Excellence, Friend or Foe?

Harold Abrahams won the Gold Medal for the 100 meters sprint at the 1924 Paris Olympics. His story, and that of Eric Liddell, is told in the movie “Chariots of Fire” though the movie has multiple historical flaws. In the movie at least, Abrahams is challenged by the Master of his Cambridge University College as to why he has employed a professional coach to further his athletic ambitions.

Abrahams replies, “I believe in the pursuit of excellence.”

This is not an unusual expression. It has been used by many with application to a variety of human endeavours. It also has its critics. Michael Frost wrote recently, “Who told us excellence should be our core value? It’s not found in New Testament teaching on the church.” Here I am caught in a dilemma. I kind-of agree with Frost. However, I have long been stirred by Philippians 4:8, Paul’s imperative to think and to go on thinking, to reason through the values he lists. And there it is, “excellence”.

Let us assume that the translators are right in using “excellence/excellent” here. It is a word of some flexibility and not used much in the NT. Only here by Paul. It can be found in 1 Peter 2:9 (declaring the “excellencies” of God) and 2 Peter 1:3, 5 where Peter uses it of God and calls us to be likewise (2 Peter 1:5), though the translators use other English words in Peter (“goodness” in 2 Peter). At the heart of the word is the mastery of virtue. The “pursuit of excellence” then is the striving after the qualities that are integral in the high values (moral and otherwise) fundamental to the character of God, in the person of Jesus, and in the nature of the Kingdom Jesus is working to complete.

              
There are a range of NT words that express the idea of excelling, abounding, exceeding, overflowing. Sometimes used to express the abundance of God’s love, grace and work, but also used of Christians abounding or excelling in serving, loving and honouring one another.

Of God we read of His exceedingly great power (2 Corinthians 4:7), His abundant/excelling grace/blessing (2 Corinthians 9:8), His overflowing grace (Ephesians 1:8), and the immeasurable/abundance of His power (Ephesians 3:20). All these qualities of God, and many more, express the excellencies of the character, power, and work of God.

For God’s people, us, we read of many exhortations and descriptions of the pursuit of excellence. Love is presented as the more excellent way (1 Corinthians 12:31) and in this we are to excel/abound (Philippians 1:9, 1 Thessalonians 3:12). We are to excel or abound in those gifts that build up the church (1 Corinthians 14:12) and because of the resurrection we are to excel in the work of Christ (1 Corinthians 15:58). In 2 Corinthians 8-9, we read in several ways of the abundant/excelling generosity of God and the consequent abundant/excelling generosity of the Corinthians. Paul exhorts us to be excelling/overflowing/abounding in thanksgiving (Colossians 2:7).

As noted above, the excellence/goodness of God is our inspiration to be likewise which flows over into a number of excellent practices (2 Peter 1:3-8).

Maturity, writes Paul, is in knowing one still has a long way to go (Philippians 3:7-15). So, he writes of his passion to increasingly follow in the ways of Christ. He talks of “pressing on” and “straining forward” towards this goal. He doesn’t use the language of excellence, but excellence is written all over this passage. Excellence is perfectly laid out for us in the sufferings, death and resurrection of Christ Himself. Herein is the excellence of love, the love that we are to live out in the body of Christ.

We also know of how much Paul likens these strivings to an athlete who disciplines the body and mind in whatever way it takes to win the prize of winning the race (1 Corinthians 9:24-27, Galatians 2:2, 5:7, 2 Timothy 4:7). This is how Paul understands the pursuit of excellence.

So why then is Michael Frost so negative about excellence?

Five cultural trends killing the church’s mission

Well, it does not take much to see that what he is writing about are many of the expectations of excellence that drive much of contemporary church practice. Frost is talking about the excellencies as exalted in our culture rather than the very different excellencies exalted in the New Testament.

As Frost summarizes it, we expect the ministries of others in the church to be “exceptional”. Expectations of high levels of professional performance, and a reliance on those who are perceived to be experts, have become the criteria by which we measure the worth of the activities of the church. Frost writes, “We won’t put up with anything half-baked or amateurish …. Christians are turning into connoisseurs, demanding greater and greater excellence, and finding it elsewhere if their local church can’t supply it.”

Contrast this with the words of Paul, “ ²¹ The eye cannot say to the hand, “I don’t need you!” And the head cannot say to the feet, “I don’t need you!” ²² On the contrary, those parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, ²³ and the parts that we think are less honorable we treat with special honor. And the parts that are unpresentable are treated with special modesty, ²⁴ while our presentable parts need no special treatment. But God has put the body together, giving greater honor to the parts that lacked it, ²⁵ so that there should be no division in the body, but that its parts should have equal concern for each other. ²⁶ If one part suffers, every part suffers with it; if one part is honored, every part rejoices with it.” (1 Corinthians 12:21-26)

There is a tendency to presume that the ministries of the church should be so good as to inspire us simply by the professional quality of the performance. Content has become secondary, honouring the ministry of others has become secondary unless they measure up with our expectations, our own responsibilities have become secondary to the presumption that others should make it happen in us by the quality of their performance.

Ours is the culture of all-day entertainment, if the TV isn’t on then the music is. Smart phones keep us entertained everywhere from the bathroom in the morning through to bedroom at night. The vicarious experiences of reality TV bring to us the emotional experience without having to experience ourselves the substance or ground for authentic deep emotion. Ours is the culture in which meaning and fulfilment in life are dependent on the entertaining performances of others. Hardly surprising given how much church services have become concert like.

I remember JI Packer writing years ago that we no longer ask the question, “How did you get on under the preaching today?” Rather the questions today after the sermon are more about how well did the preacher preach? There has been a shift so now it is less about content, substance and personal responsibility, more about how well the preacher inspired me and how good the PowerPoint was. We underestimate how deeply ingrained this culture permeates the values of Christians today.

Excellence, cultural more than Scriptural, has become a presumption by which we measure the performance of the ministries of others. This is the opposite of the Scriptural focus on excellence as a pursuit for oneself and certainly not a way of legitimizing the judging of the ministries of others.

So, what are we to do as leaders of International Churches (ICs)?

1. Teach and preach, exhort and explain, the call in Scripture for the pursuit of excellence in discipleship and ministry as a personal challenge. Encourage all with the many pursuits laid out in Philippians 4:8.

2. Ensure your people appreciate the difference between the pursuit of excellence and the self- condemnation that sometimes comes when we compare ourselves with others; or when we judge our own performance by how well others are inspired; or when we condemn ourselves because God has not gifted us with amazing effectiveness; or when no matter how much we pursue excellence in all aspects of our discipleship, the thorns in the flesh never seem to go away. The pursuit of excellence can become an oppressive burden, a kind of perfectionism. Remember, the Paul who wrote so well on excellence, as summarized above, is the same Paul who in several places acknowledges with honesty his own limitations and weaknesses.

3. Knowing oneself is fundamental to the pursuit of excellence. Personality, emotional baggage, life experience, opportunity, and so on, all have an effect on the journey of maturation. No two people are the same. Both in process and in outcomes, the pursuit of excellence will vary from one to the next. So, IC leaders have a role in helping people know themselves by explaining how discipleship is affected by these personal realities.

4. Explain well the difference between the pursuit of excellence and the achievement of excellence. The pursuit is a life-long journey. Achievement will always be limited until that final day when Christ returns. Focusing on achievement rather than pursuit simply creates a weary burden of disappointment.

5. Perhaps even more of a challenge than teaching the Scriptures is the need to help people discern and critique the cultural baggage and expectations that they unconsciously assume when thinking about excellence. Every culture has particular ideals of excellence, and every culture has expectations in this that are not all supported in Scripture. In ICs we soon discover how true this is. Even just across the English-speaking world there is much diversity, so much more when the vast array of cultures across the nations is considered.

6. Repeatedly teach and exhort the message of 1 Corinthians 12 as noted above: to receive and honour the ministries and service of all, especially those who are limited, timid, inadequate. The way of the world is to honour the performers, the achievers, the multi-talented, the celebrities, the entertainers. The way of the cross is to honour the least, the inadequate, the frail and limited who do their best but it is amateurish at best. The true measure of a church is not how well the best of its ministries are celebrated, but how well it respects, honours and celebrates the weak, the less honourable parts of the body, those who the world regards as no-bodies, the invisible. The glory of God is not so much in the professional performances of an exciting church service, but in the love of the unlovable, the love of the least, the love of the unlovely, the love of the annoying, the love of those who tend to make a mess of things. To love those who are powerless, remembering the powerlessness of Jesus on the cross.

The pursuit of excellence is a good thing, an excellent thing, a great servant and teacher in the pursuit of Christ-likeness in discipleship and effectiveness in serving others. But it can also be a terrible master when it becomes the source of judgementalism of self and others. The church today, as Michael Frost claimed, is suffering from the oppressive expectations of a certain kind of excellence. Professional performances that provide entertaining church services have replaced every member ministry in which the contributions of all are appreciated and celebrated. Let us pursue that excellence that reveals and expresses the excellence of the glory of Christ.

Graham Chipps