Read Colossians 1:22

Living as we do in a product-oriented culture, we like to package our faith, too. We prefer to sell a slick, shrink-wrapped version of salvation that includes happiness and peace, and happiness here and now, and heaven by and by. 

While there is nothing wrong with good marketing techniques or teaching principles of authentic success, there is something wrong if we neglect to mention the process, which must inevitably include times of defeat and failure....

What I'd like to know is who erected such a happily-ever-after standard of perfection in the first place? 

God knows very well we aren't able to produce perfection; that's why Jesus, the perfect Son of God, placed us in His family. That's why He gave us a position of perfect righteousness in Him, reminding us by contrast that our own daily experience will constantly fall short.

Excerpted from Charles R. Swindoll, Wisdom for the Way (Nashville: J. Countryman, a division of Thomas Nelson, Inc., 2001). Copyright © 2001 by Charles R. Swindoll, Inc. All rights reserved. Used by permission.