Good All the Time

Perhaps you have heard the following popular exchange. A speaker gets up and says, “God is good,” and the audience responds, “All the time.” Then, the speaker says, “All the time,” and the audience answers, “God is good.” While sometimes this back-and-forth can seem somewhat trite and seems to deny that hard things really do happen in life, the words themselves are absolutely true. Scripture tells us again and again that God is always and completely good. Today’s passage is but one expression from God’s Word that extols divine goodness.

What makes the goodness of the one true God such good news is that His goodness is coupled with His omnipotence. Unlike many Eastern religions, the Bible does not teach a metaphysical dualism that says that good and evil are equal, eternal, and opposing forces. Instead, it tells us that only the Lord “can do all things, and that no purpose of [His] can be thwarted” (Job 42:2). Evil, therefore, can never overcome God or even force Him into a stalemate. It is not that the God of the Bible is perfectly good but is unable to accomplish all that He wants to accomplish. No, the One in whom there is no darkness (1 John 1:5) cannot be thwarted, and since He can do nothing but what is good, good will always win in the end.

When we talk about divine goodness, we are not thinking of some abstract ideal of goodness that exists outside the Lord and to which He is accountable. Goodness is defined by the Lord’s character, so we must look to Him and His nature if we want to have a true understanding of the good. Thus, divine goodness includes things such as His punishment of sin. In fact, if He were to fail to hold sinners accountable, He would not be good (Ex. 34:6–7). If good human judges do not allow evil to go unpunished, then God the good and righteous Judge can by no means let wickedness go unpunished either.

The Lord is good all the time, but He can make His perfect goodness manifest in different ways. Besides in His justice, divine goodness is also seen in His benevolence, which is the general kindness that our Maker shows toward creation and everything in it, even to the undeserving. For instance, He gives the rain necessary to produce food both to the just and to the unjust (Matt. 5:45). Another manifestation of God’s goodness is His mercy, that special kindness wherein the Lord, having chosen to love His people, provides for their salvation and forgiveness (Rom. 9:1–24).