The question “Why do bad things happen to good people?” is often raised when discussing the problem of evil. The question assumes that there are “good people”—people who should be immune to the “bad things” that seem inevitable in a broken world despite the suffering and death of Christ, whose life of unqualified loyalty to the Father resulted in his resurrection, ascension, and glorification. Surely if anyone deserved to be spared from suffering and difficulty, it was Christ, but he wasn’t.
While the problem of evil is important on its own, understanding what it means to be a “good person” is crucial to understanding the problem of evil and to begin developing a strong theological anthropology. So, what does the Bible tell us about goodness and “good people” Before exploring the idea of “good people,” we need to have some notion of “good” in the Old Testament. That topic is wide-ranging—more wide-ranging than can be covered in this brief discussion. Three passages have been chosen to frame the concept of the “good” in the Old Testament: Genesis 1:1-2:3; 3:1-7; and Deuteronomy 30:15-20. These passages are not representative of all the uses of “good” in the Old Testament. Instead, they highlight an aspect of “good” that will inform the more specific question about whether or not there are “good people.”
Photo Credit: ©Unsplash/Brooke Cagle
1. Goodness Means Alignment with God’s Design (Genesis 1:1-2:3)
The creation narrative in Genesis is important to understanding “good” in the Old Testament. As God brings order to chaos, he judges the way he has ordered the world to be “good” (1:4, 10, 12, 18, 21, 25, 31). Goodness in the creation narrative involves alignment with God’s commands. God speaks, and the various aspects of creation align with God’s speech.
What is good emerges from God as the enactment of God’s will. Old Testament scholar Bruce Waltke notes,
“Although the eggshells of the precreated state, darkness and seas of abyss, are still present, they can now be called ‘good’ (i.e., beneficial and desirable) because they are bounded by light and land, respectively, and serve useful tasks (Ps. 104:19-26). Creation is imbued with God’s goodness and joie de vivre (Prov 8:30-31).”
What is deemed “good” contributes to God’s order in some productive manner. That order is designed to underscore God’s glory. There is no abstract moral good that serves as a standard apart from God. Instead, the “good” aligns with God and his purposes (cf. Gen 2:9, 12, 18).
Photo Credit: ©Getty Images/Tom Merton
2. Goodness Exists within God’s Boundaries (Genesis 3:1-7)
After having a conversation with the serpent who convinces her that humans can be like God (3:1-5), the woman makes her own independent judgement about the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (Gen 3:6). That judgment was only partially incorrect—the tree was good within the limits God previously set. To put it differently, the tree was not good for whatever humanity deemed it to be good for (3:6). It was good as that part of creation prohibited to humankind. It would have been good, then, for humankind to trust God by refusing to eat from the tree.
This passage underscores something inherent within Genesis 1:1-2:3. “Good” involves limits and boundaries. Those limits and boundaries are established by God, and the “good” exists within them. By transgressing the limits and boundaries God established, the human couple distorts God’s good creation. Their unwillingness to live in dependence on God rather than seeking independence from Him is not “good” because it is not true to God’s order.
Photo Credit: Unsplash/Janko Ferlic
3. Choosing Good Means Choosing God’s Way (Deuteronomy 30:15-20)
At the cusp of the promised land, God gives Israel a choice: ‘’life and good, death and evil” (30:15). Life and good are found in obedience. As the people of Israel follow “his commandments and his statutes and his rules” (30:16), they will experience life and goodness. The people are urged to “choose life…loving the Lord your God, obeying his voice and holding fast to him” (3:20). Experiencing life and goodness involves obedience—aligning with God’s order.
One aspect of “good” in the Old Testament involves alignment with God and his order. These passages do not deny an ethical or moral aspect of the good, but they do emphasize a theological meaning of the “good.” What is good is reflective of God’s order, submissive to God’s authority, and used according to the boundaries God has set. The “good” involves obedience to God’s commands.
Photo Credit: © Pexels/Ethan Jones
4. Human Goodness Fails without Divine Help (Genesis 8:20-22)
The flood was brought about when “the sons of God” saw that the “daughters of men” were “good” (tov; often translated as “beautiful” or “attractive” in Gen 6:2). Divinely established boundaries were crossed. Whereas the “sons of God” saw the beauty of the “daughters of men,” God “saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was evil continually” (6:5). In deciding the boundaries God set could be ignored, the goodness of the “daughters of men” was perverted like the fruit of the tree in the garden (notice the repetition of “saw,” “good,” and “took” in 3:6 and 6:2).
In 8:21-22, God says, “I will never again curse the ground because of man, for the intention of man’s heart is evil from his youth. Neither will I ever again strike down every living creature as I have done. While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night, shall not cease.” The problem of human rebellion has not been resolved, yet God will no longer curse the already cursed ground further because of that rebellion. Rather than marking history with a never-ending sequence of floods in response to human rebellion, God will deal with human rebellion in some other way.
In thinking about the goodness of human beings, Genesis 8:21-22 recognizes that humans continue to be set against God’s purposes. Left to our own devices without some divine action, humans will opt to act apart from God rather than depending on him. Humans, then, are incapable of sustained goodness—whatever efforts we are able to muster will be both inconsistent and insufficient without the graciousness of God.
Photo Credit:©Unsplash/Severin Höin
5. Goodness Is Faithfulness, Not Flawlessness (Job 1:1-5)
As the book of Job begins, Job is described in glowing terms. He is “blameless and upright, one who feared God and turned away from evil” (1:1; cf. 1:8; 2:3). Similar attributions are given to individuals like Noah (6:9), Abraham (26:5), and Zechariah (Lk 1:5-6). These descriptions are not intended to suggest that these people are without sin—they do not live lives perfectly aligned with God’s will. It is possible to use these terms to describe individuals who are flawed, but whose lives demonstrate a consistent fear of the Lord.
From these descriptions, then, we may be able to understand something about what it can mean—in an inexhaustive sense—to describe someone as good. When we think about “good” people, we are not thinking about people who are without sin. Instead, we are thinking of individuals who consistently seek to respond to the Lord from within the difficult situations rather than responding to the situations apart from the Lord.
Photo Credit: ©Unsplash/Ben White
6. Only God Can Make Us Good (Ezekiel 36:22-32)
God refuses to allow the failures of his people to cause his name to be profaned among the nations (36:22-23). Israel was to draw the nations to God rather than bearing his name in vain. However, Israel was unwilling and unable to remain faithful to the Lord. As such, God tells of a time when he will change his people giving them a “heart of flesh” instead of a “heart of stone”—a heart capable of life and faithful response to God (36:26). He will also send the Spirit to dwell within his people to “cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules” (36:27). God’s people will be delivered from their “uncleannesses” (36:39). At that time, they will look back on their former way of life and “loathe” themselves because of their “iniquities and abominations” (36:31).
As we reflect on this passage, it seems clear that God’s action is necessary. Humans, even those who have experienced God’s power in history and been privy to his revelation, will always misrepresent God in some way. It is not so much that we are incapable of goodness at any given point, but that our goodness is marred by our inevitable desire to pursue our own desires apart from God. Rather than obeying and following, we rebel and chart our own course.
Photo Credit: ©Getty Images/Thomas Jackson
7. God’s Goodness Exposes Our Limits (Mark 10:17-18)
“Good” makes a significant appearance in Mark 10:17-18 and its parallels in Matthew 19:16-17 and Luke 18:18-19. Though the rich young ruler in Mark and Luke addresses Jesus as “Good Teacher,” Matthew portrays him as asking what “good deed” he must do to inherit eternal life. Jesus’s response is similar in each account (1) questioning why the man would ask about the good (Matt 19:17) or call Jesus good (Mk 10:18; Lk 18:19) and (2) asserting that God alone is good (Matt 19:17; Mk 10:18; Lk 18:19). He then goes on to tell the man that eternal life requires a radical allegiance to God that is demonstrated through obedience to God’s commands and a willingness to answer God’s call no matter how difficult that call may seem (Matt 19:17-22; Lk 18:20-30; Mk 10:19-22).
In this context, “good” is ascribed only to God. While other passages allow for the presence of “good people” (Rom 5:7) in the world, Mark 10:17-18 and its parallels would suggest that this goodness is not like God’s goodness. There is a divine goodness that is unique to God; humans do not possess it.
Photo Credit: ©Thinkstock/RomoloTavani
8. Real Goodness Grows From Repentance (Luke 6:43-45)
In this text, we see that the fruit of a tree matches its nature. A good tree bears good fruit, whereas a bad tree does not (6:43). The trees are known by their fruit—they come to have a particular reputation as being a source of good (or not good) fruit (6:44). As Jesus notes, “Figs are not gathered from thornbushes, nor are grapes picked from a bramble bush” (6:44). People are comparable. Good people produce good, and evil people produce evil (6:45). Doesn’t this mean, then, that there are good people? Yes and no.
It is important to recognize the connections between 6:37-42 and 6:46-49. In the former, Jesus highlights the hypocrisy of those who judge their brothers without recognizing their own sin (6:42). Such hypocrisy is unnatural. It falsifies fruit—a thornbush pretends to bear figs (6:44). The latter passage (6:46-49) conveys something similar. Those who call Jesus “Lord, Lord” but do not obey Christ present themselves as disciples when they are not truly following Jesus. If the mouth speaks from the heart, how can one say, “Jesus is Lord” while not obeying Christ’s commands?
Jesus’s point in 6:43-45 is not to assert that there are good people and evil people, but that good people and evil people are characterized by their deeds. One cannot claim to be “good” while exhibiting “bad” fruit. To be good, then, one must follow Chris,t bearing fruit in keeping with repentance (Matt 3:8; Lk 3:8).
Photo Credit: ©iStock/Getty Images Plus/Olga Chetvergova
9. Human Goodness Falls Short of Glory (Romans 3:23)
In Paul’s letter to the Romans, he is, in part, seeking to establish a common theological ground for Jewish and Gentile Christians without collapsing the distinction between Jews and Gentiles. There is, for instance, an advantage for the Jew (3:1-2). Still, those advantages are insufficient to separate Jews from sin. As Paul notes, “Jews and Greeks alike are all under sin” (3:9). Freedom from sin does not come through the works of the law (3:10-20), but from “the righteousness of God… disclosed…through the faithfulness of Jesus Christ for all who believe” (3:21-22). Belief—a conviction expressed through loyalty to the Triune God—is not only for Gentiles, but for Jews as well. Because all have sinned, they fall short of the glory of God. In this sense, then, we may still identify “good” people—those who tend to do good things (cf. 1 Tim 5:9-10; 1 Pet 2:18; 3 Jn 1:11)—but we cannot find those who are not sinners. Apart from God, we cannot be “good” in the sense that we are fully aligned with God’s order and authority.
Photo Credit: ©Unsplash/Emma Simpson
10. True Goodness Looks Like the Cross (Revelation 7:13-14)
It is possible for us to become obsessed with “being good people.” However, we need to remember that if we understand “goodness” as a synonym for “wholesomeness” or “neighborliness” or “civility,” we risk missing the fact that we need to develop the sort of character necessary to remain faithful despite tribulation (7:14). Being a “good person” according to societal standards is certainly appropriate for Christians, yet only in so much as being a “good person” emerges from discipleship.
Christians are not called to be “good people” in a conventional or cultural sense. Instead, we are called to be “good” in the theological sense. We are to align our lives with God’s order by conforming to the image of His Son. We are to pursue the good of the one whose life resulted in resurrection, ascension, and glorification.
Photo Credit: ©GettyImages/shuang paul wang
Originally published Tuesday, 10 June 2025.