You Are Complete… in Jesus!

“Therefore, just as your heavenly Father is complete in showing love to everyone, so also you must be complete” (Matt. 5:48, CEB).

If you are a regular on here, today’s verse is probably looking familiar. That is because just last week, I shared another devo post about it – only that time, I quoted the NIV’s rendering of it.

I absolutely cherish the ability to look at multiple translations of the Bible as a way to dig deeper into the nuances of each verse. Today I felt in my spirit to go ahead and share this one with you in the CEB. I sensed, even as I was writing last week’s post, that there was more Holy Spirit wanted to bring out about this.

At that time, I had a feeling He was going to have me write a second devo on the same Scripture. This was confirmed to me through my brother and blogger friend, Pastor Pete (whose wonderful blog you would be blessed to swing by and visit at https://praise2worship.net/). He shared this thought responding to my original devo about it: “These verses, like diamonds show a different facet of the truth, each time the light shines through it at a different angle.” When I read that, I knew for sure that I needed to write this follow-up devo on the matter.

In the NIV and many other translations, this same verse tells us to “be perfect.” Did you know that the original Greek word for “perfect” there also means “complete”? That is why the CEB has translated it this way. Again, “Therefore, just as your heavenly Father is complete in showing love to everyone, so also you must be complete” (Matt. 5:48, CEB).

Let’s ruminate together on the idea of being complete. This immediately brings to mind a breathtaking truth that we find in Colossians 2:10, “And you are complete in Him…” In Jesus, you and I are already complete. He completes us. Being in Him means that we have everything we need and nothing is lacking.

Now, to link that back to our original passage in Matthew 5. Just a few verses earlier, Jesus instructed us to love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us (v. 44). Do you know that you have everything you need to do this? In Him you are complete. In Him. In Him alone. In and of yourself, you can’t do it. In Him, you can. Some of Jesus’ own words work well here, “This is impossible for mere humans, but for God all things are possible” (Matt. 19:26, NET).

God loves your enemies. God prays for those who mistreat you. And God lives inside you through His Holy Spirit. As you open yourself to His work and ask Him to do what only He can do, He will empower you to love them with the unmixed purity of His own love. His Spirit will pray for them through your heart if you invite Him to. As my friend Pastor Pete added, “Jesus is also calling for us to allow the perfect love and mercy of our Father to become ours.”

Let’s respond to what Holy Spirit is stirring in our hearts. Father, we are asking this of You together today. You love the prickly, hard-to-endure individuals in our lives with a perfect, unending, unconditional, complete love. Would You please put that love into our hearts and spirits for them too? Would You cause us to love them supernaturally? Would You put Your very own prayers into us for them? Would you send Your own mercy washing through our spirits like a mighty river in their direction?

********************

Have you experienced the supernatural empowering of the Holy Spirit to love as only God can? What does that look like? How would you describe it?