Do Not Withhold Good

Do Not Withhold Good.  Being labeled do-good-er, goody-two-shoes, and goody-goody are not compliments. Ranging from clueless to sanctimonious—a do-gooder is the kind of person who consciously or unconsciously looks down on others who stray from the status quo and often tattles to the teacher at first chance about bad behavior. While allowing for these negative stereotypes, and there are many, when does doing good become a bad quality? An evaluation of good or bad stems from the reason a person has for doing good—at the heart.

If the heart’s motive for a good deed is to leverage his or her pious reputation to gain an advantage socially, then doing good becomes do-gooding (negative), as different as night is from day. If the heart’s motive for a good deed is to benefit others (positive), then the person who is doing good is doing well, even if misunderstood. At the surface level of cultural perception, do-gooding looks like doing good. But in the depth of the heart where Christ is dwelling, doing good to others is functionally an overflow of love for God. “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul and all your mind … You shall love your neighbor as yourself” (Matt. 22:37, 39). Self may be deluded, and others can be fooled, but God is ever aware which of our actions are, or are not, “from the heart” (Matt. 18:35).

Once the personal motivation for doing good is settled (which is easier said than done), then the biblical scope of doing good widens out dramatically. Whichever directions the arrows of doing good proceed, they share their origin in God. God is the first, best, and most at doing good, yet without do-gooding. “You are good and do good” (Psa. 119:68). “No one is good but God alone” (Mark 10:18). “Love your enemies, and do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return, and your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High, for he is kind to the ungrateful and the evil” (Luke 6:35). If we do right by doing good, then “it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure” (Phil. 2:13).

However, a danger exists. Paul alerts the church that weariness is a possible result of doing good. “And let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up. So then, as we have opportunity, let us do good to everyone, and especially to those who are of the household of faith” (Gal. 6:9-10). “As for you, brothers, do not grow weary in doing good” (2 Thess. 3:13). A need does not constitute a call. We must love all but we cannot save any. There is one Messiah; he needs no one’s assistance. He permits and enables us to serve others in his name and power as a joy. In this tender space, being fully aware of our limitations, God applies a double caveat to our good deeds: “Do not withhold good from those to whom it is due, when it is in your power to do it” (Prov. 3:27). Some good deeds stray beyond God’s wisdom. Some good deeds drift beyond our strength.