing glare and said, "NO. I go NOT to receive a reward. I go ... to receive MERCY."

Sinless Perfection

Perfection?  One word and one word only.  Jesus.

Period.

There is a doctrine that has been going around for decades, perhaps even centuries, that has set people up to beat themselves to a pulp when they fail... which they always do.

It's called the doctrine of sinless perfection.

Basically this doctrine says that if we are in Christ and filled with the Spirit, it's possible to live as sinless a life as Jesus did. The basis for this argument is that Jesus laid aside His God-hood, His divine attributes, in order to be fully human, and that He therefore had no advantage over us in fighting temptation, did it by the power of the Holy Spirit, just the same way He got the power to do all those miracles.  

Hm.  As alluring as that statement might be, I think that a few people might be deceiving themselves. It says in 1 John chapter 1 that if we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. And the apostle Paul (arguably one of the holiest men who ever lived except for Jesus) struggled with sin all the time. He said he kept sinning even though he didn't want to, and kept "not doing the right thing" even though he desired it so much! Yet he told the Ephesians to keep on being filled with the Holy Spirit, and told the Corinthians that he spoke in tongues (prayed under the direction of the Holy Spirit) more than all of them. 

The truth is, Jesus did have a slight (okay, a big) advantage over us ... in that He was not born with a "sin nature" - that is, a natural tendency to sin (aka "the curse").  Which is not to say that He wasn't tempted; He was!!! BIG time!!! But He had the same choice Adam did, before the Fall of man.  He didn't understand what it was like TO COMMIT sin - even though (on the cross) He BECAME sin, and felt the guilt and the shame of it down through the ages (every possible sin, past, present and future).  If we believe that Jesus didn't sin because He was filled with the Holy Spirit - then what happened the first 30 years of His life before He was filled at His baptism? Are we then to conclude that He DID sin because He wasn't filled with the Spirit? if so - He was not the perfect sacrifice, and His death was in vain!  

But if He didn't sin during that 30-year period - perhaps it's because ... oh maybe it might have been that (you know) "in Him dwells all the fulness of the Godhead bodily." (Colossians 2:9).  

Now - that said - because of what He did on the cross, if we accept it as being for us personally, we are made just as righteous as Jesus, by God ... POSITIONALLY.  God no longer sees our sin, but chooses to look at Jesus, who is our life, who is our righteousness. 

Being filled with (controlled by) the Holy Spirit is the only way that we could possibly begin to live (as Jesus promised) an abundant life, to be fully alive, in other words.  And included in that is most likely a marked reduction of that S-word because we're listening to His direction on a moment-by-moment basis.  It's marvelous.  It's glorious - if we live in that every single second of our lives.

Yet to believe that we - by being filled with the Spirit on a consistent basis - are capable of never sinning? Not once?  Perfection in the everyday happenings and routines of our lives? In our thoughts? in our MOTIVES?  Seriously?  

I'm not saying we aren't to try; this is not a cop-out to justify not trying!  On the contrary - I'm saying that we so much NEED to be filled with the Spirit, in conscious contact with God.  What I AM saying is that WHEN we sin - and we WILL ... God has made provision for that in our position in Christ as believers and all we need to do is agree with Him that we've messed up - and move on! No self-recriminations, no shame-fests, just "Yeah God, I loused it up this time. What I did was wrong. Please forgive me and re-fill me with Yourself. Thank You so much for Your grace!" And that's ALL.

Mike Warnke said quite a few years back, in one of his performances, something like this:  "I could say it in a really theological, hermeneutic way that would confuse most people and perhaps impress them at the same time - but I won't.  Instead, I'll just say it like this - Minus Crud Is COOL."  

Understanding the depths of grace inspires gratitude, and births a burning desire in us to be filled with God's presence as much and as often as possible (and um, that doesn't have to wait until we get to church to happen - it can be anywhere, anytime! - just saying.) The overflow of that infilling is so incredible - but let's not give ourselves more credit than we deserve, or beat ourselves up when we don't achieve perfection.  The most we can be is honest, open, and willing. The process of 'sanctification' is just that - a process.  We can take absolutely NO credit for any progress we make.

It's all Him.