Trying to live a good life is an unending and tiring job. We struggle to keep our bad deeds in check. We strive to do good deeds. It takes our full concentration and all our energy. What’s more, we don’t live in a neutral world. This world has temptations, demands, and hassles. It drains what little energy we have left to live as we know we should live. Does God understand our struggle? Will He overlook our weaknesses? Or does God want us to experience a different kind of life—one where we have the power to do what is right?
. In fact, the Bible says, after God created human beings, He himself said that his creation was good. Goodness gave life and direction to people.
Why are we no longer the way God created us to be?
FALL
From the time of Adam, an enemy, Satan, has sought to destroy what God made. Satan tempted Adam and Eve to disobey God, and they fell to his temptation. When people disobeyed God, two things happened. First, evil entered them. Since that time, every person has had to struggle with evil or bad living inside of him. This bad nature was not part of God’s original plan for his creation. Second, the good in people died when they disobeyed God. We understand what goodness is, but goodness has no life of its own. In fact, we have to put all our energy into doing good and keeping bad from coming from us. When we are tired or someone offends us the bad in us takes over the good. The good requires our effort to make it happen.
For example, a husband understands how he is to act around his wife. He knows he should love her and treat her well. Yet he fails to do the good he knows he should do. Likewise, parents try to be sensitive and understanding with their children, but their bad side seems to come out as they relate to each other. Even children do not need to learn to be bad. We can constantly correct them and teach them to be good. Despite our best efforts, they still do wrong things and seem to be slow in learning to be good.
What can you and I do to gain control of the bad in our lives? How can we bring life back to the good that is in us?
ATTEMPTS TO RESTORE LIFE
People suggest various ways to revive the good in our lives. Some say the key is knowledge. The more we instruct people, the more they will change for the better. But instead people use their knowledge and intelligence to get their own way or to manipulate people. Knowledge doesn’t bring life to the good.
Others say discipline is the key. If we are more disciplined in our lives—in our thoughts, habits, exercise, and so forth—we will improve and do more good. Yet people closest to us know what kind of people we really are. Through discipline we might create a world in our minds, but we still live in this world. All too often exercise seems ineffective in bringing life to the good.
Religion is another option. Perhaps if we go to church, a mosque, or a synagogue, or if adopt a new religious perspective, then we will become better people. Unfortunately, what we usually gain from religion is another outlook on the world that will grow old, not the start of a new life within us.
Finally, some say, the law is the best choice for attaining good. If we have legislation that can regulate our behavior, particularly our moral behavior, then we will be better citizens and people. Yet more rules lead to oppression rather than to a desire to do right. Our human nature seeks to get around laws by finding exceptions for our behavior and justifying our actions. The law doesn’t bring goodness to life within us.
Knowledge, discipline, religion, and the law can add much to our lives. All of these solutions try to curb bad behavior, but they will never revive the good in us. They are only influences from the outside. When we stop concentrating on controlling the bad within us, we succumb to its influences again.
Should we just be pleased with our attempts of being good some of the time?
ARE WE GOOD ENOUGH?
Because it is so difficult to be good all the time, many people conclude that it is an impossible goal. They say we can only do many good deeds to make up for our bad deeds. It is as though our actions are placed on a scale. Our job is to make sure the good in our lives outweighs the bad. Life, then, becomes a test to see if we can do more good than bad.
God has created us for a purpose, not to test us. The Bible says he created us for good works. God made us to do good, not to test us to see if we would do more good than bad. True life is living a fully good life as God created us to have it. But the good must first come to life.
Rather than being like a set of scales, our lives are like a full glass. The glass is filled to t