THE GOODNESS OF GOD

Jesus accepted not to be called good (Mark 10:18), (Luke 18:18-19), (Matthew 19:16-17). Why did He refuse to take the honor? Isn't it something to feel good about to be called good? If it were you, how would you react if someone called you good? Would you say yes I am good or otherwise?

What is goodness?

By definition, goodness is the quality of being good in particular. In this then, we are not talking about goodness in the usual human sense. Rather it is not goodness as it may be perceived in the human sense or understanding. If anything, this is divine goodness. Divine goodness is imputed on us from God. For only God is good. If a person in human flesh is to be good, it is only God who imputes goodness and makes good.

Christ died to make us good

 The following may be some of the reasons why Jesus refused to be called good;

• True goodness is of God

• There is nothing good in flesh

• Self perceived goodness which only comes out of human pride

•  The sense in repentance and the need to repent

True goodness is exclusive to God.

Just as Jesus answered to the rich man, only God is good. We all are liars. Only God is true (Romans 3:4). All humans are of the same seed. For if Adam and Eve sinned, all humans are sinners by way of being the seed of Adam. And if we are to stand true and square, no human would love to be called good in the divine sense. For even when he is not been seen to have sinned, man is a potential sinner. And if he is tickled, the hidden disturbing part of him will surely surface.

God is good because He is not any potential sinner. For God says and does what He intends to. This is not so of humans. For it is proven how even one can be untrue to themselves (a person who has just stolen will blatantly deny having done so).

Thus Paul writes how he doesn't do what he wills to and does what he hates to do (against his will) (Romans 7:15-17). Why is it so? It is so because my body lives after the law of sin. For even when my mind does not will to sin, my flesh subjects me to the law of sin. For the flesh then, sin becomes a requirement rather than a choice or an option. The seed of sin makes it impossible for goodness to be ever traceable in me.

And so, the law of sin which my flesh is subjected to, undermines the will of the mind (Romans 7:21-25). So then, the law can never design a person to become what God wants him to, because the law is weak in the face of the flesh (Romans 8:3). As that, in my mind I follow the law of God, but in my flesh,  I am a slave to the desires and demands of the flesh. Thus the reason Jesus Christ came so He can take us back in the image of God.

Jesus' personality, though doesn't share in the human sin. For if Jesus' person had shared in the human sin, it would have never made sense that His sacrifice stands, and the accuser (devil) would have never succumbed to Jesus' authority. Thus to say: it had to be Jesus. 

Jesus was born of the flesh, but because He is Son of God, He is holy by the resurrection from the dead (Romans 1:3-4). But by way of having dressed in the human flesh for the purpose of making a sacrifice worthy of saving the humans, and having accepted to carry the sin of the world for the purpose of saving man, Jesus can't have denied to share in the same sin. Thus basing on this, He said well when He denied to be called good. Man is therefore only made worthy by and through Jesus.

There is nothing good in flesh.

The flesh is only destined to rot. Its sinfulness is insatiable. For after death, it has no more purpose. If anything, the flesh is not looking to anything. It thus can be careless. All that the flesh desires and demands, it does so with will and strength because other than that, there is hardly a way it gains any profit. Such hopelessness of the flesh can't be any good drive to be good. Thus then, if we are mentioning the word goodness here, we are only doing so in spiritual terms. The flesh is selfish.

As humans, and dressed as so, when we feel the urge, we go on to do whatever it requires so to give ourselves comfort selfishly, carry out murder, theft, lie, etc. Why so? For the flesh demands so. There is indeed nothing good in this flesh (Romans 7:18-19). The flesh can never be satisfied by spiritual means. It can't therefore possess or accrue that divine goodness. Jesus therefore by way of having put on the same flesh, He rightly denied to be called good.

Self perceived goodness which only comes out of human pride

We (humans) do indeed cherish to be referred to as good, but we hate to live for goodness. We only seek to be referred to as good so we can satisfy our selfish human pride. For we ought to learn that such design and genealogy is not present in us. Goodness only comes with acceptance of and submission to Jesus Christ (the perfect man in flesh).

For when a Muslim jihadist beheads a person, he thinks he is doing that which is good because it is what his god demands of him. Yet it is only a display of human pride which only comes by devilish ignition. And thus, we struggle to appear good with the intention to satisfy our ego and personal pride. But all this is just self destructive. If we could only repent...!!!???

But God through Christ sacrificed Himself to win us to Himself. God is therefore the only one to be called good because He is good with the intent to be good. God is never influenced by anything that be. Thus then, when man sinned, it wasn't only so, but that sin became part of man.

We ought then to learn that there can never be any good in the flesh (Romans 7:18). We can only be good if we give in and allow to learn from Jesus. Thus the fact that because we are pretenders and not genuine in all that we do, when we are tested in it, we are usually readily there to be disqualified. But God is good. He does not give up at whatever stage. If God were not good, He would have already given up on the world.

The sense in repentance and the need to repent

How do we become good?

We become good when we repent, not when we say we are. And Jesus presented in the flesh so that He can direct us this way. If we deny to repent, then we have sensibly denied God. For everything that Jesus did, it was meant for us. He loved us to learn from Him because He presented Himself as the perfect example for us. He had come to show us how we can be accepted of God as children. He therefore denied to be called good so He could be exemplary to us. It makes us to learn to humble ourselves when we come to God. We should come to God with emptiness.

For any lasting relationship with God begins with admission of sin and followed up with repentance (Luke 13:3). If one believes they are good, what then is the sense of repentance? We all have sinned (Romans 3:23). Only God is good.