We fail to realize that mastery is not about perfection. It’s about a process, a journey. The master is the one who stays on the path day after day, year after year. The master is the one who is willing to try, and fail, and try again, for as long as he or she lives.
Let’s start by getting one thing out of the way: we are all imperfect.
If you are like me, you are aware — usually painfully aware — of your own imperfections. Despite our best intentions, each of us will make mistakes.
It can be difficult to know how to handle our feelings of inadequacy. After all, aren’t we commanded to be perfect? Is that some sort of cruel joke?
Our loving Father in Heaven did not send us to Earth to feel guilty and doomed to imperfection. We just need to better understand what it really means to be perfect.
We become perfect as we become like our Savior. This is something we all have the potential to do.
Our goal is to gain His image in our countenance and have our hearts be changed to be like Him (Alma 5:14, 19). We become perfect as we are filled with charity, which is the pure love of Christ (Moroni 7:47).
Becoming like the Savior will not happen instantly. It is a process. You have reasons to have hope when you feel imperfect.
Parable of the Sacrament Prayer
(adapted from an original concept shared by Brad Wilcox)
The priest stood at the Sacrament table, breaking the bread for the Sacrament while the congregation sang a familiar hymn. As the last few notes from the organ sounded, the priest finished breaking the bread and stood reverently.
The chapel fell silent as the priest knelt down to bless the bread, repeating the Sacrament prayer he had recited many times before.
He began, “O God, the Eternal Father, we ask thee, in the name of Jesus Christ…”. Instantly, he realized he had messed up the prayer. Knowing the Sacrament prayer needed to be recited perfectly, he stopped. Feeling a little self-conscious, he looked over at the Bishop. The Bishop had noticed the error too and nodded at the priest.
The priest started the Sacrament prayer again. “O God, the Eternal Father, we ask thee, in the name of thy Son, Jesus Christ, to bless and sanctify this water”. The priest froze again. He was blessing the bread. His face flushed red with embarrassment.
Doubts flooded into the priest’s mind. How could he be having such a difficult time with this? What was wrong with him? Why couldn’t he finish the same Sacrament prayer he had given correctly so many times before? He felt as if everyone in the congregation was staring at him. Judging him.
Out in the congregation, many sat with their heads bowed saying a silent prayer in their heart for the priest. Many of them remembering the times they had publicly messed up, too.
The priest again looked over at the Bishop, more sheepishly than before. The Bishop looked back at the priest and gave a subtle nod of encouragement. The priest again bowed his head and began the Sacrament prayer.
This time the priest made it almost to the end of the Sacrament prayer. He started to feel a little more relaxed and confident. And then he forgot another word near the end of the prayer and froze again.
Any relaxation or confidence he had started to feel vanished in an instant. How could he have let himself mess up yet again?
Thoughts of doubt rushed back into his head and weighed on his heart.
Why couldn’t he get even this simple thing right?
Wasn’t it obvious to everyone that he shouldn’t be here?
Why should he even keep trying when it was clear that all he would do was mess up, yet again?
Why should he even bother trying?
In the midst of this brief flood of self-doubt, he glanced over to the Bishop, convinced he would see nothing but a reproving look. The Bishop once again gave a soft smile and a nod of encouragement giving the priest courage to try one more time.
On this attempt, the priest finished the prayer without error. Relieved, he looked one last time at the Bishop who gave an approving smile. The members of the congregation who had been praying for the priest smiled too as they gave a silent prayer of thanks.
As the Sacrament was passed, the Bishop smiled, knowing a lesson had been taught by a priest who only thought he was messing up. The Sacrament that day was not any less important or effectual because of the priest’s mistakes. If anything, it was sanctified all the more by the repeated efforts of the priest to perform the ordinance perfectly.
Like the priest in this story, we all have times when we make mistakes, repent, and then make the same mistakes again. Here are seven things that can help us have the courage to try again.
1. Perfection Is A Commandment
God knows that you are not perfect, that you will fail at times. God loves you no less when you struggle than when you triumph.
The first thing to remember is that we are commanded to be perfect by a loving Father in Heaven who knows we are not perfect.
He does not expect us to be something we are not. Rather, He wants to remind us of what we have the potential to become.
“Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.” (Matthew 5:48) is a commandment to continually strive to be like our Heavenly Father, especially when we feel like we have such a long way to go.
Each time we choose to serve others or help lift someone who is down, we move one step closer to being like our Savior.
2. You Are Imperfect, So Is Everyone Else
There is something interesting, almost paradoxical, about this path you’ve chosen: the only way for you to progress in your gospel adventure is to help others progress as well.
To help others is the path of discipleship. Faith, hope, love, compassion, and service refine us as disciples.
As we strive for perfection, it is easy to forget that every other person we encounter is also imperfect. Just like you, they are struggling along their own path to perfection.
No one is a finished product.
Everyone is a work in progress.
We should do what we can to lift and encourage each other as we work to become more like our Savior.
Lifting and helping each other is how we become more like our Savior.
3. Don’t Worry What Others Think
You probably wouldn’t worry about what people think of you if you could know how seldom they do!
Because everyone is imperfect — we may often feel others are judging us for our failures.
Sometimes they may be judging us. Remember, everyone else is imperfect, too.
Other times we may be the ones judging others. Remember, we are imperfect, too.
I believe most of the time people aren’t judging us as much as we think they are.
Those who love you will not be judging you, but genuinely striving to help you.
Those who don’t know you very are most likely only judging you in reference to how your actions have affected them.
Either way, we can trust that the only judgement that really matters is that of the Savior.
He loved each of us enough to suffer for every mistake any of us will ever make.
He can lift you when you are down.
4. Practice Makes Perfect
That which we persist in doing becomes easier for us to do—not that the nature of the thing is changed, but that our power to do is increased.
Our imperfection despite our desires and potential for perfection is the precise reason for the Atonement of Jesus Christ. The blessing of the Atonement is that it allows us to bridge the chasm that exists between the imperfect people we are today and the redeemed and perfected children of our Heavenly Father we can become.
Through the gift of repentance, we all have the opportunity to get back up and try again every time we fall. We are never beyond the hope provided by the Atonement of Jesus Christ.
Satan knows this. He knows that each time we get back up after we stumble we are a little better and a little stronger for it. And because he knows this, he has one goal: to make us believe it is not worth getting back up and trying again.
Satan will do all he can convince you and I that we are not good enough. He does all he can to make us feel we have messed up too badly. To make us believe we are too imperfect for anyone to love. To make us feel that we simply have too far to go. He knows if he can make us give up that he has won the battle for our souls.
Our Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ know our true potential. Because they know our potential, the Savior constantly and repeatedly invites each of us to “Come follow him”.
He knows that if we continue to try to follow Him, we will eventually be like Him.
All we have to do is keep trying.
At times we may doubt our ability to get back up and try again. When this occurs, we can seek the support of the Lord through the Holy Ghost. Knowing that we are His children and that He loves us each individually can help to give us hope.
5. Its All About Your Trajectory
Every one of us aspires to a more Christlike life than we often succeed in living. If we admit that honestly and are trying to improve, we are not hypocrites; we are human. If we persevere, then somewhere in eternity our refinement will be finished and complete—which is the New Testament meaning of perfection.
Although each of us can start walking the path to perfection in this life, it is critical that we understand that attaining perfection will not occur for a long time.
Like a ship at sea or an airplane flying a long distance, we each need to constantly adjust our trajectory to stay on course.
What really matters is not your daily adjustments but the net direction you are headed. This does not mean that small decisions don’t matter. The small decisions are what allow us to stay on course.
Small deviations from the path of the gospel can lead to us arriving at an entirely different destination.
An experience I had while serving as a missionary in Japan brought this lesson home for me. My companion and I were on our way to an appointment. We were riding our bikes along a road we thought was parallel to the road where our destination was located.
Being in a hurry and not wanting to take the time to wait for traffic lights, we stayed on the street we were on a while longer than we had planned.
Eventually, we crossed the street and went over one block expecting to be at our destination. To our surprise, it was the wrong street. We looked at our map and realized the roads we thought were parallel, had branched away from each other some time ago.
What would have been a minor course correction early on became a major redirection later.
From this experience I learned the importance of consulting a map and making timely course corrections.
In the scriptures, Alma teaches that “by small and simple things, great things are brought to pass” (Alma 37:6). The “small and simple” things are the things that help us true up our course and keep heading in the right direction.
6. You Can Be Perfect In Small Things
Each family prayer, each episode of family scripture study, and each family home evening is a brushstroke on the canvas of our souls. No one event may appear to be very impressive or memorable. But just as the yellow and gold and brown strokes of paint complement each other and produce an impressive masterpiece, so our consistency in doing seemingly small things can lead to significant spiritual results.
Even though we will constantly be making course corrections to keep ourselves on the path that leads us back to our Savior, there are also ways that we can be perfect now.
Many commandments can be obeyed perfectly in this life. Paying tithing, keeping the Word of Wisdom, partaking of the Sacrament each Sunday, reading the scriptures every day and many other commandments are in our power to do perfectly.
Doing what you can to observe such commandments perfectly will qualify you for additional help from the Holy Ghost. The Holy Ghost will give you the strength to persevere in your efforts to more perfectly follow more challenging commandments like “loving your neighbors as yourself” (Matthew 22:39).
7. Perfection Is A Gift
In this and every hour He is, with nail-scarred hands, extending to us that same grace, holding on to us and encouraging us, refusing to let us go until we are safely home in the embrace of Heavenly Parents. For such a perfect moment, I continue to strive, however clumsily. For such a perfect gift, I continue to give thanks, however inadequately.
When we do what we can to follow our Savior, He will help us to truly become like Him.
Moroni taught, “Wherefore, my beloved brethren, pray unto the Father with all the energy of heart, that ye may be filled with this love, which he hath bestowed upon all who are true followers of his Son, Jesus Christ; that ye may become the sons of God; that when he shall appear we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is; that we may have this hope; that we may be purified even as he is pure.” (Moroni 7:48)
As we strive to be like Jesus Christ and pray for His help, He will bestow the gift of charity on us and we will become perfect even as He is perfect.
Conclusion
Even with all of the mistakes, opposition, and learning that accompany our mortal experience, God never loses sight of our eternal potential, even when we do. We can trust Him “because God wants His children back.” And He has provided a way through the Atonement of His Son, Jesus Christ. The Atonement “is the core of the plan of salvation.”
While we may not be perfect now, God has instilled in each of us the potential to be perfected through the Atonement of Jesus Christ.
As we partake of the Sacrament each we, we have the opportunity to repent and recommit ourselves to following the Savior’s example.
When we repent early and often, we can save ourselves major course corrections later.
Finally, along the way when we help lift and encourage each other we become more like Jesus Christ. As we do so, we continue to become more like Him until we will eventually perfected in Him.