Mystery III: The Mystery of Goodness

Don: We are asking: What is mystery? What can we know about it? Can we develop a theology of mystery? Is it possible to lead a satisfactory spiritual life alongside unexplained mystery? Why is there a human compulsion to have mystery explained—especially, the mystery about god?

The need to have mystery explained seems to be linked to the question of will: It seems that the more we subordinate our will to god’s, the less we feel a need to solve the mystery and the more we are prepared to live on faith.

Mystery as used by Jesus and the apostle Paul, in the original Greek of the New Testament, means “Truth revealed.” The truths are timeless, immutable, and are about god. Furthermore, as made clear in Matthew 11:25-29, they are simple and comforting:

At that time Jesus said, “I praise You, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that You have hidden these things from the wise and intelligent and have revealed them to infants. Yes, Father, for this way was well-pleasing in Your sight. All things have been handed over to Me by My Father; and no one knows the Son except the Father; nor does anyone know the Father except the Son, and anyone to whom the Son wills to reveal Him.

“Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.”

In other words, the mysteries—the truths revealed—are first of all simple enough for babies to understand and yet, paradoxically, too simple for knowledgeable adults to comprehend; and second of all, they bring comfort and consolation to troubled humanity. What are the truths revealed by Jesus—what are the “mysteries”—that are so simple and bring such comfort? We’ve identified four great mysteries and we want to know what each tells us about god and what Jesus said about each one in his mission and message.

The first of the four is the mystery of godliness, referred to in 1 Timothy. It is essentially a mystery of the source of goodness, that was not understood before Jesus revealed it. The second mystery is the mystery of the source of iniquity, of evil, and is referred to in 2 Thessalonians 2. Third is the mystery that god is the god of all mankind and his grace extends to all mankind. This too was a mystery which, according to Paul, had been hidden since the beginning of time, until Jesus came along. Finally, there is the transformational mystery that we shall not all sleep but we shall all be changed.

The Mystery of Godliness
1 Timothy 3:16 says:

By common confession, great is the mystery of godliness:

He who was revealed in the flesh,
Was vindicated in the Spirit,
Seen by angels,
Proclaimed among the nations,
Believed on in the world,
Taken up in glory.

This poetic listing of the attributes of Jesus is similar to the Apostle’s Creed of the early Christian Church. Other translations of the first line of v. 16 say: “Beyond all question,” or “Beyond all understanding,” “great is the mystery of godliness”. The concept that god is good is carried throughout the bible, from beginning to end. In the first chapter of Genesis, the goodness inherent to the creative power of god is manifested again and again:

4 God saw that the light was good;
10 God called the dry land earth, and the gathering of the waters He called seas; and God saw that it was good.
12 The earth brought forth vegetation, plants yielding seed after their kind, and trees bearing fruit with seed in them, after their kind; and God saw that it was good.
17-18 God placed [the sun, the moon, and the stars] in the expanse of the heavens to give light on the earth, and to govern the day and the night, and to separate the light from the darkness; and God saw that it was good.
21 God created the great sea monsters and every living creature that moves, with which the waters swarmed after their kind, and every winged bird after its kind; and God saw that it was good.
25 God made the beasts of the earth after their kind, and the cattle after their kind, and everything that creeps on the ground after its kind; and God saw that it was good.
31 God saw all that He had made, and behold, it was very good.

So goodness seems rooted in the creative power of god. This mystery is carried through the scriptures all the way to the Book of Revelation, chapter 21:1-6:

Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth passed away, and there is no longer any sea. And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, made ready as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne, saying, “Behold, the tabernacle of God is among men, and He will dwell among them, and they shall be His people, and God Himself will be among them, and He will wipe away every tear from their eyes; and there will no longer be any death; there will no longer be any mourning, or crying, or pain; the first things have passed away.”

And He who sits on the throne said, “Behold, I am making all things new.” And He *said, “Write, for these words are faithful and true.” Then He said to me, “It is done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. I will give to the one who thirsts from the spring of the water of life without cost.”

Thus, the concept of making something new seems central to the goodness of god.

Adam and Eve’s transgression regarding the forbidden fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil is the quintessential example of Man’s burning need to know—a need that caused the Fall of Man.

A perfect summary of the ministry of Jesus, and further evidence that goodness is at the heart of god, is given by Paul in one verse—Acts 10:38:

You know of Jesus of Nazareth, how God anointed Him with the Holy Spirit and with power, and how He went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with Him.

There are more than 60 passages in the bible that talk about the goodness of god.

What is it that we should understand about the goodness of god, particularly from the ministry and the message of Jesus? What was the mystery about the goodness of god before Jesus came?

In Matthew 7:15-20, Jesus talked about good and bad fruit. He established the basic characteristics:

“Beware of the false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly are ravenous wolves. You will know them by their fruits. Grapes are not gathered from thorn bushes nor figs from thistles, are they? So every good tree bears good fruit, but the bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot produce bad fruit, nor can a bad tree produce good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. So then, you will know them by their fruits.”

In the story of the Rich Young Ruler, Jesus established the principle parameter of goodness. Matthew 19:16-22:

And someone came to Him and said, “Teacher, what good thing shall I do that I may obtain eternal life?” And He said to him, “Why are you asking Me about what is good? There is only One who is good; but if you wish to enter into life, keep the commandments.” Then he said to Him, “Which ones?” And Jesus said, “You shall not commit murder; You shall not commit adultery; You shall not steal; You shall not bear false witness; Honor your father and mother; and You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” The young man said to Him, “All these things I have kept; what am I still lacking?” Jesus said to him, “If you wish to be complete, go and sell your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow Me.” But when the young man heard this statement, he went away grieving; for he was one who owned much property.

What is the timeless truth, the mystery, about the goodness of god that Jesus revealed?

David: The picture you have painted is of a god proactively creating and doing good. This is what confuses people. A god proactively doing good would not have allowed the Holocaust. The Daoist does good by Doing Nothing, which is a sort of proactive inactivity (which is mysterious enough). But there is no mystery in a god whose stated mission is to proactively do good—unless he does not follow through!

Pat: I was diagnosed in 2000 with stomach cancer, which then had a 15 percent survival rate. Facing a high probability of death I worried about what was going to happen to my family and I wondered what was going to happen to me: Would I cease to exist entirely? Would I enter a heaven paved with streets of gold? As the days passed, I discarded more and more of these mundane considerations about what life would be like after death, and eventually came up with one kernel of truth that encompassed both mystery and goodness. First let me say that (to me) mystery is the difference between science and faith. The faithful may believe what science teaches yet still embrace the mystery that science cannot explain. My insight was that my death didn’t matter because god loved me, therefore whatever happened, god had planned for me something that was good. This realization, this conviction, brought me such peace. There have been many trials since then but I have always been able to hold onto that kernel, which encompasses both the mystery and the goodness of god.

Kiran: Job 22:1-3 says:

Then Eliphaz the Temanite responded,

“Can a vigorous man be of use to God,
Or a wise man be useful to himself?
“Is there any pleasure to the Almighty if you are righteous,
Or profit if you make your ways perfect?

Eliphaz is asking: “Why should god care about us? We are nobodies.” It seems not to make sense that god loves us, yet scripture shows clearly he does. To me, the mystery is god’s love.

Charles: The solutions to the great mysteries, including the mystery of the infinitely good nature of god, seem to me to be inherently inaccessible to our time-bound, finite human minds and senses. However, what we can do is recognize that the mysteries exist. In so doing we are led to contemplate them; and in contemplating them we are led to god. The revelation of truths/mysteries by Jesus was not to define them but to awaken us to their existence. We need light reflected by the sun in order to be able to see that the things revealed do exist, but if we gaze directly into the sun hoping for a deeper understanding of them we will be blinded. To use another metaphor, we know the mysteries not directly, but by their fruits. We cannot define or understand grace or love, but we can know them when we see and experience them. And simply by trying to understand them we are drawn closer to their source. Seeking answers pulls us along on our spiritual journey.

Jay: Searching for answers helps build faith. The more we realize we cannot understand something we can nevertheless perceive, the more we are driven  simply to accept it—to have faith in it. It removes the cognitive dissonance we feel when, for instance, bad things happen to good people. This is not a sectarian message, though it came through the ministry of Jesus: It is a message about goodness for everyone and is to be actively shared with everyone, as Jesus did in sharing it with lepers and tax collectors and the blind.

Chris: It seems to me significant that in the parable of the Good Samaritan, which was addressed to a lawyer who asked Jesus how to achieve eternal life, Jesus chose a Samaritan—an outsider, an “other”, a non-Jew—as the do-gooder. This was in the day when Jews had no doubt they were the Chosen People and therefore the only ones who had god’s mandate, through the Judaic law, to do good. Yet Jesus chose a Samaritan to reveal the mystery of goodness to the Jews!

Jay: As with the Rich Young Ruler, Jesus was demonstrating that there is a component of goodness missing from Judaic Law—that the Ten Commandments are incomplete if ultimate goodness—godliness—is the goal, as opposed to just staying out of trouble. The missing component was that you have to do everything—everything—in your power to help others less fortunate than you.

Joyce: It is easy to do some things for others when we already have a gift or means for doing those things. It is harder, but much more rewarding, to do things for which we have no gift or means. This was the case with the Catholic priest in the Maureen Dowd column quoted in Fayth*: He felt desperately ill-equipped to console the parents of the dead child, yet he did it.

Kiran: At the heart of the mystery of goodness, it seems to me, is the willingness to love people who don’t seem to deserve it. So the Jews would not have been ready to love un-Chosen people, yet Jesus was telling them to love even their enemies. To achieve that is to achieve godliness. I can understand that message in principle, but can’t see myself following it in practice. I conclude that god loves even me and I don’t see why he should!

Joyce: Is anyone really capable of that level of love and goodness? I keep my distance from people I do not like, even within my own family. Who doesn’t? How many wealthy people would just give everything they have to the poor and impoverish themselves as a result? It is indeed a mystery.

Jay: Somewhere in Luke, Jesus said if you really want to be godly, you need to sacrifice your life, your family, everything for him. But then he went on to say that he did not expect us to take on too great a burden. What he expects is for us to shoulder whatever burden we can bear when called upon, when the opportunity presents itself. So we have to be able to recognize the opportunity, but to do so we have to subordinate our will to god’s, because we are not reliable judges. When we do subordinate our wills, we receive god’s grace, which we can then share with others who need it. Our own burden is thus lifted, yet we can accomplish more for others.

Kiran: The answer Jesus gave to the Rich Young Ruler exemplifies that. He added that a rich man can no more go through the gates of heaven than a camel can go through through the eye of a needle. It seems impossible. But then he said that with god, everything is possible. Knowing that gives me motivation at least to try to love my enemies. I might not succeed very well—I am after all only human—but there is good in trying.

Pat: I find it helps to love others by conveying not my own version of love but by conveying god’s love to them; to act as a vehicle, a channel that does not discriminate and does not ask whether the recipient deserves it.

God made us in his image to be Real, and the only way to have a 100 percent good world is for us to become puppets, and I don’t believe god made us that way.

Ada: I wish god were more predictable! Goodness seems to be revealed in ways we don’t expect.

Chuck: Revelation is god’s process for pulling us along spiritually and reconciling our humanity with god’s divinity. Scripture tells us what the Truth is like but does not tell us what it is. Like Buddhism, scripture can show you the way, the path to enlightenment, to oneness with divinity, but only you can walk it.

Robin: Mysteries seem to deal with the character of god, a spirit. The characteristics of a spirit must be so different from human characteristics, which are all we have to go on. Just before Moses received the tablets he asked god for proof of god’s presence. God replied (Exodus 33:19-20):

I Myself will make all My goodness pass before you, and will proclaim the name of the Lord before you; and I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show compassion on whom I will show compassion.” But He said, “You cannot see My face, for no man can see Me and live!”

When the Pharisees asked Jesus to show them the Father, Jesus replied that if they had seen him (Jesus) then they had seen the Father. So we can see god, but only through the physical Jesus, a mortal being we can understand.

What did Jesus mean by “follow” when he told the Rich Young Ruler to give up all his possessions and follow him? We can follow the teachings of Jesus, we can mimic his behavior toward others, but we cannot follow him to the Cross, therefore we cannot take on his mantle of godliness, his messiahship.

It all goes back to the point where reason fails and faith is all that’s left.

Don: Next week we will conclude our investigation of the mystery of goodness. In Matthew 5:20 Jesus makes the provocative statement:

For I say to you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven.”

In Jesus’ time nothing was considered more righteous, more godly, than scribes and the Pharisees. Yet Jesus said their goodness was totally inadequate. He elaborates on this in some detail in the Sermon on the Mount. He brings into focus and seems to downplay personal piety and personal righteousness. He addresses the essential elements of piety found in every religion: Prayer, alms-giving, and fasting.

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* Fayth, edited by David Ellis, forthcoming December 2014, Elysian Detroit.