Why Good People Need Jesus: Part 2, He is Kind to the Ungrateful and the Evil

I guess the first place the start exploring why good people need Jesus is with this question: Are there any good people?

I know when we look around we see good people. Kind, loving, beautiful people. And we can ask, "Do these people need Jesus?" Maybe not.

But whenever I've asked these people, these kind, loving, beautiful people, if they consider themselves kind, loving and beautiful they tend to demur. On the outside we tend to look pretty shiny. But inside? Inside I think most of us admit to hiding some pretty dark things. We carry lingering resentments, hostile thoughts, bubbling rage, flashes of hate, petty grudges, and closets of shame. 

To be clear, I'm not suggesting we're all seething cauldrons of depravity and wickedness. I think most people are pretty decent. But this notion that any of us is a "good person" seems doubtful to me. And I think Exhibit A in this regard his how the best people we know tend to be quickest to reject the designation that they are a good person. No doubt, such a denial is likely a sign of their goodness, a mark of humility, but I also think the best people tend to be the most honest and truthful. 

All that to say, all of us need the Lord. Even those of us who get designated as "good people," believer and non-believer alike. We know things about ourselves hidden from the eyes of others.

Plus, the bar here is pretty high. When we describe people as "kind, loving and decent" the moral standard here is actually not as significant as we think it is. For example, the label "kind, loving and decent" tends to be pretty tribal. That is to say, you are "kind, loving and decent" to the right kind of people. For example, a progressive Christian might say that their atheist friend is more "kind, loving and decent" than evangelicals who are condemning of gay persons. Fair enough, but how do these same atheist friends feel about those Trump-supporting evangelicals themselves? Suddenly, that kindness and love goes missing, often replaced with anger and hate. And if not hate, then indifference or suspicion. We don't wish evil on those people, but I'm not inviting them to my dinner party.

So when we hear people say, "I know atheists who are more loving than Christians," that statement tends to be pretty narrow and politically circumscribed. You are not, in point of fact, talking about unconditional and universal love and kindness. 

When God is the standard of being "a good person" the bar is set pretty high. I think about these words of Jesus all the time: 

But love your enemies, and do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return, and your reward will be great, and you will be children of the Most High, for he is kind to the ungrateful and the evil. (Luke 6.35)

If being "a good person" is being kind to the ungrateful and the evil I don't know many good people. And yet, I do think these people have existed. We call them saints. And most of them, as best I can tell, have been people who believed in God, or at least in some inviolate and sacred value system that called them to and sustained their heroic sacrifices. When love gets hard and real you need more than a reputation among your friends that you listen well over coffee and throw lovely dinner parties.

Yes, it is true, many of us are, legitimately, decent people. But we know in our hearts, even the best of us, that we aren't as good as we appear to be. Our kindnesses can become narrow and specific. And there are many people we struggle to love.