What does it mean to be a good person?
When Jesus was approached by a man who called him a good teacher, he responded with an interesting question: “Why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone.”
Jesus reminds us that absolute goodness belongs to God. And in his own life, he shows us what that goodness looks like. He welcomes the excluded, confronts injustice, forgives sinners, and extends grace to people others have written off.
But what does it mean for the rest of us? As I have written previously, the prophet Micah offers a remarkably simple answer to what God requires of us: to do justice, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with God. Three virtues that are easy enough to understand but much harder to hold together.
Justice means taking seriously what is right. Mercy means responding to others with compassion, even when they have done wrong. Humility means recognising our limits and dependence on others. It involves being open to God, willing to learn from him, and ready to respond in service
None can exist without the others. Justice without mercy can become cruel. Mercy without justice can become an excuse for avoiding responsibility. And humility without moral courage can become an excuse for doing nothing.
Life rarely presents us with straightforward moral choices. Sometimes doing what is right will hurt someone. Sometimes extending mercy will be misunderstood as overlooking wrongdoing. Goodness requires judgement, and judgement requires humility.
One of the dangers of regarding ourselves as good people is that we can become blind to our own shortcomings. We judge ourselves by our intentions while others experience us through our actions. We can be remarkably generous in explaining our own failures while being less generous towards others.
Perhaps the closer we come to goodness, the less inclined we will be to claim it for ourselves. For Christians, goodness is not simply a project of moral self-improvement. It is a response to the grace of God, whose goodness we seek to reflect in our imperfect lives.
A good person is not someone who always knows what is right or always gets things right. It is someone who seeks justice without becoming harsh, practises mercy without abandoning responsibility, and walks humbly with God, learning to serve others.
What does it mean to be a good person?
View all responses
Leave a Reply