What does it mean to be a good person?
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What does it mean to be a good person? That’s a question that sounds simple enough until you really start thinking about it. After all, most of us probably consider ourselves good people. We try to do the right things, avoid doing the wrong things, and generally behave ourselves. At least when someone’s watching.
But what actually makes someone good? Is it honesty? Generosity? Compassion? Treating other people with respect? Is it doing what’s right even when nobody’s watching, or when doing the right thing comes at a personal cost? I’d suggest it’s all of those things, and probably a few more.
As a Christian, I believe the Gospel provides a pretty clear blueprint for how we should live. We’re called to love our neighbors, forgive those who wrong us, serve others, care for those in need, and treat people the way we’d want to be treated. Jesus even tells us to love our enemies, which is considerably harder than loving the neighbor who occasionally borrows our lawn mower and actually returns it.
But here’s something I’ve learned over the years: Being a Christian doesn’t automatically make someone a good person, and not being a Christian doesn’t automatically make someone a bad one.
I’ve been cheated by people who professed to be Christians. I’ve also been treated with extraordinary kindness and generosity by people who made no such profession. That’s not to suggest that Christians are dishonest or that non-Christians are somehow morally superior. Neither statement would be true. But it does demonstrate that a person’s religious identity doesn’t necessarily tell us how that person will treat others.
And that ought to bother those of us who call ourselves Christians.
If we’re genuinely following the teachings of Christ, shouldn’t that be reflected in how we live? Shouldn’t people experience kindness, compassion, honesty, humility, and generosity when they interact with us? The Gospel doesn’t merely encourage those qualities. It commands us to practice them.
Unfortunately, we have a remarkable talent for getting in our own way.
Jesus tells us to love our neighbors, and we immediately start looking for exceptions. He tells us to forgive, but we’d rather hold a grudge. He tells us to serve others, but we want to know what’s in it for us. He tells us to love our enemies, and sometimes we have trouble being civil to the person who took the last parking space.
Our selfishness, pride, resentment, and self-interest have a way of undermining the very Gospel we claim to follow. And sometimes we’re so convinced of our own righteousness that we don’t even recognize what we’re doing.
Christianity shouldn’t be for show. It shouldn’t be a costume we put on Sunday morning and hang back in the closet when we get home. It should flow naturally out of who we are and, more importantly, whose we are. It should be a minute-by-minute, day-by-day, year-by-year reality that influences everything from how we treat our spouses and children to how we respond to the stranger who cuts us off in traffic.
James 1:22 tells us, “But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves.” It’s a straightforward reminder that knowing what’s right and actually doing it are two very different things.
Of course, none of us gets it right all the time. I certainly don’t. I lose my patience, say things I shouldn’t, and occasionally let my own interests take precedence over the needs of others. Being a Christian doesn’t make me perfect, and I don’t expect perfection from anyone else. But when we fall short, we should be willing to acknowledge it, make things right when we can, and try to do better.
There’s also an important distinction between being a good person and being saved. Christianity teaches that salvation comes through God’s grace, not because we’ve managed to accumulate enough good deeds to earn our way into heaven. Our good works should be the result of our faith, not an attempt to purchase God’s favor.
So what does it mean to be a good person? I think it means treating others with honesty, kindness, generosity, compassion, and respect, even when there’s nothing to gain from doing so. It means doing what’s right when doing what’s wrong would be easier. It means recognizing our own shortcomings instead of spending all our time pointing out everyone else’s.
And for those of us who call ourselves Christians, it means recognizing that our faith should be visible in the way we live, not merely audible in the things we say.
After all, if the only people who know I’m a Christian are the people who see me sitting in church on Sunday morning, perhaps I need to spend a little more time examining how I’m living the other six days of the week.
Being a good person isn’t about convincing everyone else that we’re good.
It’s about living in such a way that we don’t have to.
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Copyright © 2026 Doug DeBolt.
