Keith Webb

   In the musical “Fiddler on the Roof”, Tevya, the peasant Jew from Russia, is faced with a difficult decision: a young man has asked for the hand of one of his daughters in marriage. As he sitsand ponders, he reviews all the reasons why this suitor should not be allowed to marry his daughter. He agonizes about how hard it will beto lose her and that to lose her to some one unworthy would even be worse. After some time of muttering to himself about this he says, “But….. he is a good man ….” and that settles it!

Throughout history, mankind has hoped that theabove procedure is what God uses to determinetheir eternal destiny. Some religions even teachthe concept of a god who has a set of balancesin which he weighs all their good works against their bad works; as long as the good outweighsthe bad, you make it! Unfortunately, or maybe fortunately, that isn’t what we are taught in Scripture. God actually says that the very best of works that man can come up with is still like dirty rags in comparison to the “goodness” that is necessary for entry into His kingdom. (Isaiah64:6) Jesus also said that “unless your righteousness exceeds the righteousness of thescribes and Pharisees, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven.” (Matt 5:20) So,what hope it there for us then?

Jesus was saying that we need a different kind of righteousness (goodness) altogether, not just a more intense version of the Pharisees’ righteousness (legal compliance). How do we obtain this quality of goodness? The only way is by receiving Christ’s righteousness as a gift from God, becoming one with Him through his blood that was shed for our sin. (II Corinthians 5:17-21) Through salvation, the Holy Spirit enters us and begins to produce the fruit of the Spirit in us,which includes Goodness! So, when God sits and ponders about our eternal destinies, he looks at us and sees Christ’s righteousness in place and says, “But ….. he is a good man ….” and that settles it!