What Is Right

Doing what is right in our own eyes does not always manifest as evil.

In fact, many times what is right in our eyes can appear quite good. Obtaining a better job that increases financial freedom. Volunteering to serve in a ministry. Living in a neighborhood deemed safer for our kids. Getting married. Protecting those we love.

In and of themselves, none of these are evil. Desiring them is not sinful. But if they are not what God has asked us to do, then doing them is wrong.

Because we don't get to define what is right or wrong. That is the exclusive prerogative of God, and what He defines as right is obedience to Him. Obedience first to His commands as revealed in Scripture, then obedience to His Spirit's leading (which will always fit within the framework of the biblical commands). Anything else is disobedience and therefore wrong, no matter how good it seems.

It is a difficult lesson to live, as my heroine Yosi learns in Perplexity, because sometimes what is right in God's eyes doesn't seem good in ours. But when we follow Him in obedience, it will always lead to what is best.