Man or Rabbit?

"The idea of reaching 'a good life' without Christ is based on a double error. Firstly, we cannot do it; and secondly, in setting up 'a good life' as our final goal, we have missed the very point of our existence." -C.S. Lewis

This quote seemed to me to be the bottom line of Lewis’ essay. It addresses a lie that so many people believe, Christians and non-Christians alike. Because God has written the moral law in the depths of our hearts, we know that there is such a thing as good and many will reach the conclusion that our life purpose must somehow be connected with goodness. This is true. The essence of God is goodness and love; God is goodness. He designed us to be united with Him, and thus be united with goodness. However the object of our pursuit and affection is not goodness in itself, but God Himself.

This lie that the end goal of our life is goodness is closely connected to the truth that our end goal is the good God. However this lie may be one of Satan’s most effective tools to distract us from God. I see several dangers of living a life for the pursuit of goodness. We can do nothing good apart from Christ (although I believe Christ can still use those who don’t know Him to do good). When the objective of my life is for me to do good, there is one major problem: my and me. I am the source of the good action. The focus is for me to accomplish the greatest degree of good actions I can accomplish. At the end of the day if I have done something good, I deserve the glory. When I do all these good actions to “be the best person I can be” and perfect myself, I am totally missing the point. I cannot be the best person I can be without Christ - and this is not even the point when I do know Christ. The focus on how good I am or how I need to be better, instead of living out the reality that no matter how good I am I still fall short of God’s glorious standard and I need his grace every minute of my life. When I live by Christ’s grace every day, the goal of life is not to be “a good person” – this is a selfish goal – but to humbly be near to the Lord and let him, in my utter brokenness and failure, use my weaknesses (and strengths) to reveal how great He is in my weakness.

Once we grasp this reality, it is liberating. In the Old Testament we were under the law. When Christ came he freed us from the law, that we may live to know him and not live to meet the requirements of the law. But when we live to be “good people” we put ourselves under the law again – and we can never be justified. When we accept God’s grace, we no longer need to live to do the best we can do. We live to be near to God and live by his redeeming grace in all that we do. When we choose to live in God’s grace and love, and not by our own means, we experience great freedom that can never be found outside of his grace.