So, How Good Are You?

Psalm 14: 1 – 7

So, how good are you?

1 The fool has said in his heart, “There is no God.” They are corrupt, they have done abominable works, there is none who does good. 2 The LORD looks down from heaven upon the children of men, to see if there are any who understand, who seek God. 3 They have all turned aside, they have together become corrupt; There is none who does good, no, not one. 4 Have all the workers of iniquity no knowledge, who eat up my people as they eat bread, and do not call on the LORD? 5 There they are in great fear, for God is with the generation of the righteous. 6 You shame the counsel of the poor, but the LORD is his refuge. 7 Oh, that the salvation of Israel would come out of Zion! When the LORD brings back the captivity of His people, let Jacob rejoice and Israel be glad.

I had a memorable phone conversation with a person who was frustrated and angry with a co-worker who comes to our Christian Fellowship. Right from the start this guy gave me the full barrel of his problem with someone else.

He informed me that a guy at his work constantly hammers him to be born again. He told me that this other guy told him that if he did not accept Jesus Christ as his Lord and Savior, he was going to hell. Now how would you like to start off the day dealing with this type of phone call?

I sensed that the Holy Spirit wanted to guide my response, so I reluctantly went along with His guidance. I asked the caller if he thought his co-worker cared for him and was sincere in his concern that his eternal life was secure? The question kind of short circuited the way he might have expected the conversation to go.

I then asked the man permission if I could ask him a couple of questions, which he agreed to answer. They were;

. Do you believe there is a God?

. Do you believe that heaven exists?

The guy on the other end of the phone said ‘yes’ to both questions. Then I asked him, ‘So, then how does one get to go to heaven?’

The man remained quiet and did not respond. So, I then added, ‘suppose a person was a good person, would that qualify him or her to go to heaven?’ To this question the man immediately responded, ‘Yes’.

I then threw out the question, ‘how do we determine how good a person really is?’ Again, there was silence from the caller.

I then remarked to him, ‘Remember that old nun, mother Theresa, who gave her life for the poor and sickly. Would you say that she was a ‘good person’?

This question also spurred him on to a quick answer. He said he believed that this old saint was ‘good enough’ to qualify for heaven.

So, I then said, ‘Now stop and compare yourself to this good lady and how to you stand in comparison?’

The man would not answer so I continued my point. I told him that he was thinking that he fell far short in the category of ‘good’. I said that he was not good enough to get to heaven and I added that neither was I. So, our Great and Wonderful Loving God had to step in to help us be able to get there. Therefore, He came to earth and gave His life for the both of us because we are not able to get there on our own.

I concluded with our conversation by stating that he co-worker must really be concerned and care for him. He wants to make sure that you put your trust in the finished work of the Lord Jesus Christ. I ended by asking him what he is going to do with the information I just gave him.

His response, ‘I will join him at church this Sunday.’

The psalm begins with a verdict on man’s general attitude towards God and follows it with a general view of the whole world, seeing it as totally sinful. It then moves on to the fact that either YHWH’s or the psalmist’s people are being devoured in that world by ‘the workers of iniquity’, those who do not call on YHWH or obey His commandments but reveal the sinfulness of their hearts by their lives. This will assuredly result in some judgment on those workers of iniquity which will reduce them to great fear, because YHWH looks after the righteous. He allows them to be subject to chastening but in the end, He will act to deliver them. But these workers of iniquity will have only themselves to blame because they will have deliberately thwarted God’s people, overlooking the fact that YHWH is the refuge of His people. So, from this position of confidence the psalmist then prays that that deliverance will now become actualized.