Learn to do good; seek justice, rebuke the oppressor; defend the fatherless, plead for the widow — Isaiah 1:17
“I don’t smoke and I don’t chew, and I don’t go with girls who do” is an old adage that many people seem to think is an apt definition of the Christian life. We are the people who don’t do this and don’t do that. It is true there are things God has told us to refrain from, things we are not to do. But if that is how we approach the Christian life, we will encounter only a sense of bondage rather than the joy of liberty.
It is all the things we “do do” (sorry, couldn’t resist) that keep the Christian life filled with passion and excitement. It’s not just learning not to do bad, but it’s learning to do good. Look at the series of verbs used here by Isaiah: learn, seek, rebuke, defend, plead. This certainly does not describe an empty life governed by a list of “I can’t, I’m a Christian” prohibitions. Only learning not to do bad and not learning to do good, I believe, is one of the leading causes of succumbing to the pressures of the world, especially for young people.
We must consider the lives of those we revere in Scripture. These were all people of action—not inaction. Take, for example, one of the best-known Bible heroes, King David. A mighty warrior for God, David took action, though he was but a youth, when the entire army of Israel was being intimidated by Goliath (1 Samuel 17). This was David’s greatest victory.
There is, however, another famous story about David, but this one tells of his greatest defeat: his sin with Bathsheba. In 2 Samuel 11:1, the Bible says, “It happened in the spring of the year, at the time when kings go out to battle, that David sent Joab and his servants with him, and all Israel; and they destroyed the people of Ammon and besieged Rabbah. But David remained at Jerusalem.” David fell into sin when he was “not doing.” He was the king, but at the time of year when kings were supposed to go out to battle, he did not go. He stayed behind and let others go, and though he was not physically present on the battlefield, he was the one who fell.
When David was on the battlefield as a boy and Goliath was challenging the army of the Lord, David’s older brother said to him, “What are you going to do, you prideful little wimp?” (loose paraphrase of 1 Sam. 17:28–29). David replied boldly, “Is there not a cause?”
Do you have a cause that you are acting on, or is your Christian life merely a list of things you don’t do? Don’t set yourself up for a fall, but live a life that is full with reaching out to others. Take up a cause for the widows or the unborn. Rebuke those who oppress, and care for the orphans. After all, doesn’t Jesus divide the sheep and goats by what they did as well as by what they did not do? The Christian life is one of doing and not doing. Both are required if we want a life that is rich and full. Learn to do good—not just not to do bad. It will keep you from living a life bound to nothing but “thou shalt not”!
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