“Why do you call me good?” Jesus answered. “There is no one good—except God alone.” (Mark 10:18)
Are there good people in the world? Yes and no. There are great people everywhere. Kind, loyal, steady, reliable, compassionate, trustworthy people. But when it comes to the Spiritual aspect of life, they are only relatively good. The only human who ever walked the earth that was truly, wholly, Spiritually, and morally good was Jesus of Nazareth. We call him Jesus Christ. The word “Christ” in its original language translates to “Anointed One,” or “Messiah.”
The way we can tell if anyone is good, compared to Christ, is a simple test. The Bible is filled in the Old Testament with many laws, but you can use a short list: the Ten Commandments. When you think of the best person you know, ask if they have ever stolen. Have they ever taken God’s name in vain? Have they ever committed adultery? (And that one can be expanded on...Matthew 5:28 says that if they’ve ever looked at someone and fantasized about sex with them, they’ve committed adultery in their heart!) Have they ever looked upon or obsessed over someone else’s property and wished it was theirs? You don’t have to get too deep into just the Ten, before you find the flaw in a person. But the Bible teaches that Jesus fulfilled every bit of the Old Testament Law, in spirit and in practicality. He even allowed a man to baptize him, before baptism was a requirement for entry into the Church!
When Jesus answered in today’s scripture, “Why do you call me good? There is no one good—except God alone,” he wasn’t denying his own goodness. I suspect the person addressing him as “good” was throwing the term around lightly. Not only that, hidden in this statement is the fact Jesus knew he was God “in the flesh.” The Son of God, yet the embodiment of God in human form. Isaiah 7:14 says: “Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign: the virgin shall be with child, and his name shall be Immanuel.” Immanuel literally means “God with us.”
So compared to the divine Jesus, every man falls short of goodness, relatively speaking. It doesn’t mean there aren’t “good” people. The Apostle Paul, who emphatically says salvation is not earned, even said “very rarely will anyone die for a righteous person, though for a good person someone might possibly dare to die.” (Romans 5:7)
As a personal illustration, my Grandmother is an excellent person. In my estimation she is the anchor of the family. She’s 93, she is full of wisdom, she rarely turns away people who bring a need to her, she gave up personal dreams and interests to raise a family and dedicate herself to her family’s business, and she believes in God. Yet she’ll be the first to say she deals with guilt, mistakes, and a healthy fear of the Lord. She will say openly that she could never make it to Heaven without Jesus. She's one of the best people I know, and she's so aware of falling short she literally fears God.
So in the broad sense of goodness, there are good people. But in the Spiritual sense, there are none. We've all fallen short of faith and obedience to God, and every one of us has taken onto ourselves the full weight of sin and its punishment, which is eternal separation from God--in hell.
The good news? That same Jesus who lived so sinlessly he fulfilled God's law (the Bible says God's very word was made into flesh, so He was the Bible incarnated), was crucified and cursed and shed his blood to pay for our sins! On the third day, he rose from the grave, appearing before many witnesses, to show that God had accepted his sacrifice for us. The Bible teaches that his death was to atone for us, and his resurrection was to justify us. If you step into belief in these two elements of Christianity, and confess it with your mouth, it doesn't matter how bad or good you are. You will be credited with the goodness of Christ himself, when God opens the ledgers to see the contents of each person's "goodness." You will be pronounced righteous, apart from any good work you could've done. You'd be insane not to make that exchange, yet many people don't. The reward for doing so is eternal life; the punishment for refusing is eternal hell. Won't you trade your "goodness" for his perfect righteousness today? Won't you seal your destiny, and have a place forever with Jesus in Heaven?
No comments:
Post a Comment