Prelude:
October 09 this year will mark nine years that God led me to start Monday Reflections. Allow
me to say thanks to Brothers Bevon White, Christopher Euphfa, and Dominic Blair and Sisters
Shaneka Raymore Euphfa and Kerone Lamoth who have contributed throughout the years. To
God be the glory! In celebration of this journey, I have decided to go back to the archives and
share reflections from the month of November 2020.
Monday Reflection – November 02, 2020
No Good
They have all gone astray, they are all alike perverse; there is no one who does good, no, not
one. Psalm 14:3
To better appreciate today’s Watchword, let’s hear the two preceding verses: “Fools say in their
hearts, “There is no God.” They are corrupt, they do abominable deeds; there is no one who
does good. The Lord looks down from heaven on humankind to see if there are any who are
wise, who seek after God.”
David outrightly rejects those who deny the existence of God and declare that they are fools,
because they reject God. David says this because of the plain evidence that there is a God:
evidence in both creation and human conscience. The fact that some people insist on denying the
existence of God does not erase God from the universe; it instead speaks to their own standing
as fools. The God-denying person is a fool because he/she denies what is plainly evident,
especially because the universe reveals the creator God, the designer God, the relational God,
and the governing God of morality. What is worse is when such a person denies God in his/her
heart.
David then considers the result of denying God. It leads people into corruption and abominable
works. There is a marked difference in moral behaviour between those who take God seriously
and those who do not. More than that, as David considers the sin of the God-denier, he looks out
over the landscape of humanity and concluded that there is no one who does good. It is not that
there is no human good in this world, but that fallen man is so fallen that he does not by instinct
do good, and even the good he may do is tinged with evil. And while we may wish to forget
about God, God never forgets about us. He is always observing, looking down from heaven upon
the children of men.
Continuing in this same vein, David says in today’s Watchword, “They have all gone astray, they
are all alike perverse; there is no one who does good, no, not one.” When God looks, he finds
that we have turned away from him, grown sour, and have become perverse and corrupt. David
observes and remembers that humans are truly, profoundly, deeply fallen. David’s use of “there
is no one who does good” suddenly broadens the scope beyond the atheist to include us. We may
not be atheists, but we all have gone astray, and are perverse.
What a picture of our condition as humans! Charles Spurgeon says, “Save only where grace
reigns, there is none that doeth good; humanity, fallen and debased, is a desert without an oasis, a
night without a star, a dunghill without a jewel, a hell without a bottom.” Yet, today’s New
Testament lesson of Romans 3:24 offers hope – We are justified by God’s grace as a gift, through
the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.
May we graciously receive God’s gifts of redemption, salvation and justification so we may do
good and live each day bearing the image of Christ. Amen.
Jermaine Gibson