Example of Perfection

"Be perfect, therefore, as your Heavenly Father is perfect." - Matthew 5:48

A very gracious friend of mine, Train Master, hired me on as a temp to help clear up a mistake in his business. He works in model trains, importing them from Korea, and a specific type was all screwed up in the wiring. So L and I were asked if we'd like to work for a couple weeks unpackaging/repackaging these trains that would be repaired by two Korean specialists. I was thrilled for the offer, a wished answer to prayer for something more and steady than my sporadic substitute schedule.
Anyway, I had a moment where the Holy Spirit taught me an interesting analogy as I watched one of my co-workers testing the repaired trains. We began to get backed up at testing because it takes so long, and there would be this huge wall of trains waiting to be tested while I waited for the next tested train to package it. Eventually, Train Master noticed the problem, and I could read his mind. He would want to teach me to test trains to speed up the process.

The Holy Spirit began working then, putting thoughts into my head that I would never come up with on my own. What if Train Master were to try and show me how to test trains, but every train he tried to show me was faulty or a failure. He would have to show me a good train, an example of perfection. Once I saw a perfect train, I would know how to recognize a failure or faulty train.
That is when the Holy Spirit really hit me with a profound thought! This concept of perfection and failure was a metaphor for following Christ Jesus. There are a lot of ways to live in the world that are faulty, and they will try to convince us over and over that it is the way to go. The only way to discern these faulty ways of life is to have an example of perfection, and the good Lord gave that to us in Christ Jesus who is Lord! And His perfection is presented to us in the Bible, the very God-breathed words we are called to follow.

So, I began to think about what example am I striving for in my own life. Am I striving for Christ's prefection - looking to it for wisdom, discernment, and direction - or am I looking to someone or something else? It was a convicting thought, and it got me right into Scripture, doing a quick word study on perfect/perfector/perfection. Matthew 5:48 said what I was thinking best, but James 1:22-25 called me to action:

Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like a man who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. But the man who looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues to do this, not forgetting what he has heard, but doing it—he will be blessed in what he does. - James 1:22-25

It is more than just opening up the Bible and reading it; it is applying it that means something. I have been reading Scripture, every morning, but I am not sure I am leaving it with an imprint on my heart. Tomorrow is a New Day (Robbie Seay Band reference...sweetness!), and I will pray tonight that the Lord give me a heart that stamps His law, commands, and Word on my heart so that everyday I may be living for His perfection, not a perfection of the world.