God Speaking

“How beautiful on the mountains are the feet of those who bring good news, to proclaim peace, who bring good tidings.”

(Isaiah 52: 7)

As I was watching the news, recently I kept looking for any piece of good news. The story of the world in chaos with the fear of this vicious virus racing through countries with no respect of age, youth, or even the very fit, dominated, but not far behind were terrible stories of ugly warfare with no regard for women or children, citizens abandoned to fare for themselves, then in our own country vicious racism is becoming more prevalent. Even in our own communities we have strident voices protesting about everything imaginable, mostly about selfish minor issues not related to the common good, and they too were evident on the news with big signs proclaiming anger about the smallest details of our lives. Good news, hard to find.

We, who follow and love the way the Lord has told us to follow, need to look closely how we could be those who bring good news.

“Do not withhold good from those who deserve it, when it is in your power to act.” (Proverbs 3: 27)

We are often tempted to be

• critical and judge others who even disagree slightly with us
• intolerant of other races who differ from us
• jealous of our friends who achieve something we would like to have done and withhold our praise

Looking carefully at the message in Proverbs we realize that we could exhibit God’s love by looking for the good in all situations and we could be the ones to bring that good news to others. Rather than finding something to complain about, we need to learn to find the good in all in all the happenings in our own lives and this even applies to what we are experiencing that may be overwhelming, but if we search diligently, we will find light even in the darkest days.

Not only are we to look for good news, God’s word, entreats us to bring good into other’s lives.

“Therefore, as we have opportunity. Let us do good to all people, especially those who belong to the family of believers.” (Galatians 6: 10)

Bringing good news means action on our part. Not to just use words but to be active in doing just what we can. Living the good news needs practice and persevering through our human natures that are often focused on ourselves. In Matthew we read the solution to how to do that. Firstly, we need the Lord to fill us, so we have a store of goodness to share with others.

“The good man brings good things out of the good stored up in him…” (Matthew 12: 35)

We get that store of goodness by following the commands of the Lord.