goodness on Overcoming Evil

Leader: Creator God, our Source and our Home, we belong to you. All: We praise you, and we gather to worship you and give our lives to you. Living Christ, you establish justice, overthrow the ...

The confession of evil works is the first beginning of good works.

Every year of my life I grow more convinced that it is wisest and best to fix our attention on the beautiful and the good, and dwell as little as possible on the evil and the false.

Pastor: Satan and the powers of darkness seek to divide and destroy. And all too often God’s people either run from the battle in fear and defeat, or pick up the wrong weapons in the fight, relying ...

God would never permit evil, if He could not bring good out of evil.

Pastor: In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. People: Amen. Pastor: Be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. People: Put on the full armor of ...

As you go forth from this place, may you have the courage to confront the dark places. May you trust in God’s goodness to lead you to the living water. May you act justly, love mercy, and walk humbly ...

Gracious God, our hearts are often divided between what is good and what is evil. Not one of us is pure in heart yet we long to have a whole heart. Where there is hypocrisy in our life, please n...

But let me point out something we almost always fail to notice. We can only be tempted to something that is good on some level, partially good, or good for some, or just good for us and not for others...

Good can exist without evil, whereas evil cannot exist without good.

Gracious Father, the words of scripture are not without harshness in relation to our sin. We are prone to lead others astray in our words and actions. Knowingly or unknowingly done, we are condemned. ...

The awful thing is that beauty is mysterious as well as terrible. God and the devil are fighting there and the battlefield is the heart of man.

Father, we speak the truth about who we are apart from you. Paul summarizes our condition in Romans 3 using the truth found in the sacred writings of the Psalter and Prophets, There is no one righteo...

In his thoughtful book, Our Good Crisis: Overcoming Moral Chaos with the Beatitudes , Jonathan K. Dodson provides a wonderful analogy of what happens when we cultivate the virtues in our lives: W...

Every time your enemy fires a curse, you must fire a blessing, and so you are to bombard back and forth with this kind of artillery. The mother grace of all graces is Christian good-will.

In his classic fictional work on spiritual warfare, The Screwtape Letters , C. S. Lewis imagined a senior demon (Screwtape) corresponding with one of his protégés (his nephew Wormwood) as the latte...

Gracious God, you call us to draw near but we keep our distance. We are afraid of your direction and discipline, so we avoid honesty and confession. Father, help us trust in your goodness and your gra...

Forgiving God, too often we hear your call, think it over, and turn away.  We can be like Jonah, believing we know better the ways you should bless others. We run from Nineveh, preferring to keep en...

Heavenly Father We confess before you and before one another that we do not always trust your goodness. We are worried about losing control of our lives, and we are scared of what taking up our cros...

For most of us it takes a long time for the Spirit of freedom to cleanse us of the subtle urges to be admired for our studied goodness. It requires a strong sense of our redeemed selves to pass up the...

Badness is only spoiled goodness.

The story is told of a little girl who prayed, “Lord, make the bad people good and the good people nice.”

It’s easy to label what we consider “good things” in our lives as gifts from God and to welcome them with gratitude. But when difficult things happen, we don’t look at them as part of God’s good plan ...

Prayer of Confession All: Certainly God is good to his people, to those pure in heart, but as for me, I nearly stumbled; I nearly lost my sure footing. I struggle with envy as I look at the those in ...

Lord, your love is remarkable. Despite our ongoing sin, You have graciously pursued us, forgiven us, and saved us. We confess that sharing Your saving love is sometimes intimidating. Forgive us for be...

All-powerful God, overwhelmed by the sorrows and pains of the day, we are prone to doubting. We search for your goodness yet we cannot perceive it.  We long for your greatness but we disbelieve it.  H...

The great danger is to always single out some aspect of God’s good creation and identify it, rather than the alien intrusion of sin, as the villain. Such an error conceives of the good-evil dichotomy ...

How great and glorious You are, O God. There is no one like You. You transform our weakness into strength. You forgive our stubbornness and arrogance, and fill us with Your generous wisdom. You turn o...

Where love is the compelling power, there is no sense of strain or conflict or bondage in doing what is right: the man or woman who is compelled by Jesus' love and empowered by His Spirit does the...

Nothing shows up my badness like a concerted effort at goodness.