by Jeff Penner | PSAP, CPRC
Recently, I had the chance to do an overnight silent retreat in Houston. Getting away from the distractions of modern life was a breath of fresh air and gave me a sense of clarity I rarely get. As I walked, journaled, prayed, and read, something became clear: My pursuit of perfectionism and certainty is exhausting me.
My desire to be good at what I do so easily escalates toward perfectionistic pursuit that becomes debilitating. Often it helps me serve others well and honor God in what I do. But more often than I want to admit, I strive for perfectionism and superiority so that I can have peace with myself and protect myself from failure. I want to control my circumstances and secure the future that I desire. The thinking goes this way: If I can secure my place of belonging by being exceptional, then I can have certainty that I am good enough, that I am valuable, and that I will not experience failure. It shows up in the way I make decisions too. I can get stuck in an endless loop of looking for “the answer” so that I make the “right” decision. Certainty and perfectionism become how I find my identity.
Living in the modern age makes it easier to believe we should be strong enough to have certainty and control over our lives. Our culture celebrates superiority and power; we see it in sports, politics, work, etc. As theologian Miroslav Volf says, “Striving for superiority is pervasive, clothed in distinctively modern and deeply pernicious guise.”[1] (The Cost of Ambition: How Striving to Be Better Than Others Makes Us Worse). Perfectionism, superiority, and certainty promise us power to control our lives. The issue is that might and power must be maintained, and as soon as we feel we have it our own brokenness or the evil in our world derails it. It is just a flash in the pan. As the writer of Ecclesiastes says, “Then I considered all that my hands had done and the toil I had expended in doing it, and behold, all was vanity and a striving after wind” (2:11). Living for certainty, power, and might is maddening. It is as reliable as grasping for wind.
In the Christian faith, we have a way of escaping this trap that seems counterintuitive at first. It is only by relinquishing our pursuit of strength that we become strong. In fact, we’re presented with a challenge to embrace our weakness and trust in God instead. The path to strength is found in letting go and trusting in his strength. And what gives us the strength to be capable of doing that is by looking to Jesus Christ who has all the might. As Paul said in 2 Corinthians 12:10, “For when I am weak, then I am strong.” By experiencing Christ’s power in our weakness, we experience the peace that He has secured for us.
In Colossians 1:15–20, Paul gives us a grand picture of the might of Jesus Christ and how his strength gives us what we need to escape the elusive search for strength and certainty. Jesus Christ is described as the one by whom and for whom all things were created. All powers and authorities are through and for him. Everything in the universe is held together by him, and all power in the universe is pointing to him. And as the all-powerful God over all, Jesus Christ has powerfully secured peace by “the blood of his cross.” If there was ever a person who we could fully trust to be strong for us and secure our peace, it is Jesus Christ. And the wonderful reality is that he has done it. His peace is available to us.
In this Advent season, we acknowledge not only that Jesus Christ is all powerful, but also the fact that in him we have true peace that allows us to let go of our constant striving for strength and certainty in this life. When we embrace our weakness alongside his strength, we experience the peace “that surpasses all understanding,” to borrow Paul’s words from Philippians 3. May this Advent season be a time when you experience the peace of Christ richly in your heart as you embrace his might for you.
[1]. Miroslov Volf, The Cost of Ambition: How Striving to Be Better Than Others Makes Us Worse (Grand Rapids, MI: Brazos Press, 2025), 43.
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