Perfection

I'm not a perfectionist because I realize that as  mere human being, I can never possibly be perfect. Some people are obsessed with the goal of perfection and do things in a most orderly manner to assist it achieving perfection. Obsessive–compulsive personality disorder (OCPD) is a personality disorder characterized by a general pattern of concern with orderliness, perfectionism, excessive attention to details, mental and interpersonal control, and a need for control over one's environment, at the expense of flexibility, openness to experience, and efficiency. (Wikipedia). In psychology this striving is a disorder, and is abnormal.

Now for a commercial break.

I just finished writing my next book "Building the Dream: History of the Corvette Plant", due out in the fall. In the book, I discuss the goal of zero repair. In building Corvettes the goal is first time quality (FTQ) in everything. Managers for future cars always plan on a repair area because they know that everything is imperfect. Managers demand FTQ, but realize that even with the best efforts failures will occur. However, the goal is still perfection in everything.

No process exists which has the idea that "this won't matter to the customer". Customers want perfect cars. Even one defect makes a defective vehicle, and customer enthusiasm wanes. The customer becomes disappointed if even one defect occurs, let alone many. In fact, depending on the nature of the defect, for some people there may as well be many defects because disappointment is disappointment!

Corvette's are built to standards. They are what the customer demands. Each of those standards are written down and become a requirement toward quality. Again, the designer knows that some of these standards will fail because people fail as well as systems. However, designers can live for that because repair is possible.

Back to my commentary on perfection:

God intended that man be perfect. Knowing that they are human, He established one standard: in essence, don't eat of that tree means love only Me. Adam and Eve did that perfectly until one day they were deceived. The serpent basically said about God: the Customer won't mind. You won't really die!" Both of the humans became satisfied with imperfection. They violated the one standard: love God.

With the standards violation, there was a loss of quality for mankind. Man went from perfection to  defective! Liking better what was right in their own eyes, Adam and Eve were satisfied with their loss of perfection. They lowered their own standards below God's standard. The end result is that the "Customer" - God, was not satisfied. He made mankind perfect, and perfect He wanted them to be. In fact, God wants all the people patterned off the first to be perfect!

Mankind, being created in the image of God, was made perfect, and he wants us to become perfect again!

Matthew 5:48 "Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect."

Unfortunately, we were reproduced according to our model. We are not perfect. All men violate God's standards. Some claimed that they didn't know, so God made the one standard more clear: he divided the one standard - love God, into ten and wrote them on stone for a standard for all time. Mankind was then without excuse! How would they know? It's written in stone!

The Ten Commandments are standards. They are the metrics for perfection. If all these things are adhered to, quality ensues. We call that quality - goodness, but since only God is good, we all miss the mark.  Those who attempt to do good without the idea of pleasing the final customer, miss the mark. God is disappointed in them. Therefore, doing good because of demands, misses the quality goal for the final Customer wants goodness because the person desires to please the Customer. Therefore, it is the willingness to do good more than doing the standard which most pleases the Customer.

The pessimist would say: we can never be perfect. That is true but we are required to minimize our defectiveness. We are to strive for perfection - work, not to be gods, but to be like God. We can never get there, but we should still strife to be perfect just to please God!

Sometimes defects will occur just as with car-building. Being the same, people are imperfect so automobile defects will occur as they are built. A repair area is set aside for those incidental failures. Assemblers still attempt to build first time quality. but in the event they fail, there is a repair process. Things are fixed there, but first they need to be identified.

Defects are found by inspection - for cars it's by close examination and comparison to the specifications. With people, it's by introspection, but it's using God's standards of satisfaction - His commands. One must realize the defects in order to fix them, and people must know their transgressions.

After the defects are presented, for humans by conviction, and for cars by defects, they must be fixed. The repair process for imperfect humans is repentance. But before repentance is possible, there must be sorrow for making the Customer displeased. Repentance repairs the defects and makes the person perfect again. Sure he will still stall out later, but reflection of God's Word minimizes the occurrences. Hence, perfection is never achieved but it's still the goal, and is God's will! We never want for God's enthusiasm to wane because that's a reflection on us! He cries when we are in error.