The attributes of God

The Goodness of God

An attribute of God · Psalm 34:8

The goodness of God means that he is good in himself and good to all he has made, the source and standard of everything good. O taste and see that the Lord is good, the psalmist invites; blessed is the man that trusts in him. God's goodness pours out in daily kindness on the just and unjust alike, and reaches its height in the gift of his Son. He is good, and does good.

O taste and see that the LORD is good: blessed is the man that trusteth in him.Psalm 34:8 (KJV)

What the goodness of God means

To say God is good is to say two things. First, he is good in himself; his very being is the fullness of all that is excellent, beautiful, and worthy. He does not merely have goodness; he is goodness, its source and its measure. When Jesus said there is none good but one, that is, God, he was pointing to God as the origin from which every lesser good flows. Second, God is good toward his creatures, kind, generous, and benevolent, delighting to give.

His goodness embraces and unites his other perfections. His holiness is good, his justice is good, his patience is good; goodness is the warmth that runs through them all. It shows itself as generosity to all he has made, and as grace and mercy to sinners in particular. The Lord is good to all, and his tender mercies are over all his works. Nothing but good comes from God, for he is light, and in him is no darkness at all; every good gift comes down from him, and no bad gift ever does.

How the Bible reveals it

When Moses asked to see God's glory, God answered, I will make all my goodness pass before thee. His glory and his goodness are nearly the same thing. The Psalms return to it endlessly, most famously in the invitation, O taste and see that the Lord is good, an appeal not merely to believe it but to prove it in experience, to trust him and find him faithful. The earth, they say, is full of the goodness of the Lord.

God's goodness is written across creation itself, which he pronounced good and very good, and across his daily providence, giving rain and fruitful seasons, filling our hearts with food and gladness. He is kind even to the unthankful and the evil, making his sun to rise on the just and the unjust. And his goodness is supremely proved in redemption: he who spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things. The whole story of salvation is the goodness of God pursuing us.

Common misunderstandings

The great objection to God's goodness is the suffering of the world. If God is good, people ask, why is there so much pain? Scripture does not offer a tidy formula, but it does insist that God's goodness is not canceled by a world under the shadow of sin and death, and that he is working, even through suffering, to bring about a good we cannot yet see. He is good in the dark, and the cross proves he will go to any length for us.

Others mistake goodness for mere niceness, imagining a God who only ever comforts and never confronts. But real goodness opposes what harms us; a good God must be against the evil that destroys his children. His goodness therefore includes his discipline and even his judgment on unrepentant evil. And some, weighed down by guilt, cannot believe God could be good to them in particular. To them the invitation stands: taste and see. His goodness is not for the deserving but for all who come, and none who trust him are ashamed.

Why the goodness of God is good news

If God is good, then reality at its root is trustworthy. The One who holds your life is not indifferent, not malicious, not stingy, but generous and kind, and disposed to do you good. This changes how we meet each day and each trial. We can cast our care on him, knowing he cares. We can pray with confidence, since he is a Father who gives good gifts to those who ask. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow us all the days of our lives.

And his goodness invites us not merely to know it but to enjoy it. Taste and see; do not stand at a distance analyzing, but come and prove for yourself that the Lord is good. Those who take refuge in him discover that his goodness is not a doctrine but a feast. However dark the season, the believer can say with the psalmist, I had fainted, unless I had believed to see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. His goodness will have the last word.

How the goodness of God is seen in Jesus Christ

Jesus went about doing good, healing all who were oppressed, feeding the hungry, blessing children, weeping with mourners. In him the goodness of God took hands and feet and walked our roads. When people met Jesus, they met the kindness of God in person; the sick, the outcast, and the sinful found in him a goodness that sought them out and would not turn them away.

The supreme proof is the cross. There the good Shepherd laid down his life for the sheep, and the goodness of God was measured out to the last drop. He gave himself for us, that he might redeem us and purify us to himself. In the gospel, the goodness and love of God our Savior toward man appeared, and saved us, not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy. To taste and see that the Lord is good is, in the end, to come to Jesus, and to find him better than every hope.

A note offered humbly and for all Christians: God is one, simple, and undivided in his being, and these attributes are not parts of him but the one God seen from many sides. His holiness is loving, his love is holy, his justice is merciful, and his mercy is just. He is also greater than all our words, and no page can contain him. What we can say, we say only because he has graciously revealed it, above all in Jesus Christ, who is the image of the invisible God.

Related: The Grace of God · The Love of God · Who is Jesus? · All the attributes of God