The God Who Is Omnibenevolent

 Psalm 34:8, “Oh, taste and see that the LORD is good! Blessed is the man who takes refuge in him!”

Psalm 100:5, “For the LORD is good; his steadfast love endures forever, and his faithfulness to all generations.”

Nahum 1:7, “The LORD is good, a stronghold in the day of trouble; he knows those who take refuge in him.”

Romans 11:22, “Therefore consider the goodness and severity of God: on those who fell, severity; but toward you, goodness, if you continue in His goodness. Otherwise you also will be cut off.”

The word omnibenevolent comes from the Latin word omni, meaning “all,” and the word benevolent, meaning “good”. When we say that God is omnibenevolent, we are saying that God is absolutely good and that no action or motive or thought or feeling or anything else about Him is not purely good. He is “all-good,” and “always good.” The Bible provides many testimonies of God’s goodness, including Jesus’ own, when He asserted that no one is truly good except God Himself (Mark 10:18, “And Jesus said to him, “Why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone.”).

C. S. Lewis reminds us of the goodness of the Lion of the tribe of Judah in “The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe”: “Aslan is a lion - the Lion, the great Lion.” “Ooh,” said Susan. “I’d thought he was a man. Is he quite safe? I shall feel rather nervous about meeting a lion…” “Safe?” said Mr. Beaver… “Who said anything about safe? ‘Course he isn’t safe. But he’s good. He’s the King, I tell you.”

Many of us were taught to return thanks for our food at the dining table by beginning our prayer like this: "God is great. God is good."

Some years ago a phrase became very popular and spread throughout the church around the world. It was used in a call-and-response pattern. The worship leader or pastor would shout, "God is good, all the time!" And the congregation would respond by exclaiming, "All the time, God is good!"

When things turn out well, we exclaim, "Isn't God good!"

Is God good when things don't turn out the way we wanted them to?

Max Lucado writes, "When the cancer is in remission, we say "God is good.' When the pay raise comes, we announce 'God is good.' When the university admits us or the final score favors our team, 'God is good.' Would and do we say the same under different circumstances? In the cemetery as well as the nursery? In the unemployment line as well as the grocery line? In days of recession as much as in days of provision?"

Is God good when babies are born deformed; millions starve to death in Africa and India, when floods destroy lives and property, hurricanes and tor­nadoes destroys lives and buildings; when earthquakes kill hundreds; when the wicked seem to prosper and Christians are persecuted? Is God still good?

1. God is Orginally Good of Himself

Goodness is more than an activity God undertakes, but the essential attribute of God. The original Saxon meaning of our word GOD is The "GOOD." Goodness in reference to God is the sum total of his attributes. God is originally, essen­tial, eternally, and inherently good in Himself. He is the sum and source of all good. No man is good by nature as far as measuring up to or meriting favor with God, for there is none good, no, not one. Only those who are in union with Him by grace through faith in Christ are good and do good in an acceptable manner.

Psalm 135:3, “Praise the LORD, for the LORD is good; sing to his name, for it is pleasant!” 

Psalm 119:68, “You are good and do good; teach me your statutes.”

The English language has several phrases that serve as a polite way of avoiding the use of God's name while referring to him. "My goodness, Goodness gracious, goodness only knows, for goodness sakes, in the name of goodness; thank goodness!

If God were simply omnipotent (all-powerful) and omniscient (all-knowing), but not omnibenevolent, i.e., perfectly good and all-loving, then we would have reason to be frightened. In fact, this is how Muslims view Allah. According to Islam, God is not all-loving, and whatever Allah does is simply called “good,” even if it is really hateful. As a result, Muslims have no assurance of salvation (unless they die in Jihad).

If God is completely self-sustaining, independent of need, He must also be perfectly good. If God were simply a good and powerful being, but not perfectly good, there would be an element of contingency. That is, we could conceive of a being of potentially greater benevolence - and someone with greater goodness would be greater than God. Since the goodness of anything is measured by its perfection, God must be perfectly good in order to also be omniscient and omnipotent. All three aspects of His person must be in place for us to conceive of any one of the three.

The most common objection to the assertion that God is omnibenevolent, as well as omnipotent and omniscient, is the problem of evil. If God is all-knowing and all-powerful and perfectly good, why does evil exists? Philosophers debate this question endlessly. Some solve the problem by saying that Lucifer’s and then, later, man’s free will was the cause of evil and that God was not involved in causing evil. One might then ask, “Why then did God create a being who could choose evil?” and the typical answer to that is “because He wanted beings who would be able to make choices”; i.e., He did not want robots.

The problem of evil is the greatest emotional obstacle to belief in God. It just doesn’t feel like God should let people suffer. If we were God, we think, we wouldn’t allow it.

The atheist philosopher J. L. Mackie maintained that belief in God was irrational, for if God were all-knowing (omniscient) he would know that there was evil in the world, if he were all-powerful (omnipotent) he could prevent it, and if he were all-good (omnibenevolent) then he would wish to prevent it. The fact that there is still evil in the world proves that God doesn’t exist, or if he did, that he must be “impotent, ignorant, or wicked.”

As keenly felt as the problem of evil may be, it doesn’t represent a strong intellectual or logical obstacle to God’s existence. Mackie was wrong: The existence of God and the existence of evil aren’t mutually exclusive.

In fact, rather than disproving God’s existence, the reality of evil actually points to it, in an indirect way. If evil exists, then it follows that morality exists. If morality exists, then it follows that God exists.

Moral laws point to a moral law-giver. It’s only within a moral framework that the sufferings of this life can have any meaning. It may be a mystery why an all-good God allows suffering and evil to take place, but at least on this view there is meaning and purpose, and God can ultimately bring about justice and draw good out of the sufferings of this life.

George Smith states the problem evil this way in his book, Atheism: The Case Against God: "Briefly, the problem of evil is this: ...If God knows there is evil but cannot prevent it, he is not omnipotent. If God knows there is evil and can prevent it but desires not to, he is not omnibenevolent." Smith thinks that Christians logically cannot have it both ways: God is completely good, as well as completely powerful.

1. GOD IS ALL-GOOD.
2. GOD IS ALL-POWERFUL.
3. EVIL EXISTS.
4. GOD HAS A MORALLY SUFFICIENT REASON FOR THE EVIL WHICH EXISTS.
5. GOD IS REMOVING AND WILL ULTIMATLEY REMOVE ALL EVIL FOREVER!

For God to be God, He must be omnibenevolent, omnipotent, and omniscient. And, really, the issue comes down to believing the Bible, which presents God as always good

Psalm 106:1, “Praise the LORD! Oh give thanks to the LORD, for he is good, for his steadfast love endures forever!”   

Psalm 135:3, “Praise the LORD, for the LORD is good; sing to his name, for it is pleasant!” 

Nahum 1:7, “The LORD is good, a stronghold in the day of trouble; he knows those who take refuge in him.” However, a contextual reminder of Nahum chapter one is in order. “The wicked must not think God's goodness eclipses His clear intention to deal with evil. We were told in verse Nahum 1:3 that the “LORD will by no means clear the guilty.” He is an enemy of those who reject His sovereignty. His enemies will experience "an overflowing flood" and "darkness" (Nahum 1:8) instead of His goodness. Wrong cannot forever remain on the throne while right goes begging for vindication. 

His message to sinners, through Christ, is “good news” (Luke 2:10-11, “And the angel said to them, “Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.”)

His revelation of Christ is called the appearing of “the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior” (Titus 3:4, ESV). It is the goodness of God that leads us to repentance (Romans 2:4, “Or do you despise the riches of His goodness, forbearance, and longsuffering, not knowing that the goodness of God leads you to repentance?” NKJV), goodness is one of the results of His indwelling Spirit aka, “fruit of the Spirit” (Galatians 5:22), and He brings goodness to fruition in our lives through faith (2 Thessalonians 1:11.)

2. God’s Goodness Encompasses All His Attributes

All the acts of God are nothing else but the outflows of his goodness. Goodness is called different names based on the way it comes to its object.  For example, when Moses longed to see his glory, God tells him, he would give him a glimpse of his goodness (Ex. 33:19): “I will make all my goodness to pass before you.” His goodness is his glory. The whole catalogue of mercy, grace, long-suffering, abundance of truth, is summed up in this one word, goodness (Ex. 34:6). All are streams from this fountain; he could be none of this, were he not first good.

When goodness gives happiness without merit, it is grace;
when it bestows happiness against merit, it is mercy;
when he bears with provoking rebels, it is long-suffering;
when he performs his promise; when it sympathizes with a distressed person, it is pity;
when it supplies a needy person, it is bounty;
when it helps an innocent person, it is righteousness.

The Psalmist expressed the same sentiment in the same words (Psalm 145:7-9): “They shall utter the memory of Your great goodness and shall sing of Your righteousness. The LORD is gracious and full of compassion, Slow to anger and great in mercy. The LORD is good to all, And His tender mercies are over all His works.” 

3. God is Good to All in Some Ways

He is good in creation.

Psalm 33:5, “The earth is full of the goodness of the LORD.” 

Psalm 145:9, “The LORD is good to all: and his tender mercies are over all his works.”

Psalm 86:5, “For you, O Lord, are good and forgiving, abounding in steadfast love to all who call upon you.”

Psalm 100:5, “For the LORD is good; his steadfast love endures forever, and his faithfulness to all generations.”

Psalm 107:1, “Oh give thanks to the LORD, for he is good, for his steadfast love endures forever!” 

Matthew 5:45, “For he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good and sends rain on the just and on the unjust.”

4. God is Good to Some in All Ways

He is good in salvation.

The whole gospel is nothing but one entire mirror of Divine goodness the whole of redemption is wrapped up in that one expression of the angels’ song (Luke 2:14), “Good-will towards men.”

Stephen Charnock declares, “Goodness was the spring of redemption. All and every part of its appearance in the world owes only to this perfection. When man fell from his created goodness, God would demonstrate that he could not fall from his infinite goodness: that the greatest evil could not surmount the ability of his wisdom to design, nor the riches of his bounty to present us a remedy for it. Divine Goodness would not stand by a spectator, without being reliever of that misery man had plunged himself into; but by astonishing methods it would recover him to happiness, who had wrested himself out of his hands, to fling himself into the most deplorable calamity: and it was the greater, since it surmounted those natural inclinations, and those strong provocations which he had to shower down the power of his wrath.

“It was a pure goodness. He was under no obligation to pity our misery and repair our ruins: he might have stood to the terms of the first covenant, and exacted our eternal death, since we had committed an infinite transgression: he was under no tie to put off the robes of a judge for the bowels of a father and erect a Mercy seat above his tribunal of justice. Certainly that God who had no need of creating us, had far less need of redeeming us: for, since he created one world, he could have as easily destroyed it, and reared another. It had not been unbecoming the Divine Goodness or Wisdom, to have let man perpetually wallow in that sink wherein he had plunged himself, since he was criminal by his own will, and, therefore, miserable by his own fault.

“The effects of it proclaim His great goodness. It is by this we are delivered from the corruption of our nature, the ruin of our happiness, the deformity of our sins, and the punishment of our transgressions; he frees us from the ignorance wherewith we were darkened and from the slavery wherein we were fettered. When he came to make Adam’s process after his crime, instead of pronouncing the sentence of death he had merited, he utters a promise that man could not have expected; his kindness swells above his provoked justice, and, while he chased him out of paradise, he gives him hopes of regaining the same, or a better habitation; and is, in the whole, more ready to bestow on him the blessings of his goodness than charge him with the horror of his crimes (Gen. 3:15).

It is a goodness that pardons us more transgressions than there are moments in our lives and overlooks as many follies as there are thoughts in our heart: he not only relieves our wants but restores us to our dignity. It is a greater testimony of goodness to instate a person in the highest honors, than barely to supply his resent necessity: it is an admirable pity whereby he was inclined to redeem us, and an incomparable affection whereby he was resolved to exalt us. What can be desired more of him than his goodness has granted? He sought us out when we were lost, and ransomed us when we were captives; he pardoned us when we were condemned, and raised us when we were dead. In creation he reared us from nothing, in redemption he delivers our understanding from ignorance and vanity, and our wills from impotence and obstinacy, and our whole man from a death worse than that nothing he drew us from by creation.

God is good!

Can He be good and evil exist? If God is good and wants to eliminate evil, if God knows how to eliminate evil, if He has the power to eliminate evil, then why does evil still exist?

The problem of evil has caused many to either deny the existence of God, or declare that he is the devil. Skeptics believe that they have Christians in a Catch-22 situation - God would eliminate evil if he could, but he can't; God could eliminate evil if he would, but he won't. So either God is helpless or heartless!

Many people believe that God is too good to send anyone to hell. James Mill expressed what many have felt: "I will call no being good, who is not what I mean by good when I use the word of my fellow creatures; and if there is a Being who can send me to hell for not so calling him, to hell I will go!"

What is the Biblical response to the problem of evil? God is good and always does good and everything he does is good and he makes all things work for the good of his redeemed people. He is eliminating evil in his own way, on his own time schedule and will eventually quarantine all evil to the Universal Waste Products Storage Facilities, better known as Hell! Hell is God's cosmic rubbish dump, and all who go there become the garbage of the universe - wasted and worthless. C.S. Lewis said, "To enter heaven is to become more human than you ever succeeded in being on earth; to enter Hell is to be banished from humanity. What is cast into Hell is not a man; it his remains."

God is good to his people even when very bad things are happening to them. Anything that happens to anyone short of hell - short of getting what our sins have earned, is far better than we deserve and is sheer mercy and grace!

On February 6, 1870, George Mueller's wife, Mary, died of rheumatic fever. They had been married thirty-nine years and four months. He was sixty-four years old. Shortly after the funeral he was strong enough to preach a "funeral sermon" as he called it. What text would he choose when God had taken his best beloved? He chose Psalm 119:68, "You are good, and do good." His three points were:

1.The Lord was good, and did good, in giving her to me.

2.The Lord was good, and did good, in so long leaving her to me.

3.The Lord was good and did good, in taking her from me.

God never stops doing good to his covenant people. And if an enemy is temporarily given the upper hand, we can say, straight into the muzzle of the gun, "You mean evil against me, but God means it for good" (Genesis 50:20). Since God is sovereign and has promised not to turn away from doing good to His covenant people, we can know beyond all doubt, that God is good to us always.

Charles Wesly wrote my hearts cry to our Great and Good Heavenly Father:

O God, My Hope, My Heavenly Rest,
My All Of Happiness Below,
Grant My Importunate Request,
To Me, To Me, Thy Goodness Show;
Thy Beatific Face Display,
The Brightness Of Eternal Day.

Before My Faith’s Enlightened Eyes
Make All Thy Gracious Goodness Pass;
Thy Goodness Is The Sight I Prize,
O Might I See Thy Smiling Face!
Thy Nature In My Soul Proclaim,
Reveal Thy Love, Thy Glorious Name!