Reflection - Good

By Steve Hall

http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/090520.cfm
1 Corinthians 4:6-15
Luke 6:1-5

The cartoon strip “Peanuts” was a popular comic strip in the daily paper back when I was a kid. It was one of my favorites. However, that was more than a few years ago and there are only one or two that I remember now. The strip that came to mind after reading these few verses from Paul was one that presented Linus and Charlie Brown lying on a grassy slope. They were watching the passing clouds and talking about the images each one saw there. Linus went first. He also went on at length, describing a cloud cluster which he imagined to be showing a meeting of the Continental Congress, with Thomas Jefferson here and Ben Franklin over there, along with other notables from the time. When he finished he asked: “How about you Charlie Brown? What do you see?” To which came the response: “I was going to say I saw a horsey and a doggy; but never mind.”

I doubt that I am alone in my reaction to the richness of the teaching in this brief passage. Nevertheless, let me reflect on one small item from the whole. Early on Paul asks:

“What do you possess that you have not received?
But if you have received it,
why are you boasting as if you did not receive it?”

With heavy sarcasm Paul will continue his challenge to the Corinthians. One by one he confronts their presumed successes, in the financial area, in the political arena, in the academic area, in the physical area and in the social area. Not unexpectedly does he berate their adolescent behavior with sarcasm.

“You are already satisfied;
you have already grown rich;
you have become kings without us!
We are fools on Christ’s account, but you are wise in Christ;
we are weak, but you are strong;
you are held in honor, but we in disrepute.”

In essence, we have heard this teaching before; though the connection might not be readily apparent. Recall these incidents as recorded in Matthew, Mark and Luke.

“One came up to him [ie, Jesus], saying, ‘Teacher, what good deed must I do, to have eternal life?’

And he said to him, ‘Why do you ask me about what is good? One there is who is good. If you would enter life, keep the commandments.’” (Matthew 19:16-17)

“A man ran up and asked him, ‘Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?’ And Jesus said to him, ‘Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone.’” (Mark 10:17-18, Luke 18:18-19)

The gospels have Jesus making a bold statement. In this passage from Corinthians, Paul echoed the same challenge as Jesus, yet doing so in broader yet more specific terms: Whatever good comes to us, whatever good is offered to us, whatever good is within us — it all is of God and we deceive ourselves if we claim it originated within us alone, as if we could be the source, or even a source of what is good.

I tell my dog that she is a ‘good girl.’ But by that I mean she is doing what I want her to do. I tell my grandson that he’s a good boy with more substantive meaning to the compliment, such as: he has made a positive choice, or he has acted in an appropriate way, or he has made an informed decision. But when we talk about the ‘Good,’ that is Good with a capital ‘G,’ we are talking about whatever will lead us closer to God or to be more like God. The ‘Good’ is not a societal or cultural ideal; it is a theological fact. This is why Jesus will say “No one is good but God alone.” But it is also why Paul berates the Corinthians for their claims when he says “What do you possess that you have not received?“ All that is good comes from God. And that is true no matter whether it comes in the financial area, in the political arena, in the academic area, in the physical area or in the social area. All good comes from God because all that is good leads us to God.

In this understanding it is appropriate that the athlete kneel after some achievement if, by that, he means to acknowledge that his success is a gift from God and is meant to lead the player to Him. It would be similarly appropriate for the businessman, the politician and the academician to respond similarly. We have a hard time with these things in giving credit where credit is due. We wrap ourselves in the cloak of our own personal achievement; and quite possibly that is correct if our success has been attained by dubious means. In the real world, not the imaginary one we have created independent of God — in the Real world, however, I should not be telling my grandson that he is a good boy. Rather, I should be telling him how great it is that he has responded to God’s Spirit within. That would be far closer to the truth.