125: Perfectionism or Biblical Excellence? (with Brian Delamont)

What does Biblical excellence look like? Brian Delamont walks us through Scriptures about the difference between performance-based perfectionism as compared to Christ-honoring stewardship as we continue in our series on TeachBeyond’s core values.

• TeachBeyond’s Core Value of Excellence: “Acknowledging that God deserves glory in all that we do, we undertake everything wholeheartedly and to the best of our ability. We approach our calling to excellence with creativity, committing ourselves as stewards of God’s resources.”
• A Call to Excellence: Understanding Excellence God’s Way by Gary Inrig
• “This Biblical view of excellence isn’t rooted in my performance, but it’s rooted in the character and nature of God, who is excellent in every way and who is fully integrated in His nature as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.”
• 1 Corinthians 12:31
• Philippians 4:8
• Titus 3:8
• Colossians 3:23-24 
• “Yes, it is the Lord Christ we are serving, and we do want to bring our very best offering to Him every time, all the time. But, we receive an inheritance from the Lord… And you never, ever have to work to receive an inheritance. I receive an inheritance because someone else has done all of the work, and I am the beneficiary of their love and their generosity. That’s the beauty and power of the Gospel.”
• 1 Peter 1:3-4
• “The best course correction for a false standard of excellence is to look to what God says about Himself and about ourselves.”
• Psalm 18:30
• Psalm 19:7
• “God isn’t insisting on perfection or a twisted sense of my life being excellent or good enough before I can come to Him. He gives me His excellent wisdom by His Word. For me, and I think for all of us, that shifts the weight of responsibility for excellence to the place where it was always intended to be - to have God be the source and sustainer of excellence. He is able, and I am blessed to be His child. ”
• “It’s all about God’s glory. He’s the one who deserves the praise and honor in all that we do. It’s not about me, it’s not about how well a certain school scores in testing, it’s not about whether TeachBeyond is known around the world or not. We recognize that God deserves all glory.”
• Mark 12:41-44
• Matthew 5:43-48
• “It’s not that He’s demanding perfection because Jesus actually came to show us that we could never fulfill the Law; only He would be the perfect offering, the perfect sacrifice.”
• Psalm 33:2-4
• “Doing something well reflects the God we love.”
• Psalm 78:72
• “Excellent leadership flows from a heart of integrity, and it’s done skillfully.”

We are unpacking TeachBeyond’s four core values each month. Listen to the first one here: Episode 121: Following in Humility

November Reflection: What’s your own standard for evaluating excellence?

What’s changing our lives:

• Keane: A season of his family being sick
• Heather: High-top tables
• Brian: Updates to Microsoft Teams

Weekly Spotlight: Bucharest Christian Academy

We’d love to hear from you! [email protected]
Podcast Website: https://teachbeyond.org/podcast
Learn about TeachBeyond: https://teachbeyond.org/