But there are some interesting words from Jesus on the matter: "If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him!" (Luke 11:13).
Jesus addresses goodness in two different ways in this sentence. First, He describes a certain kind of goodness, that is, the giving of good gifts to our children. Second, He also describes us as evil.
In this one statement, Jesus tells us that there is a civil goodness in human beings. However, He also tells us that such goodness is contrary to our natural inclination because we are, in His blunt words, evil! Such civic good is a demonstration of Genesis 1:26: "Let Us make man in Our image, after Our likeness." Adam was created in God's image. And, since God is good (Matthew 5:45), Adam was created good (Genesis 1:31), and this goodness has not been completely eliminated by the Fall.
This goodness is not a form of merit. No one could claim that giving good things to his children earns him a right to God's favor. Rather, it increases our judgment as sinners, because we have an awareness of goodness, yet continue in our sinful rebellion against the very God who is so good to us.
We Americans may enjoy patting each other on the back, boosting our self-esteem. However, the word of Jesus over us is "evil."
Chris - I was taught that the tree of the knowledge of good and evil contained only negative attributes - such that the "good" was actually not divine level good, but what we would call "human good" of a good that produces human but not divine merit. Divine level good can only be produced by the means of the Holy Spirit. So when I see people describe some work as "good", I ask them to describe how they determined the "quality" level. This drives back to the issue of "filthy" rags. Because to Total Depravity the unbeliever can only produce human or sinful good - so it is actually "bad good" which is what we gained the knowledge of in the fall. Thoughts?
ReplyDeleteI don't believe that the tree had any particular good or evil. It was the command of God itself that was the issue. After all, part of the enticement for Eve was that the fruit was good to eat. As an act of lawlessness, disobedience to God is an act of high treason, so there is no relativity to its wickedness.
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