Rules

When I was young, I was brought up in a monochrome world, with little room for  shades of grey. This was most apparent when it came to societal rules and codes of behaviour. To fall foul of these rules implied either a sin of omission or of commission.
I recall being taken aside by the Principal of my college for holding my knife incorrectly during school dinners. Obviously a sin of commission. On another occasion, I was given detention for carrying rather than wearing my school scarf one winter’s morning. My sin of omission was brought to the attention of my Year Head by an observant, or as I called him a sneaky, older prefect. 
Obeying these rules was very difficult, as few were written down, but were still required standards for  a model citizen. No excuses were accepted.  Once a classmate was standing on a seat to get a better view of a brewing altercation. He was asked by an irate teacher “would you do that at home?” and answered “Yes Sir”. Truth did not exempt him from detention. 
Church had its own peculiar set of rules. I wasn’t allowed to turn round when seated in the pew, because, quote,  “Lot’s wife turned into a pillar of salt when she turned round”.  Young girls always dressed up for Easter, with a new bonnet as “they needed to dress up to meet God”.  When being confirmed, I was warned not to wear hair gel as “the Bishop’s hands might slide off when he blessed me” .
One Greek word for sin translates as “missing the mark”. It comes from the lexicon of words connected with archery where it meant failing to hit the target. In my view, we have taken this meaning and misapplied it, identifying the mark we miss as a list of rules. The rules include wrong behaviours, activities or actions that the church at any given time designates to be a sinful behaviour,  act or activity.  Over the years this sinful activity has included language use, theological views, sexual orientation and even divorce and remarriage. Such an approach tries to frighten people into heaven for fear of Hell. 
When success is seen as our ability to obey one set of rules,  we are  judged solely on keeping those rules. Such an approach can create the impression that God’s love can be earned by doing the right thing and can be lost by failure to follow the rules. To sin.  We don’t become Gods children by obeying rules.  Jesus came because we are unable to earn God’s love.
So, I think the mark to aim for is not adherence to a rulebook,  but, rather it is to seek to follow Jesus to the best of our ability.  Hitting the mark, success,  is then seen as being committed to the journey of following Jesus, while realising we will be imperfect disciples this side of Heaven.