The first group of people we’re going to focus on are Reformers. Reformers are drawn to perfection. They have a high standard of excellence and their greatest fear is being flawed. Perfectionism is a pretty big problem in today’s society. We want to do everything well and not make mistakes. We want others to see us in a good light, and dislike doing anything that could ruin our reputation. We even filter all our photos and select only the best parts of our life to appear on social media. But reformers take this a step further. Their perfectionistic tendencies don’t only apply to their own lives but also to society as a whole. Reformers are great at being advocates, regulators, and prophets. They want society to match up to their standards, which is useful for campaigning for justice and change. But because they wrestle with perfectionism and self-righteousness, they tend to judge others whose standards aren’t quite so high. The prophet Amos is a good example. He writes about ‘a plumb line’ that shows how short people fall of God’s standards (have a read of Amos 7:7-8). It can be easy to judge others, and point out their flaws. But judging others isn’t what God wants us to be doing. Paul said, ‘Be kind to each other, tender-hearted, forgiving one another, just as God through Christ has forgiven you.’ We should be encouraging and building each other up, not criticising and trying to change things about others. There’s the right time for gentle and kind words of advice, but we need to learn to see people as God sees them – with love. If we’re a reformer our greatest challenge will be to demonstrate love, patience, and grace in our relationships. But with God’s help we can do it.
