What Is Good?

How many people read the newspaper or watch the news on television? You ever wonder about this world? You ever wonder about right and wrong? You ever wonder about what is right? Or about what isn’t good? If you were to ask a humanist they would tell you that right is dependent on your needs, and if "it" whatever "it" is fulfils those needs then that is good.

To the professor of situational ethics good is totally dependent on the situation, and your particular circumstances. The historian would tell you that right is dependent on the historical relevance of the issue.

The anthropologist would tell you that right is dependent on a particular culture. Many of the liberal churches would tell us that they can’t tell you what right is because right is dependent upon you.

Nobody wants to commit themselves to what good is and what good isn’t. But an obscure Judean prophet hit on what God considers to be good and we read his words in the book that bears his name. Micah 6:8 The Lord God has told us what is right and what he demands: "See that justice is done, let mercy be your first concern, and humbly obey your God."

Let’s start then with who has told us? The Lord God has told us what is right, not Denn Guptill, not Harry Wilson, not John Paul II, but God, He is the final authority.

The Lord God has told us, you ever wonder how God speaks? he spoke to Moses through a burning bush, and spoke to Balam through a donkey, and to Mary through an Angel, and to Joseph through a dream, and to Isaiah through a vision and to Elizah through a still small voice. Today he speaks through his word and through his servants.

But who has God told, he has told us. His people and it doesn’t matter if his people were the Israelites of the Old Testament or the Christians of the New Testament, they are those who seek to follow the ways and the words of God.

But what has God told us, well Micah says that he has told us what is right and what he demands. Why do you believe what you believe? "That’s easy" you say "I believe it because that’s what my church believes" wrong answer because that answer could be given by the Mormons, the Jehovah Witnesses, the Christian Scientist and the Moonies.

"Ok, then" you say "I believe it because that what my pastor teaches" Wrong answer, because how far can you go with that? From Denn Guptill to Jim Jones. Believing something because that’s what you’ve always believed or because that is what your church believes or that is what your pastor believes or that is what parents believe isn’t good enough.

We stress a personal relationship with God. My salvation is worthless to you. And so is your parents salvation, and your spouses salvation and your friends salvation. The bottom line is this: the only person whose relationship to God will make a difference to your eternity will be you and you alone.

The only person who needs to get his life right with God is you. And your faith has to come from God, not from Denn and not from Bedford Community Church but from God and from His word. The reason we have the scripture in English is so we can read it. And so God can speak to you through it.

And so what is God telling you? Well in Micah 6:8 he’s telling you what is right, and what he demands. But the question remains what is right? Well let me start by saying that right is not relative. God is saying to the prophet Micah: "Right and wrong are black and white and grey is just a colour of paint."

The world may say that right and wrong are relative and that may be fine for the world but it’s not for Christians, but Christianity isn’t relative, Jesus said, "I am the way the truth and the life, and no one comes to the Father except through me" doesn’t sound very relative to me.

ALAN LEGERE IS EVIL BECAUSE HE KILLED A MAN, BUT IS HE LESS EVIL THEN NOEL WINTERS WHO KILLED TWO MEN, AND WAS NOEL LESS EVIL THEN MITCHELL JOHNSON & ANDREW GOLDEN WHO KILLED FIVE PEOPLE AND WOUNDED TEN MORE IN AN ARKANSAS SCHOOL YARD LAST WEEK. IN 1989 MARC LEPINE SHOT FOURTEEN YOUNG WOMEN TO DEATH IN MONTREAL. TWENTY YEARS AGO LAST WEEK LT. WILLIAM CALLEY KILLED OVER ONE HUNDRED WOMEN AND CHILDREN IN MY LAI, AND ADOLF EICHMANN WAS RESPONSIBLE FOR THE DEATH OF 6,000,000 JEWS. WHAT IS RIGHT?

IF YOU KILL YOUR CHILD TWO DAYS AFTER THEY ARE BORN YOU ARE A MONSTER, BUT IF YOU HAVE YOUR CHILD KILLED BY A DOCTOR BEFORE THEY