God is Light and in Him there is no darkness at all. He wants His children to dwell perfectly in Light as well.
This is because we can acquire the spiritual authority to dispel darkness and derive love and blessings from God to the extent that we cast away sins and accomplish goodness in us. By meditating on the following questions, you can check how much goodness you have cultivated in you and how well you dwell in Light.
"Am I accustomed to giving or to receiving?"
Acts 20:35 reads, "…remember the words of the Lord Jesus, that He Himself said, 'It is more blessed to give than to receive.'" The things we 'give' or 'receive' include all our truthful deeds that require time and efforts as well as money.
Suppose many people received financial aid from church. Some of them manage their Christian life diligently, constantly say thanks, show deeds of thanksgiving, and even help those in need later to repay the grace they received. On the other hand, there are others who express their gratitude, but they themselves do not practice the goodness they benefited from. They know that helping the poor is one of the deeds that belong to goodness but they just expect others to do such deeds of goodness without acting upon it themselves. Still others work faithfully and volunteer to pay back the grace, but they stop it at some point in the middle. They even forget about a desire to repay the grace when a lack of agreement occurs in the relationship with others.
Let's take another case for example; when a group has a meeting. Some come early to the meeting, prepare for it before others come to make it go well, and check preparations diligently. If they are in the situation where they cannot come early and make preparations, they feel ashamed and try not to do the same later. Others, however, are habitually late for meetings. Even if they are not late they come to the meeting after others have finished pre-meeting preparations. They have made a habit of receiving benefits from others' service.
Here is another instance. Some of you may enjoy helping the poor or giving presents, and you like to serve others even when you don't have to. However, if they fail to thank you, some people may think they do not know the duty of men or consider them to be arrogant and rude. Acting like this implies that you have set a price for your service. God does not deem such deeds as 'good'.
The goodness or the heart of spirit acknowledged by God simply gives others what they want and comforts their hearts. God does not stop giving after He gives once, but He desires to give the best things again and again to us. We must also take pleasure in giving more than receiving, just as God does, without thinking, 'I've served him once and that's enough.'
"Do I understand others and put myself in their shoes?"
Many Christians ask God to allow for them to achieve a form of goodness such as a serving heart or a heart of sacrifice. But, in reality they lack understanding or acceptance of someone whose behavior does not meet their expectations of benefit.
For example, suppose that a church worker has been working together with you but he is about to go home in the middle of the work. Now, if you understand him in goodness thinking he may have some reason, you will not feel troubled. You can just work more earnestly so that the work can be completed well.
But some people think, 'I'm also busy and have things to do. Wasn't this planned for in advance? Does she really have to go now?' Or they might judge her thinking she is selfish. Or, they might think they will ask her to fill-in for them for the same period of time she was absent from work when they have volunteer work to do later. Then, their volunteer works cannot be offered up to God as the fragrance of goodness. It occurs to them because they do not cultivate the word of goodness in their hearts and accumulate it as just knowledge.
If you apply the standard of goodness to others, but not to yourself, it could happen that you mistakenly think you are good and righteous. You might think you are achieving goodness because you invest time working for God's kingdom even in the middle of your busy schedule. Then, what if you had been admonished for it when you were about to leave early in the middle of the work? You may have felt hurt thinking, 'Does he have to say that? I am already embarrassed about having to leave early. He should thank me because I worked so hard for this long.' You might be offended and might think you are right.
When we think of our own viewpoint and benefit, we cannot achieve spiritual goodness. Men of goodness always think from the position of others. That way we will not choose the easier or better way for us, but we will find ways to make others feel at ease and become the source of glory to God.
"How well do I serve my superiors in accordance with the system of order?"
Some people do not serve their superiors with their hearts and do not obey within the system. Nevertheless, if their subordinates do not serve them properly, they feel uncomfortable saying they 'undermine the order of things'! Because such people have arrogance they feel discomfort with people who do not serve them as they see fit.
Let's say a project is going on in your office. A subordinate makes a report to your superior without reporting to you. You might feel uncomfortable and think, 'Why hasn't he reported about it to me? Why hasn't he asked for my opinion?' But people who think like it usually do not follow the order themselves. When superiors command them to do something, if things do not agree with their hearts, they complain and feel agitated with all kinds of thoughts.
Every organization or group has its order, and each individual has his own tasks. However, there can be different situations: where they have to just understand and harbor subordinates, and where they have to correct their mistakes in kindness to allow for the order to be well kept. That is, it is not always spiritual goodness to unconditionally understand and embrace a subordinate who violates the group's order.
What do we have to do to discern such cases in the truth and choose what is pleasing to God all the time? We must cast away a desire to dominate others, to become the head, to be served, and to receive recognition and also get rid of self-esteem. We then can distinguish the case that requires us to understand and encompass juniors with deficiencies from the case that needs our intervention and training for them to maintain the system's order. Also, we can wisely discern between the cases where we have to just obey a superior and we have to accept subordinates' opinion and make suggestions to the superior.
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