When preaching professor Dr. Anna Carter Florence keynoted the Maryville College February meetings this year, she talked a great deal about the state of our church and especially about what it means to play fair when we disagree. The conversation inevitably led to some questions about the infamous, “Peace, Unity and Purity Report” that will come up for discussion and debate at this year’s General Assembly. Her response was the best one I’ve heard so far. She said that although peace, unity, and purity are all good ideals, with two boys at home, ages ten and fourteen, “That’s not happening at my house.”

I often feel the same way. We have family rules. I’d like to think of my own household as serene and unified, and capable of obedience to the family standard – but we all miss the mark. If I can’t keep peace, unity, and purity at home with three people and a couple of pets, I know it’s a crapshoot in the larger context of the church. To say that Jesus is our peace and our unity is about as close as we can come. There’s a difference we often fail to mention between our ideals and our reality.

I find the same to be true about marriage. I looked back at the marriage vows my husband and I chose since they were a bit different from the traditional, and 10 years later, I can let you know that I wasn’t always there to give love as freely as I should have and frequently I wanted to receive love in my own way, not in the way my spouse could give it. I promised to speak and to listen, and I must say that speaking is still my stronger suit. I promised to inspire and respond, and yet I know laziness often sets in after a long day at the office. Loyalty, I’m good at. But I dare say that loyalty “with my whole being” that I promised takes more energy than I have most days.

Does that mean that we shouldn’t have ideals if we can’t follow them? Does that mean that religious commandments are a hoax to try to keep us in line? Does that mean that we should all keep our fingers crossed every time we make a promise or take a vow?

I don’t think so. Scripture is clear that God’s commandments are a blessing to us, and the instruction we get from great wisdom – including that which our parents are able to give – is something that offers us comfort and peace in our lives. The sage of Proverbs says, “Let your heart hold fast my words; keep my commandments and live.” And 1st John says, “For the love of God is this, that we obey God’s commandments. And God’s commandments are not burdensome, for whatever is born of God conquers the world.” In some way, following instruction and doing good brings us into a sense of spiritual maturity and peace.

Kathleen Norris writes of perfection in her book, Amazing Grace: A Vocabulary of Faith, and in that chapter, she says that the word we take as perfection originally had a meaning closer to maturity. The Martha Stewart brand of perfection hadn’t taken the same hold in early Christian communities, and we’ve seen that perfection can crumble quite quickly with a couple months in a West Virginia prison. So instead Norris defines Christian perfection through the monastic communities that have taught her about the “rock tumbler” world of communal life. It takes the years of living together, arguing, making up, to smooth us into the spiritual beings we can become. We learn wisdom and gain a smooth exterior as we bump around in what life has to offer.

This is often a fearful thought to parents who are sending their kids off on their own for the first time. The rules they’ve grown up with may or may not apply. The instruction that has been foundational – may or may not be remembered. The lure of other more seductive choices can cause young adults to stray from the best paths.

This concept of obedience as a blessing is losing its power and authority – in part because it has become formulaic. Do this, and you’re good. Do that, and you’re bad. Scripture speaks about God’s law in poetic ways as “sweeter than honey” and “better than the finest gold.” In Proverbs, wisdom is the woman who helps you on your way – the woman your father told you to follow and respect. I hate to see us losing the poetry of scripture and theology as we debate reports and uphold unrealistic expectations that set us up for failure.

I know it would be awkward, and probably undermining, to make our promises with the “buts” attached. Or including “I’ll try” at the end. When you’re sent home with a baby from the hospital, they don’t give you an operations manual. My computer came with more instructions. Instruction and commandments are in part, an intuitive adventure. Jesus, in the scripture I’ll read from at the service tonight, says there’s only one commandment that he gives, that we love one another as much as he has loved us. Not an easy thing to get a handle on, and certainly not something we perfectly accomplish.

We’re not so perfect. Our graduates go out of this place with about as much instruction as we can cram into their heads, and hope that some of it also infuses their hearts. What they choose to do with those words we give probably has a lot to do with how they’ve watched us apply them in our own lives. We must keep on tumbling, rolling over and over each other as a church community, in our families, and with our closest friends to let ourselves mature in wisdom and God’s instruction. Then it will become our nature and not our lists of do’s and don’ts. I don’t know if I’ve got it all right either, but I think this comes closer to God’s plans for us to grow.

Amen.