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“Good work.” My heart would thrill when my dad, a coach, or a boss said those words. I’ve seen in my own children how their faces light up when I praise them for doing something well. Even among non-Christians, there’s a yearning and recognition for good work. People acclaim sports teams, hail new product launches, and recognize actors for the good things that they do.
We love to hear people tell us “Good work” because we’re made for good works. God created us for them in the very beginning, in the garden of Eden (Gen. 2:15). Of course, Adam and Eve did a bad work. Since then, no one (except Jesus) can do truly good works apart from the saving grace of God, because we are “dead in [our] trespasses and sins” (Eph. 2:1). While our culture may recognize relatively good deeds, only objectively good works that glorify God truly count before Him. “Without faith it is impossible to please [God]” (Heb. 11:6). We cannot meet God’s perfect standard.
That’s why Jesus came—to do the good works that we could never do. Now that His good works have been credited to our account through our faith in Him alone, we are counted “good” before God (see 2 Cor. 5:21). From that grace flows a renewed calling: to walk in the good works that God prepared for us to do (Eph. 2:10). In a sense, He calls us back to the task that He first gave humanity in the garden—to cultivate and to keep, to work and to guard, to do good. It is remarkable, isn’t it, that Adam began as a gardener, and Mary mistook Jesus for a gardener after His resurrection (John 20:15)? Her assumption was truer than she knew. Jesus is the Gardener—the One who tends creation and restores it through His own good work. He teaches us to be gardeners like Him—not atoning sacrifices, of course, but cultivators of righteousness. We plant, we water, we reap (1 Cor. 3:6–9). Good works are the stuff of everyday Christian life. Because we are new creations in Christ (2 Cor. 5:17), the Holy Spirit works deeply within us. Good works grow out of us because that’s who we are now—gardeners who delight to labor alongside our Savior, Jesus Christ.