Seeing Good in Everyone

Silliness! Someone said: we must see the good in everyone. That was meant to be positive and loving but is entirely wrong! First off, how we view other people has no bearing on their spiritual condition. Salvation is a personal thing to be "worked out" between them and God.

Philippians 2:12 ...work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.

Thinking "good" thoughts about evil people is meaningless. Using God's rules, even those whose works are  "good" that "goodness" is as  filthy rags  (Isaiah 64:6).

Let's take this to the extreme: "Everyone" included Hitler. To what avail was it when his admirers saw "good" in him?  Many people did you know? In fact, their "positive Christianity" - their official religion, saw "good" in evil people, and evil in "good" people. That certainly didn't get Hitler to heaven but it did send others to their death. Death is a reward which only God can make, and if accomplished by another, is punishment.

Now, let's get more general. The epitome of "goodness" was Mahatma Gandhi. Nearly everyone saw goodness in him. However, Gandhi was a self-professed non-Christian. What then, was accomplished by seeing his goodness. Our senses and thoughts have no bearing on the righteousness of another. In fact, it is more likely if we see the evil in "good" people, it is more efficacious!

There are two ways of seeing our fellow man: (1) righteous or (2) unrighteous. Righteousness is not the measure of "goodness". Since our good works are as rags, it must be something else! What is righteousness? Obeying the Law of God. What is God's Law?

Matthew 22:37  Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. 38 This is the first and great commandment. 39 And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. 40 On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.

Firstly, the Law is not voided. With this statement Jesus validated the Law. The Ten Commandments are the metrics for the Greatest Commandment and the "second like unto it".  The Greatest Commandment is to love God, and the second is it's corollary. Essentially, there is one Commandment - to love God, and that love is manifested in how we love others.

If we merely "love thy neigbours as thyself", that is humanism. Anyone can love others. In fact, it is damning to love others without first loving God. (The story of the rich young ruler demonstrates that). Most people are content with secular humanism. However, they miss the gist of the Command: love God, not with impunity, but with our very being: heart, soul, and mind. Those three aspects of our identity are our existence. We exist for God's sake - communion, love, and obedience.

If "good" is done for any reason other than for God, it is fruitless!

Building up Gandhi did nothing for Gandhi. On the other hand, tearing him down, so that the Lord would lift him up would have! Let me explain: Building Gandhi up would have preserved his fiction and that of others. Gandhi could never be good enough to go to heaven; living in peace is not even half the requirements for heaven. The rest and most of the story is loving God. It is only through  the blood of Jesus that anyone is made righteous: "without shedding of blood is no remission (of sins) (Hebrews 9:22).

Of course, Jesus shed His blood for Gandhi too because Gandhi is one of the "whosoever" in John 3:16, but again, the rest of the story is "that whosoever believeth in him should not perish". In fact, seeing the evil in everyone is what can save! 

Romans 3:23 For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God...

Perhaps if some Christian had seen the evil in Gandhi, he could have been persuaded. However, Gandhi was credited with saying that he could have been a Christian if not for Christians! I submit that one way Christians failed Gandhi, was only looking at the "good' in him. Perhaps for Gandhi to see evil, the Christians around him should have looked at the evil inside him.

Seeing "goodness" in mankind elevates them too highly. Scripture says this:

James 2:8 If ye fulfil the royal law according to the scripture, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself, ye do well: 9 But if ye have respect to persons, ye commit sin, and are convinced of the law as transgressors. 10 For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all.

In fact, James goes on to point out that those who humble themselves shall have the Lord to lift them up. (James 4:10). In another place, Jesus said that those who are forgiven the most tend to love him the most! (Luke 7:47). "Seeing good in everyone" is not efficacious. However, seeing evil in everyone is, because in God's sight we are all evil-doers; even Gandhi!

How should we look at our fellow man then? As fellow-sinners who need redemption. It's okay to look at human potential, but without God, there is no potential. Only destruction exists. When we look at "good" people as well as "evil" people, we can indeed look at their divine potential. They can be fellow heirs to God! How can anyone be transformed if they are seen as already good? How can the old person be converted to the new without evil to exist within them in the first place?

If we look at fellow Christians, we do an injustice if we think them "good". Why so? Jesus Himself said that "only God is good" (Mark 10:18). When one considers himself  "good" that is pride. Why would it not be propagating evil by considering another "good"? The intent is noble, but the outcome is ignoble!

Test everything by scripture. Linkletter said "Children say the darndest things!" Scripture indicates that mankind says the most foolish things! My conclusion, is that foolish adults are yet children in their thinking.