This episode takes you on a journey through biblical passages that highlight God’s unwavering goodness. Starting with creation in Genesis, where everything from stars to humanity was declared ‘good’, to God’s grace in our everyday lives, we examine how this characteristic of goodness permeates even in the trials we face. By reflecting on historical instances from the Bible, we answer pressing questions about judgment, hardship, and divine mercy. Discover how, through understanding God’s goodness, we can find reassurance in His plans for us.
Welcome to the In Touch Podcast with Charles Stanley for Wednesday, March 5th. Do you associate God’s care with what happens around you? Today, you’ll learn that even in hard times, God expresses His loving kindness. Here’s a timely reminder of the goodness of God.
SPEAKER 01 :
When you think about God, what words come to your mind? Things like omnipotent, omnipresent, omniscient, merciful, justice, conviction. What are the words that come to your mind? I wonder where in all the words that you think about goodness comes into your mind about God. I think that so many people think in terms of how great and mighty and powerful God is that oftentimes, even though we talk about him being a loving father and full of kindness and mercy and grace, somehow we can’t get him down to earth to the point of just being plain old good, just God being good to us. And I want you to turn to the 31st Psalm. And I just want us to look at one verse in the Scripture because the psalmist here declares something about the goodness of God that I want us to notice. Psalm 31 and verse 19. So, he says in the Psalms here, verse nineteen, Now, let’s read it again. Notice what he says. Now, when we think about the goodness of God, I want us to think about it in terms of two things. First of all, in the terms of goodness as an attribute. That is, Goodness is characteristic of God. If you describe God, you can’t describe him fully until you also include the fact that God is a good God, that God is a God full of goodness. Now, what is that goodness? Goodness is the highest standard of good, which God himself is and can perform. And so when somebody says, well, how good is God? Here’s how good God is. God is as good as as absolute perfection, absolute holiness, absolute purity can possibly be. Which means that not only is God good, but God is the standard of all goodness. All goodness has to be compared with God’s goodness because He is the only one who is absolutely perfect. He is the only one who is absolutely holy. He is the only one whose standard is absolutely perfect. And so, When we talk about whatever God approves of as good is certainly good. Why? Because God is good. What He approves of as being good is good. And sometimes we don’t always agree with what God says is good. Sometimes we think some things are very painful and difficult and hurtful and trying, and therefore, how could they be good? So from our limited viewpoint, we’d say, well, that certainly is not good. But goodness is what God says goodness is. And goodness is an expression of the very character and the nature of God. Therefore, I don’t have to wonder how God is going to operate in my life or your life because I know that because one of his attributes is goodness, because it is his nature and character to be good, every single thing God does in your life and my life is going to be something good. You say, well, now, how can you say that God is all that good when there’s so much evil and so much wickedness in the world? Well, I’m coming to that. But what I want you to see is this, that the highest standard of good is God himself. Therefore, whatever God approves of as being good is good. And because it is his nature to be good, he is going to be good in every aspect. Now, I want you to turn to Psalm 119 for a moment. Because if we have a good God, there’s something you and I can expect from a God who is by his very nature good. One who cannot violate his nature, and he certainly cannot do that. And he does not change. He says, if you’ll notice, in Psalm 119, verse 68. Verse 68 says, speaking to God, thou art, listen, thou art good and doest good. That is, God, you are good and you do good. It is the only way God can act. Now, think about this for a moment. God has always been good because it’s his nature to be so. He is good today and he’ll be good tomorrow. He couldn’t be any more good today than he was yesterday. Goodness is the attribute and the character and the qualities of God. It is the absolute perfection of everything that is good from God’s viewpoint. We don’t always agree with him as far as what good is, but God knows what good is. And so, therefore, we can expect his actions to be good because that is his very nature to do so, which means that God cannot. This is hard for some people to accept. God cannot, by his very nature, he cannot act toward you in any other way but what is good. So, because He’s a good God, you say, but wait a minute, what about His justice, and what about His condemnation, and what about His judgment, all these things? Certainly, that’s not good, but yes, it is. God is a good God. He can only act in terms of what is good from His viewpoint of what is good, which is the highest level, because He is the standard of all good. And so, when we come to acknowledge that… And understand that God is only going to act toward us in those ways that are good. There’s something very reassuring about knowing that you and I have trusted a heavenly Father whose very nature it is to be good and His actions are good. The Bible says He is good and He does good. Now, let’s think about this in the Scripture for a moment, how He has expressed His goodness in the Scripture. And I want you to go back to Genesis chapter 1 for a moment. Because in the very first book of the Bible, I want you to notice something here. Look, if you will, in verse 3 of chapter 1 now. Then God said, let there be what? Light. And there was light. And God saw that the light was what? Good. So the very first thing he created, he said it was good. As you read down this first chapter, you notice that all the things he created, he says, and he saw it, that it was good. In verse 10, he saw that it was good. Then I want you to notice in the 31st verse what he says. He says in the 31st verse, and God saw all that he had made, and behold, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day. That is, God sort of stood back. This is my way of looking at it. God stood back and said, after he’d said all these things were good, he looked at this. He said, wow, this is very good. Look how what a good job I did. God did this most fantastic job of creating the world. And he said it was all good piece by piece. Then when he put it all together, he said it was very good. Can you imagine what God must have been thinking when he was speaking this world into being and creating each separate part of it, placing it in its space, in its orbit? Placing a sun, the moon, the stars, and all the galaxies out there, and the millions and millions of things that we can’t see, won’t ever be able to see until we get on the other side. And God looked at that. He saw the proportions were right. Everything from insects to elephants, things that fly, things that walk, things that creep, things that crawl, things on two feet, us, those things on four feet, those things with many feet, those things, I don’t even know the name of them. Anyway, they were everywhere. And God said, everything, he says, it’s very important. very, very good. You know why? Because that’s his nature. Everything God has ever created has been good. Everything that God has ever done has been good. And so when you and I look around us and look at this first passage of the Bible and say that God says that the creation, for example, is good, then certainly it is good. If you look in, if you will, at Romans chapter 2 for a moment, and here again, we see God being good in a different sort of way. Because in this particular passage, you’ll notice that he’s being good to people who are not good to him, who are rebellious toward him, people who are not trusting him. And he says in verse 4, Do you think lightly of the riches of his goodness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that the goodness of God is for the purpose of leading you to repentance? Here’s what he says. God is so good. that he even showers some good things, limited though, some good things even upon people who reject him and who are not believers in order, he says, for the purpose of leading them to repentance. Why? Because it is the very nature of God to be good. No matter what God is doing in the Bible, he’s being good. No matter who he’s dealing with, he’s being good. It’s his nature to be good. For example, you walk on your feet. You don’t walk on all fours. Why? It is your nature to stand direct. It is the nature of other animals to walk on fours. It is our nature to walk on two. If you began to crawl up and down the aisle this morning, I think you were sick. Something’s wrong with you. It’s not your nature to do so. It is not the nature of God, the character of God, to act in any fashion other than what is good. And so we see here in the book of Romans, again, that he is good. acting good, that He’s expressing goodness even to people who are lost. Then, of course, you know the passage in Galatians chapter 5, verse 22, the fruit of the Spirit. He says the fruit of the Spirit is love, goodness, And kindness and peace and so forth and joy. Goodness is one of the fruits of the Spirit. Why? Because the Holy Spirit and Jesus and God the Father, the three persons of the Trinity, make up the Godhead. If God the Father’s good by His very nature, Jesus is good by His very nature. Jesus is good by His very nature, the Holy Spirit is good by His very nature. So that… The Holy Spirit living on the inside of us is doing what? Expressing the life of Jesus in and through us. So therefore, because he’s living his life in and through us, God has the right to expect you and me to be good and also to act in a good fashion. That is to act good, kindly, lovingly toward other people. Merciful and gracious, whatever it might be. Because you see, once you trust that Jesus Christ is your Savior, the Bible says you were born again. You received the new spirit. You began a whole new life. That new spirit was of the character of our Lord. And what is that? And that is He was good. So that believers are to be good because we are followers of one who is good by His very nature. So when you look at that passage, you realize… That being good is not a matter of me trying to be good. It is a matter of allowing the goodness of God who is within us to express itself through us. Turn to James chapter 1 for a moment. In James chapter 1, you’ll recall in this very first chapter what he says about this idea of goodness. And in the 17th verse… He says in James chapter 1, every, listen to this, every good thing, not some good things, every good thing bestowed, that is it comes, and every perfect gift is from above coming down from the Father of lights. Now watch this. with whom there is no variation or shifting shadow. That is, there’s no variation. There’s no shifting. That is, if God was good yesterday, he’s good today. If God is good today, he’ll be good tomorrow. There is absolutely no change in the goodness of God. Somebody says, but wait a minute. If I rebel against God and sin against him, you mean to tell me God is going to be good to me? Yes, he is. Now watch this carefully because folks who believe that you can fall from grace always come at me on this truth. because god is good he is eternally good even when you and i act in an ungodly fashion is god good to us yes he is god doesn’t change his character he doesn’t change his attitude because you and i act up number one you can’t disappoint him because you can’t disappoint somebody who who already knows everything you’re going to do you have to have anticipation that is let down in some fashion before you have disappointment so therefore he’s not disappointed Is he grieved in his spirit when you’re not sinning against him? Yes. Does he change from being a good to being not good because we’re not good? No, he does not. You cannot alter, vary. He says there’s no variation and no shadowy turning in the very nature and character of God. God is good, period. Whatever God approves of is absolutely good because he is the highest standard of good. Now, let me ask you this. What is the greatest expression of the goodness of God? The cross. The cross is the greatest expression of God’s goodness possible because God in his goodness looked down upon a sinful world. You and I were separated from him and in his goodness toward us, motivated by his love for us. And you could put goodness and love and kindness and all these together. What did he do? But he placed upon Jesus your sin, that in mind made it possible for us to be forgiven of our sin and And therefore, it was good. Now, it may have appeared to be a very bad situation. In fact, for example, anybody living in that day, including his disciples, would have said, there’s nothing good about this. This is a spotless Lamb of God. This man has never sinned. He’s never done a single wrong. He’s never committed a wrong against anyone. And now they nail him to a cross like a thief, like a criminal. There can’t be anything good in that. That is the human viewpoint. There’s nothing good about crucifixion from a human viewpoint. What we have to remember is this, that you and I are limited by a human viewpoint. From God’s viewpoint, the crucifixion was absolutely good because it was God’s way of doing what? of saving you and me and remaining the sinless, perfect, unchangeable God that He is. He said, the soul that sinneth it shall die. The wages of sin is death. If God had just said, well, I’m going to let you get by with it, He would have violated His own principle. He would have no longer been good because He would have lied. He would have violated His own character, which He could not do, of course. And therefore, what did he do? He gave us a substitute in the person of Jesus Christ. And when you look at Jesus Christ as the substitutionary lamb that bore the sin of the whole world on the cross at Calvary, as tragic as it was because of the nature of sin, it was the best thing God has ever done for humanity when Jesus went to the cross. Good from a divine viewpoint. And so when we think about the goodness of God from Scripture, there’s illustration after illustration of God’s goodness. Now, what about in your life and mine, for example? And you think about this. God has saved you and me. That’s the goodness of God. We live and we walk in His forgiveness. That’s the goodness of God. We have friendships. That’s the goodness of God. We have good health. That’s the goodness of God. We have clothes to wear and a place to live. We have air conditioning and heat and something to drive. And we can be educated. We’ve got things that, many things that we don’t even need. The goodness of God is just poured out upon us continuously. And God is always expressing that good in some fashion or the other. Now, so we’ve said, according to Scripture, He says, how great is the goodness of God. which He has stored up for those who believe Him and those who will rely upon Him. But here’s the big question about God’s goodness. If God is so good, if all these things are true about the goodness of God, then you and I have to ask the question, why? Three things. Number one, why do these bad things happen to us? Secondly, why is there a judgment? if God is so good? And thirdly, surely, how could there be a hell if our God is a good God? How can these things be if He’s as good as the Bible says He is, if He’s as good as He says He is? God says He’s a good God. The expression of the Father is goodness and mercy and love and kindness and justice and all the rest, all wrapped up in the whole idea of goodness. God is a good God. Because you and I have a distant view of him, because we don’t see the fingerprints and the handprints and the footprints of God’s goodness around us, we don’t categorize him as good. But I want to show you why when we ask the question, how can these things be? If God is so good, how can these bad things happen? So I want you to go back, if you will, to the third chapter of Genesis. And I want you to notice something very interesting here. The third chapter of Genesis, of course, is the account of… Satan with his interview, shall we say, with Eve. And you’ll recall what happens here. Notice in these first couple of verses here. Here they are in a perfect garden. The Bible says in verse 1, Now the serpent was more crafty, subtle, tricky, than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made, and said to the woman, Indeed has God said, You shall not eat from any tree of the garden. And the woman said to the serpent, From the fruit of the trees of the garden we may eat, but from the fruit of the tree which is in the middle of the garden, God has said, You shall not eat from it or touch it lest you die. Now listen to this. Now, listen carefully. Do you know where all sin and all suffering and all heartache and all tribulation and all violence and all the rest began? His hand began. It began with Eve’s doubting God’s goodness. Look at this. Here’s what Satan said to her. He said, now… You will not surely die because the truth is, in the day that you eat of that tree, which he forbids you to eat of, in that day, you’re going to know the difference between good and evil. What he was saying is, look, God is trying to cheat you. If this God is so good, he wouldn’t deprive you. He wouldn’t withhold from you. He would not keep you from knowing the difference between good and evil. So, Eve, the truth is there’s nothing wrong with eating that because if God is who he says he is, why would he not let you know the difference between good and evil? Why would he want to keep that from you? If God is this good God, he says he is. Why would he want to keep that from you? I wonder how many times you and I have the same feeling. And that is, well, God, this appears to be good. And God says, no, this is what I want you to do. And so what do we do? We think, well, God wants to keep me from having fun. So I’m going to do what I think is right or what I think is good in spite of what God said. My friend, listen, behind every restriction, Behind every commandment, behind every single exhortation from God is the goodness of God. God doesn’t put restrictions on us because He doesn’t want us to have fun. He doesn’t give us commandments because He wants to be harsh. He is not a harsh, restrictive God. He is a good God. Anytime God puts a restriction on any facet of our life, what’s He doing? He’s being good. He is expressing goodness. He’s expressing kindness. And so what happens is we get in arguments with God. All of our sin is our disagreement of what’s best for our life. And so we choose those things that are not good. Every restriction, every commandment, every exhortation is an expression of the goodness of God toward us.
SPEAKER 02 :
Thank you for listening to The Goodness of God. If you’d like to know more about Charles Stanley or In Touch Ministries, stop by intouch.org. This podcast is a presentation of In Touch Ministries, Atlanta, Georgia.
