Not Good Enough? — A LifeWords Devotion

“Come now, let’s settle this,”
    says the Lord.
“Though your sins are like scarlet,
    I will make them as white as snow.
Though they are red like crimson,
    I will make them as white as wool. (NLT)

We may have heard some people lament the fact that they are not good enough for God. Even some who claim to be Christians can say such things. They see themselves as “not good Christians”. And there is some truth in all that.

None of us can claim to be acceptable to a perfect God because of our “goodness”. We certainly possess some goodness as those made in the image of God, but God’s requirement is perfect goodness and none of us can claim that. And so to be in right relationship with God we need to trust in the perfect goodness exhibited by Jesus, not our own relative goodness.

If we have done that, then all talk about our not being good enough is irrelevant. God no longer judges us on our imperfections. He instead sees the perfection of Jesus which is like a new set of clothes we wear as we trust in him. So in ourselves we truly may not be good enough. But in Jesus, we are forever acceptable.

Accepting we are not good enough through our own merits is a healthy dose of realism. Ignoring the fact that Jesus’ own goodness is the more basic reality is to turn our backs on new life and surrender to hopelessness. Our failure to be perfectly good does not stop God loving us and offering us the perfect goodness of Jesus.

His goodness is greater than our badness.

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Blessings

David