So, What Is a“Good Person,”Anyway?
Most of us walk around assuming we’re “good people.” We don’t rob banks, we don’t kill anyone, and we try to be decent to everyone we meet or when we put a dollar in a donation jar, walking away patting ourselves on the back, because I‘m a good person. We assume that’s enough for God.
But “good” is a subjective human standard—and it’s a moving target.
God’s standard isn’t about being “good enough” on a grading curve; it’s about perfection and wholeness. The gap between my best behavior and the Divine is too wide to bridge with just good deeds. As the scriptures say, even our best attempts can look like “filthy rags” (Isaiah 64:6). when compared to the magnitude of God’s glory.
That sounds harsh, but it’s actually the setup for the best news in history: We don’t have to bridge that gap ourselves.
Salvation isn’t a reward for the righteous; it’s a gift for the guilty. You can’t earn it, which means you can finally put down the exhausting burden of trying to be “good enough.” Heaven isn’t full of people who earned their spot. It’s full of people who trusted the One who paid their way.
Are We Good, or Just Lucky? We often assume a “good Christian” is just someone who is polite, votes a certain way, and follows the rules. But C.S. Lewis challenged this, reminding us that “niceness” is often just biology or good upbringing, not spiritual fruit.
Here is the uncomfortable truth I’ve wrestled with: I know plenty of atheists, Buddhists, and agnostics who are kinder, more patient, and more generous than many Christians I know. Some people are just naturally wonderful. That is a gift of genetics or parenting, not necessarily the Holy Spirit. (C.S. Lewis)
The “Christian Nation” Paradox If we look at our culture, the evidence is pretty damning. In a country that loudly claims to be a “Christian Nation,” the behavior we see is often arrogant, unloving, and deeply hypocritical. We are failing the simplest test of our faith: to “do everything in love” (1 Corinthians 16:14).
So, if being a Christian doesn’t automatically make you “nicer” than your neighbor, what is the point?
The Difference is the Source. The answer is humility/Ego. When we ask, “How can bad people get into heaven?” we conveniently leave ourselves out of the “bad people” group. We assume we have the ID card to get in, while everyone else is trespassing. (C.S. Lewis)
But the Gospel flips this. It admits that I have no goodness of my own to trade for God’s love. I don’t do good works to get God’s attention; I do them because God has already turned His attention toward me.
I love the analogy of the greenhouse: The roof of a greenhouse doesn’t attract the sun because it is bright. It becomes bright because the sun is shining on it.
I am not the source of the light. I am just the glass. And I become “good“ only when I let Him shine through.
If you’ve been living under the crushing weight of trying to perform your way into heaven, let me invite you to put that burden down today. It isn’t yours to carry. Trust in what Jesus has already done, rather than what you are trying to do.
So, to close, stop trying to be the source of the light. It’s exhausting, and it doesn’t work.