You Can’t Over-Exaggerate the Goodness of God!

11-30-25

You Can’t Over-Exaggerate the Goodness of God!

Recently I have been around different people who seem to be living out being a victim of their hostile environment.
Watching them display actions that seem to be coming from and environment of pain and hopelessness. That seems to be rampant in our society.

Given the theme of Thanksgiving, and thinking towards our next major holiday – Christmas, I have just been thinking about the message of Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Easter combined.

Text: 1John 3:8, Isaiah 9:2, 6-7
Mat.4:16 “… the people who sat in darkness… Those who sat in
the region and shadow of death, LIGHT has dawned.”

This promise was written about 3,000 years ago, give or take a few hundred years.
And people today are still living in the land of the shadow of death.

What does the last part of ver.7 mean? “The zeal of the LORD of hosts …”

Why did Jesus come? 1 Jn.3:8
1Jo 3:8 “… that He might destroy the works of the devil.”

There is more access to hope today than in the last 3,000 years.
God’s Zeal is at work.

Can you imagine the celebration in Heaven when the perfect time had finally come to send Jesus to the earth to fulfill EVERY promise?
God’s plan of redemption cannot be halted.

And while my heart cries at seeing people living out 3rd generation of hopelessness, my heart gets excited about the fact portrayed in Scripture, that God is moving more today than when Isaiah prophesied.

Do you personally rub shoulders with people who seem to be living in the shadow of death and hopelessness? Then this Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter message should cause us to ramp up with excitement.

God is pouring out His Spirit out on all flesh, not because people deserve it, but because God sees each one who is living in the shadow of death as someone precious, and He sent you to be a part of His plan to see them come to hope.

You are a part of God’s zeal put into practice.

But a major problem I see is, we keep remembering the duck.

Story – Remember the Duck. - Tommy and Jenny go to spend a week with Grandma & Grandpa. Grandpa has made a sling shot for Tommy. On his way in for lunch, Grandma’s pet duck happens to cross his path, and he takes a random shot and kills it. Now he’s afraid, so he hides it, but Jenny sees what happens.
When lunch I over, Grandma asks Jenny to help her with the dishes, but Jenny tells Grandma that Tommy wants to help her instead, then leans over to Tommy and whispers, “remember the duck?”
This goes on meal after meal, with Jenny blackmailing Tommy, until Tommy has had enough. He goes to his Grandma and confesses killing her pet duck. “Will you ever forgive me Grandma?” “Of course I forgive you. I saw what happened from the kitchen window, and I forgave you before you even got to the house, but I was waiting to see how long you were going to let your sister control you by reminding you of what you had done.”

What does our duck represent? Our guilt, Our shame, Our failures, Our false identity, Our disappointments. Everyone of us have a duck story Satan uses to control us.

We get overwhelmed by guilt, shame, regret, disappointment.
Weights the enemy wants to attach to me and my personality.
Guilt that we take on as an identity.
Shame that wants to define me.
Jesus came to set me free from the law of sin and death.

Ro 8:1-2 “There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death.”

Joh 8:36 “Therefore if the Son makes you free, you shall be free indeed.”

Isa 61:7 “Instead of your shame you shall have double honor, And instead of confusion [you will possess a double portion of prosperity (NLT)]. Everlasting joy shall be theirs.”

I speak this over every memory that has been attached to our failures or sin.
I speak this to every fear you and I live with.
Every fear we don’t even know is in our heart.
I speak this to every doubt my heat ponders.

I speak this to every frustration my heart holds against God. (Why didn’t God heal my mom, the little girl with brain tumors, people I think deserved to be healed.)

Sometimes we are more impressed with the enemy’s power, then we are with God’s power. What’s up with that? Where does that come from?
From the enemy saying, “Remember the duck?”

What voice has captured my heart to meditate on?
The duck? Or God’s Promise? Which has more power?

It's impossible to exaggerate the goodness of God.
Let my heart become fixated on His goodness to me!
NOT fixated on the duck.