Are we essentially good?

 

I once read a statement by a group that said, “We operate from the belief that everyone is essentially good.” I thought this a bit contradictory since it was given in a statement of policy concerning dealing with problems between individuals! If all people are “essentially good,” then why all the problems among them in the world: the wars, the crime, the conflicts between individuals, the mistrust and on and on? But what is worse, this same principle is at the core of most all religious beliefs. Yet the word of truth is clear. God who knows man far better than we know ourselves says, “There is none that doeth good, no, not one...” (Romans 3:12). The “good heart” that most claim to have is the seat of all bad, all evil according to God. “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?” (Jeremiah 17:9). The hearts of men are “desperately wicked” and most deceitful, deceiving us into imagining we are essentially good. Christ said, “For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, a d u l t e r i e s , f o r n i c a t i o n s , t h e f t s , f a l s e w i t n e s s , blasphemies” (Matthew 15:19).

If we were essentially good instead of evil, self-deceived sinners, there would have been no need for a Savior such as Christ! Our self-righteousness is not righteousness at all in God’s sight but sin. Therefore, if we are saved, we must be “made righteous” through the imputed righteousness of Christ. Christ alone is “essentially good.” He is the only sinless, perfect and good man essentially that ever lived in this world. The righteous we read of in scripture are only righteous in Him!

It is no wonder that false religion offers its faulty remedies and ways of salvation; it denies the true condition of man. I have often heard people deny God’s election, predestination, effectual calling, and salvation through an imputed righteousness, saying they do not believe them. The truth is, they do not believe what God says about them! If we are spiritually dead sinners with no righteousness of our own, deceived, blind, helpless and unable to save ourselves, then these precious truths are essential! A man that would have been called a “good man” by most came to Jesus and asked, “Good Master, what shall I do that I may inherit eternal life? And Jesus said unto him, Why callest thou me good? there is none good but one, that is, God” (Mark 10:17,18). Christ is the God-Man and essentially good, and none are looked at as good but those in Him. In Christ, believers are good, perfectly righteous, in His sight. “As He is, so are we in this world” (I John 4:17).

-preacher Gary Shepard

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