By the Rev. Mark Boorsma

Ascension Lutheran Church, Albert Lea

We stand at the threshold of a new year. Tomorrow begins a month the Romans named after Janus, the god of gates and doorways commonly depicted with two faces — one looking forward and one looking backward (and you thought your mother was the only one with eyes in the back of her head).

Although Janus has fallen from popular memory, many still practice his particular kind of double vision, reviewing the year past while also greeting a new year with fresh resolve.

This year I resolve not to make any resolutions that immediately set me up to fail. While I could certainly stand to eat less and exercise more, or set a dozen other goals that would make me more trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, courteous, kind, obedient, cheerful, thrifty, brave, clean and reverent, I’ve learned that I will also feel way too guilty about my inevitable stumbling.

The character flaw that gets me in the most trouble is my perfectionism — that troubling expectation that everything must be just so. I’m never so grumpy as when I fault myself and the world for being less than perfect. It’s also too easy to suppose that a demanding God expects perfection also.

Although the many good people we encounter might fool us into believing that “good” is the norm, somebody somewhere is bound to disappoint. An aspect of the Christian message that resonates well with me is the assessment that human beings are “sinners” — essentially self-centered with a fatal disregard for God and one another. Though this may sound depressing, it sets us up for the really good news that God knows this about us and has arranged to give us a perfection we could never hope to manufacture.

My wish for you in the new year is twofold. First, I pray that you may come to know your maker and redeemer, the one who loves you completely. Second, I hope that you may find a faith community that’s not so perfect that it has no place for “people like you.” The best faith communities are gatherings of imperfect people who have learned to forgive and encourage one another. Since we’re on this journey together, we might as well respect and help each other in every new year we are given.