1 - Introduction - Living like a real Christian GOODNESS | Page 9
into the temple and saw the Lord high and lifted up, he realised how pathetic his
own goodness was in comparison to the overwhelming goodness of God. This
would have been a similar experience to the one we focused on yesterday, in
reference to the rich young ruler who came to Jesus with his “goodness”, only to
find out that his goodness was not good enough. When Jesus confronted himwith
the truth, he realised that he wanted to be good, but not that good. Both Isaiah
and the rich young ruler are great examples to us of what social scientists call a
“self-serving bias”. It is this self-serving bias that makes us think that we are
“gooder” than we really are. I mentioned on Sunday the research finding of social
scientists when they conducted a survey amongst 829 000 students. They asked
the students to answer one question: How do you rate yourself compared to other
students in your ability to get along with other people; are you above or below
average? This self-serving bias proved to be so strong that one hundred per cent
of these students believed that theywere, in fact, above average. By human nature
we tend to think that we are better than we really are.
My conclusion today would simply be that there are many amongst us who would
need an Isaiah type of experience, where we are so confronted with the goodness
of God that we are forced to realise the impoverished nature of our own. It is the
goodness of God that we believe makes us good.
Prayer Thought: Won’t you contemplate, today as you pray, the incredibleness of
this God who is ours. Contemplate the wonder of a God whose goodness knows no
bounds and a God who stands alone when it comes to the subject of being “good”.
I pray that you may have a similar experience to the experience that Moses had in
Exodus 33, where Moses pleaded with God that he might see God and that God
would show him His glory. In verse 19 we read, “And the Lord said, ‘I will cause my
goodness to pass in front of you and I will proclaim my name, the Lord, in your
presence.’” God then passed by Moses and, as it were, Moses saw God’s back and
was blown away by the enormous and incomprehensible goodness of God. May
this be our experience today!
SATURDAY
Matthew 9 v 9 – 13