Be ye therefore perfect

This morning I was reading Matthew 5 and had a little epiphany. Verses 43–48 (and this is from the NIV, never mind the post title being from the KJV):

You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? And if you greet only your own people, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

I’ve long interpreted that last sentence as a command to stop sinning, but today (and acknowledging that this is probably news to nobody else), seeing it as part of a paragraph and in the context of the immediately preceding verses, I believe I now actually understand it. (I was about to say that I finally understand it, but how final my interpretation is remains to be seen. And who knows — my reading may turn out to be balderdash.)

The epiphany: in these verses, Christ commands us to love our enemies, those who are hard to love, and by extension it’s a command to love everyone, inclusive, just as Heavenly Father loves everyone — a love encompassing, a love complete, and (in the sense of not missing anything or anyone) a love that is perfect. So “be perfect” here maybe doesn’t mean “don’t mess up in any way” (impossible in this life, and that impossibility is precisely why we need a Savior) but rather is a reiteration or summation of the preceding verses: a much more doable “love everyone.”