This morning as I sat down to prayer, I was asking the Lord where to read in scripture and I thought I heard Him ask the following question, "Why do you call me good?" This is a direct quote from Mark 10:18 NIV: “Why do you call me good?” Jesus answered. “No one is good---except God alone." I figure I should probably spend some time reflecting on God's goodness.
The first use of 'good' in scripture comes from the beginning of Genesis, where God is reviewing His creation and calls it good. In fact He uses that term seven times. It is important to know that which is good comes from God. The first place where the word 'goodness' is used is when Moses asks to see God's glory, in the Book Exodus 33:18-19 NIV:
[18] Then Moses said, “Now show me your glory.”
[19] And the Lord said, “I will cause all my goodness to pass in front of you, and I will proclaim my name, the Lord, in your presence. I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion."
I find it very interesting that Moses asks to see God's glory, and God responds that He will cause all His goodness to pass in front of him. So clearly goodness and glory are closely related. In addition, the goodness of God is also closely related to His name, and mercy and compassion, so we are talking about a core attribute of God.
I also find it interesting that the primary attack against God always seems related to His goodness. Questions like "how could God allow this?"; "If God is real why didn't He intervene?"; "Why would God do this?" The primary characteristic that is being called into question in these statements is God's goodness. The word used in Ex 33:19 is the Hebrew word "Tuwb" and it would normally be defined as:
1) goods, good things, goodness
a) good things
b) goods, property
c) fairness, beauty, joy, prosperity, goodness (abstract)
d) goodness (of taste, discernment)
e) goodness (of God) (abstract)
These make sense, but I believe there is more depth to what God is communicating. I was able to do a bit more digging and came across this the following bit, which is from Baker's Evangelical Dictionary of Biblical Theology and it's entry on Good and Goodness:
"The main Old Testament words for good/goodness come from the Hebrew word tob [טָב] while the most common New Testament words are kalos [καλός], agathos [ἀγαθός , ἀγαθοεργός],chrestos [χρηστός], and their cognates. These words often appear in a nonmoral sense; a "good" or "good-of-appearance" woman is beautiful (Gen 6:2; 24:16; 26:7; 2 Sam 11:2; Est 1:11; 2:2-3, 7) and a "good" man is handsome (1 Sam 9:2). A land may be good (Deut 1:25,35) and so may gold (2 Ch 3:5,8), soil (Luke 8:8), a tree (Matt 7:17), wine (John 2:10), or all of creation (seven times in Gen. 1). But the most theologically important uses of these words have to do with moral qualities.
God's goodness is a bedrock truth of Scripture. His goodness is praised in the psalms (25:8; 34:8; 86:5;100:5; 118:1; 136:1; 145:9). Jesus affirms the Father's goodness when speaking to the rich young ruler (Matt 19:17; Mark 10:18; Luke 18:19). In 1 Peter 2:3 Peter echoes the language of Psalm 34:8: "Taste and see that the Lord is good!"'
Although we might discuss God's goodness in some abstract philosophical sense, in Scripture his goodness appears most clearly in his dealings with people. He is not only good in general, but he is good to us (Psalm 23:6; 68:10; 73:1; 119:65; 145:9; Lam 3:25; Luke 6:35; Rom 2:4; 11:22; Eph 2:7; Titus 3:4). Human goodness is modeled on divine goodness (Matt 5:48). For human beings goodness involves right behavior, expresses itself in kindness and other praiseworthy qualities, includes avoiding evil, and springs from the inner person.
It is nearly impossible to think about goodness in the abstract. In Scripture goodness always involves particular ways of behaving. Because God is good, he is good to his people; when people are good they behave decently toward each other, based on God's goodness to them. Moses' invitation to Hobab expresses this emphasis: "Come with us and we will treat you well, for the Lord has promised good things to Israel" (Num 10:29). The general biblical words for "good/ goodness" include this idea of right behavior, although the idea is often expressed by means of a more specific term like "upright/uprightness" or "righteous/righteousness."
The goodness God's people exhibit shows itself in various moral qualities, notably kindness; hesed[חֶסֶד , חֶסֶד], translated "goodness" or "kindness, " serves as one of the major synonyms of tob [טָב], "good, " in the Old Testament. In the New Testament many words describe the specific characteristics and behaviors of good people, including "just/justice, " "righteous/ righteousness, " "holy/holiness, " "pure/ purity, " "gentle/gentleness, " and "kind/kindness." If "goodness" is the general term, these other specific terms show what goodness means in daily living.
Goodness involves not only right behavior but also avoiding its opposite, evil. The choice between good and evil has lain before people since the garden of Eden when Adam and Eve ate fruit from the "tree of the knowledge of good and evil" (Gen 2:9). Since then God's curse has fallen on "those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter" (Isa 5:20). A wise ruler like Solomon, or indeed anyone who wants to obey God, needs the wisdom to tell good from evil (1 Kings 3:9; Heb 5:14). Those who serve God will "seek good, not evil, … hate evil, love good" (Amos 5:14-15).
For the Christian or the faithful Israelite, goodness has never been a matter of outward behavior alone; it comes from within. An evil person is evil within (Gen 6:5; Mark 7:14-23; and parallels). In the same way a good person's good behavior shows a good heart (Matt 12:33-35).
In the Old Testament God's goodness to his people and their goodness in response is based on the covenant between them. God's appeal to his people to return to the covenant relationship finds expression in a call to simple goodness (Mic 6:6-8). In the New Testament goodness is a fruit of the Spirit (Gal 5:22), while moral excellence is one of the steps on the "ladder of virtue" (2 Peter 1:5)."
AUTHOR: Carl B. Bridges, Jr.
That is very helpful. I like the statement, "Because God is good, He is good to His people!" This isn't an attribute that God turns on and off, it is His core characteristic, so whenever our observation or opinion of a situation would lead us to think God isn't good, then we clearly do not understand the whole situation or God's motivation. When I run into situations like this I am always directed back in my mind to Isaiah 55:8-9 NIV: “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the Lord. [9] “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts."
God doesn't think like us, nor are His ways our ways, and thus we do not fully understand His goodness. We look at a situation and think God can't be good because of what is happening or happened, yet that is clearly not true, based on what God says about Himself. This is where we need to engage our faith and trust God! This is where we must recognize that we don't know the whole story, or don't have the right perspective. We only see and understand a very small part of the big picture that God operates within. I am reminded of the old story of the 5 blind men who are describing an elephant. They can't see the whole thing, so they describe it based on the limited area they are able to touch. The trunk, foot, tusk, ear and tail are all very different and taken by themselves do not offer a good representation of the elephant. In the same way, any of our perspectives when looking at anything this side of eternity, is going to be limited by our humanness.
I had a dream once where God took me to heaven and was showing me through the mansion He had for me. I remember that each room was better than the preceding room. I would have been happy to stop in any of those rooms, but God just kept opening new doors and I was compelled to walk into the new room, because it was better than what I was in presently. I remember waking up and having the smallest sense of the Goodness of God, and yet it was absolutely overwhelming. I believe this is what God's goodness is really like! It is always expanding and increasing, just like His greatness, His Kingdom and His rule. If I were to step back to the days before I had gone to school, I believe I would have referred to this increasing goodness as "gooder" God just keeps getting "gooder"! :-)
God is Good and He keeps getting Gooder! In fact everything about Him keeps getting better and better! What an amazing God we have!
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