Be Perfect

Today I read Genesis 14:21-17:10 and Matthew 8:10-9:5. My favorite verses are:

Genesis 17:1 And when Abram was ninety years old and nine, the LORD appeared to Abram, and said unto him, I am the Almighty God; walk before me, and be thou perfect.

Matthew 8:34 And, behold, the whole city came out to meet Jesus: and when they saw him, they besought him that he would depart out of their coasts.

God expects more from us than we are willing to give in many instances. He told 99-year-old Abram to be perfect. But notice what precedes this; if we kept it in our mind at all times that we are walking before God—He is watching everything we do—we would be more likely to make right decisions. And if we always made decisions which meet with God’s approval, we would be perfect. Unfortunately, we forget or ignore the fact that our lives are open before the Almighty God, and we choose to do things that are not pleasing to Him. When He confronts us with our own sinfulness, we may be like the “whole city” referred to in Matthew. We may just ask Him to go away. Most of us are somewhere between these two extremes—we are not perfect, but we are not asking the Lord to go away and leave us alone. We try to please Him; and when we fail, we ask Him to forgive us and we try again. Hopefully, by the time we are 99 years old, we will be much closer to “perfect” than we are now.