How Good is Good Enough?
Karen Clark writes:
"Have you ever had someone rely on you for something really important… but when it came to the crunch, you messed up?"
I once worked for someone who demanded that I live and work in a way that was “above reproach”!! As a Christian, I agreed that I ought to live a good life and be a witness through my example so I worked very hard to live up to expectations and do a good job. Despite much effort, a lot of sacrifice and really good intentions, I completely let him down. I failed. I wasn’t good enough to make the grade according to his standards of acceptance. It felt miserable.
Not being good enough doesn’t feel good! But what do we do with the fact that we are not good enough to be accepted by God?
On Wednesday this week we will be looking at this kind of situation as the disciples realise the standards God has set in his law are even higher to attain than they had realised. Even the professional rule keepers – the Pharisees – couldn’t keep all the laws perfectly. If they weren’t good enough then what chance does anyone else have?
But in Jesus teaching in the sermon on the mount, he says that’s recognising we are not good enough is the perfect place to be: “Blessed are the poor in Spirit” (Mat 5:3) We are blessed if we come to God empty handed with nothing to offer!!
Unlike my example above, when we are faced with our inadequacy … we discover that God has made a way for us to be righteous before him… Jesus lived the perfect life - not to show us how to be acceptable to God but to make us acceptable to God through his death on the cross.
Paul’s is such a great example… he was a good man! One of the best Pharisees around in terms of keeping the law… yet he says his good works are like garbage!! “All I want is Christ 9 and to know that I belong to him. I could not make myself acceptable to God by obeying the Law of Moses. God accepted me simply because of my faith in Christ.” (Phil 3v9 CEV)
We are acceptable to God through Christ!! :o)
Let’s rejoice today that we don’t have to keep the law to be good enough for God, praise God for Jesus’ grace and mercy towards us… let’s have faith… and let’s trust… in what Jesus has done for us and come to God ready to live for him today!
See you Wednesday night (7pm for 7:30pm)
