What is Good? What is Bad?

Intro

How do you and I make decisions in this broken world? We have this knowledge of good and evil, but we lack the wisdom, strength and courage to handle it. We abuse the knowledge. we use it for our own purposes?

How do we make “Good” choices?

2 Chronicles 20:12 ESV

O our God, will you not execute judgment on them? For we are powerless against this great horde that is coming against us. We do not know what to do, but our eyes are on you.”

Genesis 3:23–24 ESV

Then the Lord God said, “Behold, the man has become like one of us in knowing good and evil. Now, lest he reach out his hand and take also of the tree of life and eat, and live forever—” therefore the Lord God sent him out from the garden of Eden to work the ground from which he was taken. He drove out the man, and at the east of the garden of Eden he placed the cherubim and a flaming sword that turned every way to guard the way to the tree of life.

The Lesser of Two Evils

Good

M-W: a favorable character or tendency

The question of whether something is good or not is of paramount importance to you and I. How do we decide whether we choose A? Or B? depends largely on what we think will be good for us.

So what is Good? What is Bad? If we find good we can then determine what bad is. If we do not find good then we cannot determine what bad is and therefore are in a lose lose situation.

you hear this a lot in relation to politics, I voted for the lesser of two evils. So you in effect voted voted for evil. Well no, I voted for the lesser of two evils.

Alright, setting Joseph Stalin and Mao next to each other. How on earth can you just a vote for either one? They are both altogether Evil. The lesser really doesn’t matter. Nor can anyone accurately judge that but Jesus anyway.

The lesser of two evils approach is really little more than a emotional cop out.

We either don’t feel like searching out the truth, of what good is, or I don’t want to admit I want this guy that is obviously bad so I will grey up the situation to justify myself.

Politics aside, cause I don’t really care about that today.

But we do the same thing in our day to day lives on varying scales and degrees.

WE end up in a situation and only see bad outcomes or options, so we say, Option A is Bad, Option B is Bad, I suppose I will just choose, not ever seeking the face of God for Truth and clarity.

What we are doing is playing Russian Roulette with our lives. Maybe it will work, maybe it won’t?

We just make moral decisions based on a broken or misguided perspective of Good.

Making Haphazard decisions based on a subjective goodness can only lead one into personal chaos.

Adam and Eve were kicked out of the garden but why? If God loves you and I why would He deny us any good thing?

Eternity with Jesus is Heaven

Eternity without Him, no matter how wonderful it seems, is Not

John 17:3 ESV

And this is eternal life, that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.

Now Adam and Eve are looking at eternal life separated from God.

Once Adam Sinned, his relationship to God broke. But had he reached the tree of life, Sin would be allowed to endure forever. Man Would be both Sinful and everlasting.

Here we see God protecting both humanity and Earth.

He is protecting the Garden from Adams Sin, and He is protecting Humanity from being able to fully blossoming into Sins full potential. In a sense death is grace, because unlimited Sin is in the end Hell

You see God understood that if Adam and Eve remained in the garden, and ate of the tree of life then they would live forever and they would turn His perfect garden. His paradise into a living Hell. They would have transformed it into a nightmare

They would take something good. Something God fully intended them to have, and they would warp it into their own den of Sin..

It was intended to be a place of communion with the Almighty. A sanctuary where God and Man walked. But when Adam Sinned it became a place of Lust for man. Adam long long for the tree of life. So God had to guard it.

This is what you and I do when we sin, we often take good things, and we destroy them. Not intentionally, but because of unrestrained lust and greed.

Sin only has the ability to destroy. It has no other function.

What we do, is we say, I will compromise here and there for the greater good. I will tell a “little white lie” because its necessary in this situation.

say what you want but that little white lie, will separate you from and almighty God just as quick as any other sin. But we gray it up. How do we do this so easily? These little things are little traps

So What is Good? What is Bad?

Good is that which is like God

Bad is that which is not like God.

How can you determine the right course of action in a given circumstance then?

Here I want to return to the Garden.

Isaiah 59:2 ESV

but your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God, and your sins have hidden his face from you so that he does not hear.

Our Sins Separated us from God

Once that relationship was broken it was impossible for us to judge right and wrong, Good and Bad accurately.

Closing:

The question we often deal with is, if it doesn’t hurt anybody why does it matter? Doesn’t God just want people to be happy?

1 God doesn't you happy, He wants you Holy.

2 Why can’t I love who I want? whether that is homosexual love or heterosexual love outside of marriage.

The reason is here, in Genesis 3. Any good thing not wrapped in the blessing of God will inevitably become a bad thing.

2 Chronicles 20:12 ESV

O our God, will you not execute judgment on them? For we are powerless against this great horde that is coming against us. We do not know what to do, but our eyes are on you.”