The Bible of Self-Interest
The LORD is good to all, and His mercies are over all His works Psalm 145:9
Good – What’s your attitude toward the rule of God? Is there just a hint of irritation at the fact that you can’t do exactly as you wish? Do you chaff at the bit of the Law? Or have you embraced the gospel of unlimited grace, thinking that since Jesus died you are free from any restrictions? My guess is that at some level most of us still find a seed of discontent when it comes to the rules and regulations from heaven. Even the best saint still finds that gnawing temptation on occasion – the one that says, “Why not have it your way?”
Why do we have such mixed feelings about this? Perhaps part of the answer lies in our mis-understanding of “good.” Our cultural bias no longer emanates from the Hebrew word tov. Instead, we adopt the Greek eu. Both mean “good”, but they have very different points of view. For the Greeks (not the Greek New Testament), “good” was an expression of the ideal state of bliss, free from the interference of this physical life. The good, the true and the beautiful (Plato’s trinity) were the ultimate objectives at the summit of human reason, ready to bestow a life of contemplative pleasure to the one who pried himself loose from the shackles of human bondage to rise on the wings of love (eros) and become re-united with the divine. Every man longed for this individual destiny and, with effort and discipline, every man could become his own god.
Sound too idolatrous? Maybe, but our world is filled with the language of would-be kings where we speak about being masters of your own domains. Your home is your castle. Grab life by the horns. You deserve it. Have it your way. Rise to the top. Live life on your terms. Good things are apparently the result of human effort and lottery luck.
The Hebrew view is different. God provides good to all – the obedient and the disobedient, the rich and the poor, the wise and the foolish. Why? Because it is His nature to do so. And here’s the startling fact. God’s good serves my self-interest. God doesn’t not expect me to do anything that is not in my favor. The Bible is a thorough endorsement of personal advantage.
How can this be? Haven’t we been taught that the Bible is about denial, rules and a no-fun life? Well, those teachers are wrong. What needs to change is not the concept of self-interest but rather the perspective of my horizon. God wants me to do everything that benefits me, and He is more than willing to help me do that. But His perspective about what is truly beneficial to me is not the narrow, temporally short-sighted nonsense that the world presents as the best life has to offer. God wants me to have it all – and all God wants me to have is what I can take with me to the next stage of eternity. What I leave behind wasn’t worth keeping. It wasn’t the best – and God will never settle for “good enough.” Would you?
