I'm a Good Person

In recent days, several university athletes returned from a visit to a foreign country.  During their stay, they had been arrested for shoplifting.  In released public statements, one athlete said, “What I did was stupid, there’s just no other way to put it, and I’m not that type of person”.1

“I’m not that type of person.”  Ultimately, my guess is that this basketball player believes fundamentally that he is a “good” person.  Most people, if you asked them, would admit that they are (or at least hope they are) good people.  And why not believe that?  Psychologists have been telling us for decades that we are born good.  

Dr. Bobbi Wegner, a clinical psychologist and teaching fellow at Harvard University, 

        agrees. She says, “There are no such things as bad babies.”2

We are good.  We have been told it all our lives.  But fundamentally, the question becomes how we actually define “good.”  You see, in one sense, none of us is good, but in another sense, we are all good. 

If we define “good” as being without fault, without sin, then we would see being “good” as being righteous.  But Scripture clearly tells us that no one is without sin (Romans 3:10); all of us have sinned (Romans 3:23).  It is this sense, however, that the world usually uses.  “I’m a good person” meaning that I’m a person who doesn’t choose to do bad things (even though I did something quite awful).  We use this to excuse the things we’ve done that we know are wrong, that we know are sinful. 

To the athlete who said, “I’m not that type of person,” I would respond, “But, yes, you are because you did do this.  Regardless of why you did it, you stole something.  You are, then, a thief.”

However, there is another definition of good that actually is true of all of us and that is this: “good” as being of value.  Are we of value?  Absolutely!  We are valued because God loves us.  It’s not a value that we can earn by doing anything, but it’s a value that was given to us because of His inherent mercy and grace.  “For God so loved the world, that whosoever believes in Him shall not perish but have everlasting life” (John 3:16).  We are each the “whosoever” and God has given us value because He loves us!    

We can each stand up and say that we are “good” people, people of value, because God has chosen to love us, has chosen to interact with us, has chosen to save us.  We will never, in this life, be---through our own power—people who are good/righteous because we will do stupid things and sin.  But we are, because of His love and grace, people who are good/of value because He loves us!  And that, simply put, changes everything!  

1 “UCLA basketball players suspended indefinitely after China arrests,” FoxNews.com, November 16, 2017.
2 Kim, Jen, ”How to Know if You are a Good Person,” PsychologyToday.com, https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/valley-girl-brain/201609/how-know-if-you-are-good-person

(c) 2017 Robin L. O'Hare.  All Rights Reserved.