Some days I feel pretty good.  That sunrise sure did not hurt.  Just watching it explode with color was enough to bring some good feelings.

Some days I feel pretty good.  Some days I feel like I have great things to offer.  I feel like I’m making a difference.  I feel like I’m effective.

Some days I feel pretty good.   I’m making good decisions.  I have not really blown it in a big way (recently, anyway).  I’m doing pretty good and it makes me feel pretty good.

Some days I feel pretty good.  Let’s face it… I’m not all bad.  I can be pretty good.  I am pretty good.

Some days I feel pretty good.

This presents a problem for me.  Because the truth is, I am not good.

I am struggling to word this correctly.

I can force myself to be good for short periods of time.  I want to be honest.  It is a battle.  I have to force it.  I have to force it because I’m not good.

The moment I relax my grip on the wheel of my life I swerve (sometimes fast, sometimes slowly) right back to the ruts of the real me.  The bad me.  The bad Harley.

Sometimes I let go of the white knuckle grip on the wheel of my life in order to handle crisis, emergency, shock or negative surprise.  At that point, the same thing happens to the car but often worse.  My tires run off the edge of the road, into the ditch, into the brush, trees, other traffic.  It happens so quickly, the destruction so quickly.  I’m left looking around at the emotional upside-down cars of loved ones with tires still spinning slowly to a stop.  Steam rising from crumpled radiators.  Sod  and turf ripped through revealing formerly undisturbed deep earth.  Tiny bits of broken glass crunching under every step of others running to help.  Plastic molding strewn randomly.  I sit there, still in disbelief that I caused all of that.

I am still sitting there…

…because I’m not really good.

No one had to teach me how to be the bad Harley because that is the real me.  In fact, everywhere the Bible talks about the original sin of Adam and Eve it is speaking of the real me, my nature deep inside me.  No one ever taught me how to be bad.  It has always come natural for me.  Others have helped me, taught me to improve my bad.  But no person has made me bad.  It comes natural to me.

The real problem with me feeling pretty good (not feeling good emotionally, but feeling like I’m good, doing good) is that I begin to believe a lie that I am good and doing okay on my own.  If I try hard enough I can be good.  I can choose good.  I can do good because deep inside I am really good.  The more I believe that I have what it takes to keep the good Harley good and growing better, the more I depend on Harley.  Harley, and Harley alone (well… and maybe a wee-little help from God from time to time).

Do you see the problem?

If Harley is good (even just mostly good) then Harley doesn’t need God.   He might just need a little of God from time to time but certainly not all the time because he is pretty good.

Harley doesn’t need God and certainly doesn’t need the community of the church.  They may need the church but not Harley because he is pretty good. He is doing pretty good right now.  If Harley is pretty good, he doesn’t need God, doesn’t need Jesus, doesn’t need His death and sacrifice because Harley is pretty good most of the time.  Harley just needs to keep being pretty good and he can do that by just recognizing God and he can do that without the church.

Good Harley just needs to keep being pretty good.

Living a pretty good life is usually living a life with God in the margins.  Even if one uses his voice to proclaim God’s goodness… to “say” God is leading… to verbalize things about God… when one is living a pretty good life, the reality is God is not utmost but rather off to the side where God is placed on stand-by because someone is doing pretty good.

Think about this next statement.  I don’t believe God wants credit for our pretty good lives because to God our pretty good is no good.

If there is anything good in my life, anything at all, I must call it what it is… call it grace.

It is His grace and His mercy because I am not good.  God is good.

It is His amazing grace.  And I am dependent upon Him.  I am dependent, not separate, not independent.  I am dependent upon staying close to Him and living within the community of His creation called the church.  I am dependent and in constant need of His grace.

Today, if you try, you won’t have to search hard to find this truth throughout His scriptures.  This is not my truth.  This is His.  I encourage you to go find it.

Listen to this…

“Call It Grace”