“The Goodness of God” (September 2022 Update)
There are many aspects to the character and attributes of God. All are essential to fully know God. While one of the most accepted attributes of God is goodness, few fully comprehend the magnitude of God’s goodness. God’s goodness includes His generosity and His love, but it is much, much more.
God’s goodness comes out of His love. But God’s love emphasizes God’s heart. God’s goodness emphasizes God’s actions. William Tyndale said, “”God’s goodness is the root of all goodness and our goodness, if we have any, [and it] springs from His goodness.” And God’s goodness is the example and the motivation for our goodness.
What can we say about the goodness of God? We can summarize God’s goodness into 3 characteristics. First, we would say simply that God IS good. Psalm 25:8 says, “Good and upright is the Lord….” In Psalm 31:19, David says, ”Oh, how great is Your goodness….” Goodness is who God is! It is His character to be good.
But God is not only good – He is also the source of all goodness. James 1:17 tells us that “Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow of turning.” Every good thing comes from Him. Theologians often talk about something called “common grace” as an aspect of God’s goodness. Common grace is the goodness that God gives to all men. Jesus said that He makes His rain “fall on the just and the unjust.” That’s common grace. There are other aspects of His common grace, like natural consequences of sin that often keep us from sinning. This is also an aspect of God’s goodness in the form of common grace.
Third, God’s goodness is seen in that He is generous. God gives not only graciously but also abundantly more than any of us deserve. David speaks about God’s generosity in Psalm 23:5-6: “You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies; You anoint my head with oil; My cup runs over. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me All the days of my life; And I will dwell in the house of the Lord Forever.” Goodness and mercy will follow him ALL the DAYS of His life! That’s generous! But not only that, David says that God spreads a table before him and his cup overflows! That’s generosity! In Psalm 34:10, we are told, “The young lions lack and suffer hunger; But those who seek the Lord shall not lack any good thing.” In Matthew 7:9-11, Jesus compares the goodness of earthly fathers to that of God and concludes, “how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask Him!” And in Ephesians 3:20, Paul tells us about the generosity of God when he says, “Now to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think….” God is not just good to us – He is abundantly generous!
Finally, God’s goodness is seen in that God works all things together for good. This is Paul’s statement from Romans 8:28. God is not only good and not only does good to us generously, He takes everything and works it together for good. We can see this in the life of Joseph who was sold into slavery in Egypt and was falsely accused and thrown into prison. But God used this to put him into a position where he would be elevated to be the prime minister of Egypt. In Genesis 50:20, Joseph says to his brothers, “You meant it for evil, but God meant it for good.” God works all things, even the hard things, even the evil things – He works all things together for good.
There are Four Aspects that are really aspects of the attribute of God’s goodness: mercy, grace, patience, and faithfulness. First, Mercy is God’s goodness to those in distress. Mercy is God’s goodness toward those who deserve punishment. Instead of punishment, God often gives mercy. God shows mercy to sinners. He does this to believers in salvation, but it also does this to non-believers who cry out for his mercy. That mercy is an aspect of God’s goodness can be seen in Exodus 33:19 where God says, “I will cause all my goodness to pass in front of you, and I will proclaim my name, the LORD, in your presence. I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.” Mercy is an aspect of God’s goodness to those who are in distress.
Second, Grace is God’s goodness to the undeserving. Someone has compared grace and mercy in this way – mercy is when God does not give us the punishment we deserve. Grace is when God gives us blessings that we do not deserve. Mercy emphasizes the negative that God does not give us; Grace emphasizes the positive that God gives to us even though we do not deserve it.
However, we must remember that God’s grace never comes to us because of our good works. If it did it would not be Grace, because we would deserve it if we worked for it. In Romans 11:6, Paul says, “And if by grace, then it is no longer of works; otherwise grace is no longer grace. But if it is of works, it is no longer grace; otherwise work is no longer work.” If you deserve it, it is not grace. This is why Paul says in Ephesians 2:8-9 “For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast.”
Third, Patience is God’s goodness in withholding punishment. God withholds the punishment we deserve because of His patience. Listen to Exodus 34:6: “And the Lord passed before him and proclaimed, “The Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abounding in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, by no means clearing the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children and the children’s children to the third and the fourth generation.” God will punish – He will by no means clear the guilty. But He is patient, giving plenty of opportunity for people to repent. That is an aspect of God’s goodness.
Finally, Faithfulness is God’s goodness in keeping His Word. In His goodness, God will always do exactly what He promises. Numbers 23:19 reminds us: “God is not a man, that He should lie, Nor a son of man, that He should repent. Has He said, and will He not do? Or has He spoken, and will He not make it good?” God’s goodness is seen in His faithfulness to His word.
Now how should the goodness of God motivate us?
First, it should motivate us to Do good to all men. As believers, we should be imitators of our Father in heaven, especially in His goodness. Galatians 6:10 tells us “Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all men, especially to those who are of the household of faith.”
Second, it should motivate us to Have Mercy on others just as God has had mercy on us. Micah 6:8 says, “He has shown you, O man, what is good; And what does the Lord require of you, But to do justly, To love mercy, And to walk humbly with your God?” We should not only do mercy, we should love it! In Matthew 5:7, Jesus says, “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy.” Mercy should be one of the chief characteristics of believers.
Third, God’s goodness should motivate us to Be Patient. God has been patient with us, and we should also be patient with others. This is why Paul tells us in Romans 12 to not take revenge but to leave it in God’s hands. And this is why James 1:19 says “So then, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath.” In 1 Peter 2:20, Peter also reminds us to be patient even when we are wronged: “For what credit is it if, when you are beaten for your faults, you take it patiently? But when you do good and suffer, if you take it patiently, this is commendable before God.” God’s goodness should motivate us to be patient.
Fourth, God’s goodness should motivate us to Live by Grace. Grace keeps us humble. We realize that all we have, we do not deserve – it is all from God’s grace. Paul reminds the Corinthians that what they have is because of God’s grace to them. In 1 Corinthians 4:7, he says, “For who makes you differ from another? And what do you have that you did not receive? Now if you did indeed receive it, why do you boast as if you had not received it?” Grace humbles us. In 1 Corinthians 10:15, Paul reminds the church that everything he was and did came from God’s grace: “But by the grace of God I am what I am, and His grace toward me was not in vain; but I labored more abundantly than they all, yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me.” God’s goodness humbles us to live by God’s grace.
Finally, God’s goodness teaches us to Be Faithful. In Hebrews 11:11, we see that even Sarah was faithful because of God’s faithfulness to her: “By faith Sarah herself also received strength to conceive seed, and she bore a child when she was past the age, because she judged Him faithful who had promised.” In Revelation 2:10, we learn that even during times of persecution, we should be faithful, “Be faithful until death.”
God’s goodness is one of His attributes that we all love. But we must not forget that He is also the God who is holy, holy, holy. He is good, but He will punish sin! In fact, one aspect of His goodness is that He will deal with all evil in perfect judgment. If He was not good, He would not punish our sins. His goodness requires His justice!
In C. S. Lewis’s The Loin, The Witch and the Wardrobe. Lucy asks if the lion Aslan is safe. To which Mr. Beaver replies, “Safe? Don’t you hear what Mrs. Beaver tells you? Who said anything about safe? ‘Course he isn’t safe. But he’s good. He’s the King, I tell you.” God is not safe – but He is good!
Teaching – Full Fall Semester! …
This semester may be one of the busiest for me. I have 4 classes scheduled for this fall and all of them are online. Online classes take 2-3 times as much time as lecture classes because of all the extra work in preparing materials and in grading all the assignments and responding individually to each student. I am rushing now to try to get all these classes formatted and set up for online instruction. All this and I am still finishing papers from my summer class. Be praying for me as I try to get everything done for these classes.
In October, I will be teaching an Evangelism class for Church Planting students in Kyiv (Kyiv Theological Seminary. Then in November, I will have 3 classes! Two will be at Ukrainian Baptist Seminary in Lviv and one at KTS in Kyiv. These classes will be on Prayer, Worship and Church History. I also need to convert the Church History class from Russian to Ukrainian. This will cost me about $1000 to get everything translated before class in November. It is still hard to believe that we are having classes – God’s goodness to us is unbelievable!
Future plans … We are still trying to determine exactly what God would have me do for the future. For now, it appears that I will be teaching all the classes that I was teaching before we left Ukraine. And, if the situation changes in Ukraine, I might even be able to come back to teach a class. I would consider traveling back to teach but we have to wait on Katya’s immigration status to be completed. Since we applied for a “change of status” for her in April, her regular visa will not work anymore. If she leaves the country, she will need to start a new application to get back into the states. And she cannot even get her driver’s license her until she gets her new documents. Be praying for her documents to come soon so that we might be able to go back to Ukraine in the future, even for short mission trips or teaching opportunities.
Sharing about Ukraine …
While we have been here, we have had a number of opportunities to share about ministry in Ukraine. We have shared in twice in North Little Rock, once in Missouri, and we will be sharing in Fort Smith at the end of September. Pray for us as we share. Katya will also be sharing with a ladies’ group in Fort Smith – in English. It will be her first time doing so. She’s nervous, but she will do great!
We have also been able to be involved in participating at a Ukrainian festival in Bentonville to celebrate Ukrainian Independence Day (August 24).
We loved how Ukraine celebrated Independence Day in Kyiv. Usually, this day is celebrated with a large military parade down the main street in Kyiv. This year, since all the troops were still fighting, Ukraine had a different sort of parade. They lined up destroyed and captured Russian vehicles as their “Independence Day” parade!
Finally, we especially enjoyed being able to have dinner with and get to know new international students at the University of Arkansas last month. We are hoping to be able to continue to have some ministries here in NW Arkansas with internationals in general and with Ukrainians in particular.
Help for Us …
Housing … Just last week, we moved into a new house for missionaries, and we love it. There is plenty of space for the girls to run outside and we have a (temporary) home where we can put our clothes and have our own space! It is wonderful! In fact, the first dinner we had in our home at Hiding Place Hollow, one of the girls said, “This feels like home!’ We agree – God’s goodness to us is just amazing!
The ministry providing this home is called Hiding Place Hollow. They have built some missionary homes about 30 minutes outside of Rogers where missionaries can stay in a place of their own for up to 6 months. This ministry is wonderful and if you would like to help support this ministry so that they can help other missionary families, click on the link above to check out their ministry. They do everything debt-free, and they are waiting on funds to complete the next house. They have homes booked through 2024. What a blessing this ministry have been to us! Here are some pictures from the Open House in August prior to our moving in.
Another amazing blessing has been the Tilley family. This is another missionary family that is also moving into Hiding Place Hollow. They are in training preparing to go to Turkey as medical missionaries in January 2023. They have children around the same age as ours, so the girls are having a great time with them. But they have been a really special blessing to us. As they are in the process of selling everything in their home, they have given, or sold to us, many items that we will need when we settle into our own home. We lost almost everything from our home in Ukraine, but they have given us many of those same items so we can start over here! God’s goodness to us is amazing!
Even with this, we still need all sorts of items to replace what we had to leave behind in Ukraine. One friend at Cornerstone Bible Fellowship has encouraged us to set up a registry on Amazon. We have already been blessed by friends sending several items to help us gather essential items to start over here. We are trying to put items on whenever we think about what we need. If you are interested in helping, you can go to the Amazon link (https://smile.amazon.com/registries/custom/316YRLWE5HNVF/guest-view ) and simply choose what item you want to help with, and it will be sent to us. This has really helped us to have some essentials for starting over here in the US. There are a number of items, most of them small and inexpensive but all of them would help us to get re-established here in the US. Just click on the link to see some of the items that we need.
While our needs are many, the needs of people in Ukraine are far greater. We are blessed to be able to come “home” to family and friends and we have a great support network here. But that is not the case for our Ukrainian friends. We appreciate (and need) your support, but our friends need help also. If you would like to help any of them, we have posted some updated links to ministries we know about that are helping people in Ukraine. You can find those links at https://teachingresources.org/2022/03/03/help-for-ukraine/.
Family …
We are transition away from all our summer activities to starting Homeschool again. We have started classes and the girls are loving the lessons. But most of all, they love reading – we can’t complain.
Also, we are enjoying going to Famer’s Markets and especially just eating some cookies on the square in Fayetteville. We are also enjoying cooking our own meals again in our new home. One of Katya’s favorites is French toast.
Support and Needs …
Please continue to pray that our regular support levels will continue for another year or two. We are still needing additional funds to replace everything that we have lost in the evacuation too. Everything in the states is much, much more expensive.
Katya’s mother is still in Poland awaiting the final processing of her documents. We cannot believe that it has taken so long for her documents to be processed. She received word in August that she will be able to immigrate to the US September 20th! (Katya’s grandmother has been in California since April.) We are excited about this. Once she gets here, it will take a few months to get all her documents in California together. Then we are hoping she can travel to visit us in Arkansas – hopefully by Thanksgiving. We are so grateful that God has provided for all her needs while she has been in Poland these last 5 months! God is so good!
While our heart’s desire is to return to Ukraine, each passing month seems to indicate it might be best for us to consider staying here in the states. This is a very difficult decision for us. We are hoping to find some land so that we can have a place to garden. We think we might have found something, and we are praying that everything will go well so we can start making some plans for being more permanent here. Our plans are to try to self-build a home here like we did in Ukraine. It will be much, much harder here with all the codes and regulations, but we have a builder friend who is willing to help us by being the general contractor for us! Pray for wisdom for us as well as for finances to get re-settled here.
Pray for Ukraine …
Ukraine has been doing an amazing job not only defending the country but also with its counter-offensives that are recapturing much Ukrainian territory from Russia. Still, it comes with a great deal of loss of many lives. Pray for our soldiers and also for our chaplains who are ministering to those who have lost loved one. Pray that the gospel can be shared and that many will come to faith in these difficult times. It is amazing what Ukraine has been able to do in the face of a massive Russian invasion. We are grateful for all the countries, individuals and churches that have helped the Ukrainian forces and people during this difficult time. Continue to pray – it looks like we will be at war for many months to come. But we are so thankful for God’s grace, mercy and goodness to Ukraine during this time.
By His Grace,
Jim, Katya, Kristina and Nadia
If you missed previous updates or just want to read some short theological reflections, you can find these at our website at https://teachingresources.org/ .
Also, some have asked about how to support us. You can send checks to Teaching Resources International, PO Box 1025, Cabot, AR 72023 or pay through PayPal on our website. Just put “#1000 Ehrhard” in the memo so our treasurer knows where to allocate the funds. If you want to help with our relocation to the US – just put Relocation in the memo. You can also help us with some small needs by contributing something from our Amazon Registry. We are grateful for all your prayers and help while we try to get re-settled here in the US.
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