Reading With the People of God #12 - the Good Lifeنموونە

The Golden Rule

I remember the first time reading the Golden Rule in scripture and having my jaw drop. I was not raised in a Christian home. I did not attend church. But here, right before my eyes in scripture was the very rule my mother always taught my brother and me by:

Matthew 7:12 TPT

“In everything you do, be careful to treat others in the same way you’d want them to treat you…”

Coming to Jesus in my late 30's having never been interested in anything religious or biblical, I was at war with myself and the Lord, as His Holy Spirit illuminated His truth within scripture. I was struggling to see how being raised in the world was wrong because my parents didn't seem wrong in my understanding…then Matthew opened my heart to the realization that even those in opposition to the Lord can do good things. All because of God's unfathomable grace. If I, being the sinful person that I am, can give my children good gifts. How much greater are the gifts from God!? Who is the measure from which all good comes!!

Each and every one of us at our worst can do good things, but this must speak more about who God is than who we are. Even through the hands of evildoers, He can bless whom He chooses to bless, because He knows the beginning, middle and end. God knows hearts. He will always work things out for the good of those who are called according to His good and perfect will!

“No evil can befall us; whatever men may do to us, they cannot but serve the God who is secretly revealed as love and rules the world and our lives.” -Dietrich Bonhoeffer

* Primer contributed by Ardena Hamill, Celebrate Recovery encourager