I’ve always tried to be a good person. I’m a pleaser, so often my attempts to do good are driven by my desire to make others happy. I certainly try to be a good person as a way to love God and love my family and friends. I like trying to be a good person.
But if I’m honest, trying to be good can sometimes be bad for me and my community. How?
In my effort to be a good person, and to appear as a good person, guess what typically happens? Yes, that’s correct: lots and lots of denial, rationalizing, defensiveness, and well intentioned but maybe naive help.
My desire to be good can undermine my acceptance of the not-good within me or coming from me.
In one of the stories that Mark tells about Jesus, the religious lawyers confronted him about why his disciples ate with unwashed hands. Jesus, it seemed to them, was okay with lawbreaking. He, however, turned their questions around on them, accusing them of hypocrisy.
It’s ironic, since the Pharisees and religious lawyers were so committed to being good people and devout followers of Israel’s God. So how was it that in their attempts to be good they were bad?
In the teachings of Moses God makes it clear that people are to honor their parents, especially in their old age – and this includes caring for them financially and being a blessing to them (instead of being a negligent or abusive curse).
But the Pharisees had found a way to designate their finances and time to God as a way to both look pious and avoid the expense and difficulty of caring for their aging parents. They found a way to avoid keeping commands of God by coming up with a way to be devoted to God.
In this case, their attempts to be good people was bad for their parents.
Jesus then goes on to make a bigger point about unclean hands and being good people. He was accused of defiling his body by eating with unwashed hands. But Jesus points out that it’s not what goes in that defiles the body, but what comes out. Don’t worry about the food that goes in to the stomach, pay attention to what comes out of your heart.
This is provocative stuff. Jesus describes twelve inter-connected evils that are already in our heart: immorality, theft, murder, adultery, coveting, malice, deceit, lewdness, envy, slander, pride, and folly.
My first instinct, and probably yours too is to scan the list and see which ones apply. As an act of humility we might pick a few we all struggle with. But this is where our addiction to being good corrupts our judgment. Jesus is saying that all of these evil thoughts are in our hearts.
And if we’re always looking for ways we’re not guilty of them, we’ll be blind to the ways we are guilty. And if we’re never convicted, there’s nothing to confess and repent.
Everyone agrees Jesus was a good man. So how was it that Jesus was crucified for being seditious (a law-breaker and a political threat) and for blasphemy (slandering against God). He was put to death by men and women who thought of themselves as good people seeking to be devout followers of God.
The irony? In trying to be good and devout people they killed God.
Hypocrisy is undermined by humility. It takes humility to confess the evil thoughts within our heart. It takes humility to hear from others how we have wronged them, even though we thought we were doing the right thing.
Being good can become a vague assertion that can prevents us from being honest and humble about the bad that is really in us. And that’s bad for us.
Who then can be good? Only God is good. The rest of us, well, maybe we should give up on trying to be good and work to act justly, love mercy, and walk humbly with God.
This is, ironically, what Jesus strives for us to become and do.
