Sermon Notes
Pastor Jeff Stanfill

Goodness
Making Your Home a Treasure House - Family Series
April 23, 2006

MAKING YOUR HOME A TREASURE HOUSE - FAMILY SERIES
(COMMUNICABLE ATTRIBUTES OF GOD)
GOODNESS
TEXT: PROVERBS 15:6; PSALM 111, 112
INTRO:
Have you been amazed at what people will pay for trinkets? Have you been astounded with what others pick from your neighbor's garbage? One man's trash is another man's treasure!

If our homes can become treasure houses in which are stored and found valuable things, priceless possessions, commendable commodities - how do we know what to place in our homes and what to discard. We want what is good, valuable, exquisite, and priceless. But what determines good? Value? Price? Beauty?

Ask someone if a movie is good and the answer will depend upon whom you ask.

Ask which is better ice cream or cherry pie and the answer will be according to who answers the question.

What is good and what should be called goodness is so much a matter of individual taste that it is difficult to say that anything is good. And when comparing one choice with another, goodness is very relative. Compared to dying in a plane crash, falling down and breaking an arm is a good thing!

The dictionary is of almost no help. Good can mean:
· bountiful as with "good land",
· Handsome or attractive as 'good looks".
· Suitable or fit as 'good to eat",
· Profitable as "made a good deal of money."
· Agreeable and pleasant like a "good time was had by all."
· Conforming to a standard, "he uses good English."
· Virtuous, commendable as a "good man"
· Then we have something conforming to the moral order of the universe.
Now that should relate to church matters and God and good people.

But how does the universe - the planets, stars, oceans, dust, insects, and humans - form a moral order? What is the final measurement of moral?

You aren't interested in philosophy (though philosophy is interested in you!). If I want my home to be a treasure house, what makes for "good" treasures to possess?

The Bible speaks of God as good. But what does that mean that God is good? Is He handsome, suitable, profitable, agreeable, commendable and virtuous, conforming to the moral order of the universe, all the above? Have we written a meaning for goodness and then discovered that God fit the definition?

For some God is good because He did what they ask in prayer. Is the goodness of God a matter of how pleased I am with Him?

For some God is good because He freed them from a hardship. Is the goodness of God a matter of how easy my life is lived?

In reality, God Himself is the standard of good. As the eternal Creator, who He is determines everything - especially what we know good to be.

That God is good is shown by witness and acts.
I. THE WITNESSES TO GOD'S GOODNESS.
1. Psalmists have written and sung of God's goodness for millennia. Ps 100:5. For the LORD is good and his love endures forever; his faithfulness continues through all generations. Ps 106:1. Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good; his love endures forever. Ps 34:8. Taste and see that the LORD is good; blessed is the man who takes refuge in him.
2. Moses recruited people to join him and the Israelites as they journeyed through the wilderness. His selling feature was the good promises God had made to Israel. Num 10:29. Now Moses said to Hobab son of Reuel the Midianite, Moses ' father-in-law, "We are setting out for the place about which the LORD said, 'I will give it to you.' Come with us and we will treat you well, for the LORD has promised good things to Israel."
3. When asked about what is good, Jesus's answer was prefaced with a statement, Matt 19:17. "Why do you ask me about what is good?" Jesus replied. "There is only One who is good. That One is God Himself.
4. Apostle Paul testified that even God's purpose was good Phil 2:13. for it is God who works in you to will and to act according to his good purpose.

II. THE ACTS OF GOD'S GOODNESS.
Isn't it reasonable that if God is known as good, then His goodness would show in what He does?
1. Everything created was declared to be good by God Himself. All that He created was worth God's approval. It was exactly as He desired it to be in His own goodness. (Gen 1:31).

2. David was a recipient of God's goodness. 1 Kings 8:66 They blessed the king and then went home, joyful and glad in heart for all the good things the LORD had done for his servant David and his people Israel.

3. God desires for ways to show goodness to His people. Ps 84:11. For the LORD God is a sun and shield;
the LORD bestows favor and honor; no good thing does he withhold from those whose walk is blameless.

4. In fact, everything good is from God and should be received as if a gift from God. James 1:17. Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.

5. How can God be good with so much bad all around? Let me just give you two quick talking points for that question and then see the testimony of someone that really lived through bad things.
· First, God doesn't cause bad. All the way back to the beginning, it was Adam's sin that brought all the bad in this world.
· Second, God has done something about the evil and bad in our world - He came and died as the atoning sacrifice for our sins. If all the bad things were wiped clean form the earth, before tonight, evil would be back. Because evil is from out of the human heart. Why do I say this with such confidence? Because it has happened once already. God wiped the earth clean with a global flood that killed everything and everyone except enough animals to repopulate the earth and one righteous man and his family - Noah. So the solution to evil has to be a changing of the human heart or else all the bad will be back. And that is what God has done about the evil and bad in the world.

6. Now, if anyone had a right to complain about bad things happening to them it was Job and Joseph.
· Job has done nothing deserving of losing everything and nearly everyone except live a holy life before God. And satan comes against him with God's permission. After all that he suffered physically, psychologically, and paternally, he never charged God with wrong but accepted that his even wanting to confront God with what happened to Him, he spoke out of turn.
· Joseph was the victim of a family conspiracy, sold as a slave, imprisoned on false charges, forgotten by those he befriended, and decades later when bitterness would normally extract its revenge, he tells his brothers, Gen 50:20. You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives.

When it comes to God's goodness perhaps the three expressions that most show that He is good are His mercy, His grace, and His patience.

7. Mercy. 2 Cor 1:3-4. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, 4 who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. ESV. Mercy is God's goodness to those in misery and distress. As sinners we are deserving of miserable, distressed live. But in His mercy, God does not give us what we deserve but He gives mercy and eases and relieves our misery and distress.

8. Grace. 1 Peter 5:10. And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you. ESV. Grace is God's favor freely given to those who deserve no favor. It is His goodness toward those who deserve punishment.
9. Patience. 2 Peter 3:9. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance. God's patience God being good with those who sin repeatedly over a period of time, giving them every opportunity to repent.

III. TREASURING GOD'S GOODNESS.
God is good in His mercy, grace, and patience. Who would not want to come home everyday or visit with a friend each day that is good? Who wants to go home to criticism? Who wants to be around a friend that discourages? What is there for a life in a home in which no thing is ever good enough?

Our having a God of goodness makes our homes a treasure house. Num 10:29. Now Moses said to Hobab son of Reuel the Midianite, Moses' father-in-law, "We are setting out for the place about which the LORD said, 'I will give it to you.' Come with us and we will treat you well, for the LORD has promised good things to Israel."
Why would Moses treat his brother-in-law well? Because Moses' God treated Moses well. Our God is good and to show how we treasure Him, we display goodness to those around us.

1. Mercy - good to those in distress.
· Help your kids with their homework.
· Kids, do your chores without complaining or fighting (it was kids that first came up with the idea of unionized labor - "Not my job!").
· Listen to the other's problem without quickly offering solutions.
· Be present in the crisis.
· Show compassion instead of teasing.

2. Grace - good to those who deserve punishment.
· Discipline instead of punish. (Punishment is to charge a penalty. Discipline is to correct what is wrong in order to teach what is right.)
· Once dealt with its over.
· Deal with one issue and one person at a time. ILLU: Zach and Alex starting a conversation with us a few weeks ago. We had been unaware of this.

3. Patient - good to those who continue to do wrong or sin over a period of time.
· Keep working the issue of communication.
· Forgive.
· Trust God's promise to fulfill His purpose in your lives.
· Don't give up on either them or your situation, instead be patient.

CONCL:
Matt. 18:23-35.
· The master shows mercy, grace, and patience.
· The servant shows none - his treasure house becomes a prison house!
· Designation changes from servant to "wicked"
servant.

ILLU: Bessie T. - "He never said anything. And I knew what a good man I had married."