Can Unbelievers Do Good Works? | Can Unbelievers Please God? (Good Deeds Do Not Save Anyone)
Would you like to grasp a greater understanding of what pleases God from the Scriptures? If so, consider listening to the following sermons delivered by Dr. Caldwell:
The Character Of The Natural Man: https://youtu.be/g56d2_2_aAw
The Character Of Lost Humanity: https://youtu.be/kwsLkscXg6M
Damning Righteousness: https://youtu.be/G2Dd42gcXEQ
A Warning About Self-Deception: https://youtu.be/tu0FjCPFTlg
The Life That Pleases God: https://youtu.be/dAZYzeioh5s
The Faith That Worships God: https://youtu.be/M8vdPxd24pw
The Way To The Righteousness That God Will Receive: https://youtu.be/tVUnKCfdRwA
Through Faith In Jesus Christ: https://youtu.be/GyZbcP1deS4
The Fleshly Mind & The Law Of God: https://youtu.be/578UyQxEd90
Responsible & Helpless: https://youtu.be/yPVzFbrK3QY
Proving Our Profession – Love: https://youtu.be/YikmVBEyc9c
Loving By God’s Standard: https://youtu.be/VgZXfiNCm8U
The New Creation And The New Life: https://youtu.be/hkUEJaakFBk
God’s Workmanship: https://youtu.be/d0vPscXDBYU
Can unbelievers please God in any good that they do? Do random acts of kindness by unbelievers earn merit or favor with God? Can true goodness exist in people who are not motivated by or connected to the saving work of Jesus Christ?
This week on the Straight Truth Podcast, Dr. Josh Philpot shares that Paul says in the book of Romans that there is none righteous, no not one; there is none that does good. Dr. Philpot also says that Paul says in the book of Titus that unbelievers are not fit for any good work. But this sort of flies in the face of our experience and understanding. We can look around and see numerous unbelieving people who do some seemingly good deeds. Dr. Philpot asks Dr. Richard Caldwell to help us understand this. How can we distinguish the works (good deeds) of unbelievers versus those that are the fruit of the Spirit done by true believers of Christ?
Dr. Caldwell says that good works in believers are those wrought by God and explained by God. Good works are impossible apart from God and apart from salvation. We are all born into this world spiritually dead, sinners estranged from God. Therefore, the only abilities and capacities we humans have are those explained by our human nature since the fall. Dr. Caldwell says for something to be good, it has to be aimed at the glory of God, the honor of God; it needs to be something that pleases God. But as the book of Hebrews tells us, without faith, it is impossible to please God. Human beings who are estranged from God without Christ are incapable of that good. All our good works without salvation fall short of the glory of God. So when Paul speaks of no one doing good in Romans 3:12, he is not speaking in terms of our human concept of the word good, but of God’s standard.
We can look around us and see many people who do things we would applaud as virtuous, sacrificial, and even heroic. Yet Romans 8:8 tells us that those who are in the flesh cannot please God. So then, for something to be good in the sense of pleasing God, it will only be those works that are explained by union with Jesus Christ, by the new birth, by being made a new creation. In this sense, lost humanity is not capable of any good. What they do, is not done in fellowship of God, for the glory of God, or out of their union with Jesus Christ; they do not possess new life. Here is the distinction.
So then, the good works or deeds we witness or hear of in the world being done by unbelievers are not good according to God’s definition of good. Many of these, for sure, seem to go beyond, and might even be considered extreme, acts of common civility/good. But they are, still, only the best temporal acts that fallen man can do in this world. The only good that is real and untainted comes from God. He offers us a gift of permanent good through the saving work accomplished by Christ himself. Even after being saved as regenerate people, the good works that we do fall short and are not perfect. They are still tainted, in some respect, by our remaining sinfulness. They do not measure up to the absolute holy standard of God. They are, however, assessed by our union with Jesus Christ and are rewardable. But the good works or deeds done by unbelievers are not done in reference to God; they are not done for Him and do not merit salvation. Christ is the one who did the work necessary to save us. Practical righteousness is what flows out of our lives as believers, and it comes from the saving work of Christ in our life. Any work that is absent of God, no matter how good it is, falls short of the standard of true goodness.
Having shared all this, Dr. Caldwell says we don’t need to change our vocabulary and discontinue our use of the word good. Instead, we need to recognize and remember that good words, good behaviors, good actions, good works, and good deeds do not save anyone. Every lost person, including children, needs the new birth.
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