Crumbs30

 

Crumbs from the Master ‘s Table 30 : Goodness

Psalm 145:7 NIVThey celebrate your abundant goodness
    and joyfully sing of your righteousness.

Ephesians 5:9 NIV(for the fruit of the light consists in all goodness, righteousness and truth)

Romans 15:14 NIV I myself am convinced, my brothers and sisters, that you yourselves are full of goodness, filled with knowledge and competent to instruct one another.

2 Thessalonians 1:11 NIV With this in mind, we constantly pray for you, that our God may make you worthy of his calling, and that by his power he may bring to fruition your every desire for goodness and your every deed prompted by faith.

2 Peter 1:5 NIV For this very reason, make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge

Matthew 5:16 NIV In the same way, let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven.

Crumbs

I have trouble with the word goodness. I have difficulty defining it and tying it down. Some translations give generosity and Philips has benevolence. I can make most sense by regarding it as a word that includes all the other virtues. Looking at English translations of the Old Testament I discover that goodness is an essential a quality of God. We base our lives on the premise “God is good.” Anything else is unthinkable.

The impact that God would make on His creatures is that they become more God like. As we meet God the light dawns and the Spirit comes. Goodness is the fruit. This divine quality is imparted to us. As the old hymn says “He died to make us good”

It is good to note in the verse from Romans that Paul found goodness in the Christians in Rome. Sadly Christians have looked for the opposite in each other leading to grievous disharmony.

Goodness is the threshold of Christian development. Peter says that once the surrender of faith has been given, goodness should be the quality that should emerge. Often what to do is the challenge facing the young Christian in their entry into a new way of living. Paul felt it necessary to pray that these new desires would find fruition.

In Matthew 5:16 Our Lord Jesus Christ teaches that folk should see our good deeds and thereby led to worship God.

Queries ( for private thought or joint discussion) 1. What is goodness? 2. How should the fact that God imparts goodness to our fellow Christians affect our attitude to them? 3. How do we add goodness to our faith ?

 Please note that this is also published on my blog along with poems and other items on https://pmgsblog.blogspot.com