The Good Life

What is the good life? How do we know when we've arrived?

In our social media-saturated world, the answers seem obvious. Wealth. Influence. Beauty. Power. A bigger house, a more attractive spouse, an expensive car. If only we had just a little bit more of something, then we'd finally have it—the good life we've been chasing.

But here's the uncomfortable truth: so much of what we see as "the good life" is actually staged.

The Illusion of the Good Life
Have you heard of content houses? These are homes in places like Los Angeles that are purchased specifically as staging grounds for social media influencers. People rent time to film videos using someone else's mansion, someone else's cars, someone else's lifestyle. They create the illusion of the good life they could never actually afford.

In 2020, billionaire Rihanna purchased a mansion and branded it as the Fenty Beauty home, inviting influencers to move in and create content using her products. The pool, the furniture, the landscaping, the products—everything was staged. The influencers themselves could never afford a mansion like that on their own.

The good life belonged to Rihanna. But you could borrow it for a price.

If we're honest with ourselves, we know this. We know deep down that wealth doesn't actually bring happiness. We know that influence and beauty fade with time. We know that power comes and goes. And yet something inside us still longs for it.

A Longing Placed by God
Here's the surprising part: that longing for the good life is actually given to us by God. Though it gets corrupted and deceived and pointed in all kinds of wrong directions, the desire itself is from God.

And there's good news: there is only one good life, and it's available to you and me.

The entire book of Hebrews points to this one life—the life Jesus lived. He is our sufficiency, our great high priest, our hope, our confidence. His life is the only truly good life. And we get access to it through faith in Jesus.

You don't have to be on an exclusive list. You don't need enough influence. You can't pay for it—in fact, the good life can't be bought. The good life is a gift of God's grace, and it's free.

How We Access the Good Life
The benediction at the end of Hebrews 13 tells us how: "May the God of peace, who through the blood of the eternal covenant brought back from the dead our Lord Jesus, the great shepherd of the sheep, equip you with everything good for doing his will, and may he work in us what is pleasing to him through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen."

Access comes through grace—receiving the offer God has given us. It comes through the blood of the eternal covenant, the blood that was foreshadowed from the beginning, pointing to the Lamb of God who would take away the sins of the world.

The only way we could receive this gift is through someone who overcame death. And only Jesus Christ overcame death.

What can bring dead sinners to life? Only the resurrecting power of God. Like influencers who don't have what it takes to afford the mansion on their own, we don't have what it takes to get all that God has for us. It has to be given to us.

God is not bringing good people into the good life. He's bringing dead people into the good life. People who have turned from God, who have done their own thing, who have sinned. And it's only people like us whom God invites into His good life.

Living the Good Life
Once we have access to the good life through grace, we can actually live it out. Not to earn God's acceptance—we already have it. But because we've been given access, we respond with thankful lives.

The good life is a life of persevering love. It means keeping on loving one another as brothers and sisters, not forgetting to show hospitality to strangers. This is both Philadelphia (brotherly love) and philoxenia (love of strangers). It means loving people outside our party, our neighborhood, our church, our culture.

The good life is a life of faithful contentment. It honors marriage and keeps the marriage bed pure. It keeps our lives free from the love of money and finds contentment in what we have. Why? Because God has promised, "Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you." The Lord is our helper—what can mere mortals do to us?

The good life is empowered by grace. We're strengthened not by rules and regulations, but by grace. Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever. His grace hasn't changed, and He won't suddenly add requirements to the gospel.

The good life is a life of courageous hope. We don't live for this world. As Hebrews reminds us, "Here we do not have an enduring city, but we are looking for the city that is to come." This hope gives us courage to serve others, even when it means suffering. We can love our kids when it means pain for us. We can serve difficult people. Why? Because we have courageous hope.

The good life is a life of sacrificial generosity. Through Jesus, we continually offer to God a sacrifice of praise. We don't forget to do good and share with others, for with such sacrifices God is pleased. This is counterintuitive in a world that says "you do you" and "keep yourself good." But Jesus says the good life is giving your life away.

The good life is a life of prayerful dependence. We're not called to independence; we're called to dependence on God for everything. That means calling out to God in prayer. If you feel needy, you're close to the kingdom of God. The good life is living in prayerful dependence on God.

The Reality Check
The good life isn't lived in a perfectly staged mansion. It's lived in the nitty-gritty of real life—in moments of heartache and disappointment, separation and loss, and yes, in moments of celebration too. It's in the everyday struggles and homework assignments and work deadlines that we really experience God's grace and the good life.

The good life belongs to Jesus, and He invites us in. There's room for everybody who's a nobody. All we have to do is knock on the door. That's faith—saying, "Let me in, please." And Jesus says, "Come on in. There's plenty of room."

Grace be with you all.