One of the greatest myths our culture perpetuates is the idea that there are good people and bad people. The people we hear about in the news, who commit terrible crimes, we brand as ‘bad people’. Our indignation at their conduct serves then to establish our sense of being a ‘good person’. We may not express it as simplistically as this, but our attitude does tend to polarise in this way. According to the Bible, human beings were created good, so in essence we are good. But that goodness has been corrupted and this corruption has a pervasive effect. So, in another sense no one is truly good. While we are all capable of doing good things, there is something within us all that sabotages this essential goodness whenever it arises. So, there is the same essential goodness in the criminal and in the saint. But the same pervasive corruption effects both, though in different ways. It’s a bit like a cancer that might have an obvious debilitating and disfiguring effect on one person but remain inconspicuous in another. In some ways the first effect is more desirable because, when the cancer is manifest, it is detected and treated. But when it remains inconspicuous it often remains untreated and therefore does greater damage. That may well be the difference between you and the person you might brand as ‘bad’. As we see in the gospel accounts of the life of Jesus, the so called ‘bad’ people tend to be more open to Christ than those who see themselves as ‘good’. That, in God’s view, is the most important thing.
Ask God to give you a sober view of yourself.
Read 1 John 1:5-10 in the light of Romans 3:9-20
