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We've all heard the phrase. I guess it had to be my mother that introduced me to the expression. When I was growing up, we had an in-ground pool for my first eleven years. In the summer, our house was the hang out for all the boys in the church. My closest friends and I would be so dark by the end of summer that we would look like our skin had been stained with wood stain. I can remember older people coming up to me and sticking their arms next to mine to compare tans and saying "I'm jealous; you've got a good tan." But inevitably each summer, it would happen. Someone would come for the first time, someone whose skin had not seen the sun before. Some really white person. And they would get out there having a good time playing "Marco Polo" and sliding down the slide and doing "cannon balls" off of the diving board. They would get so wrapped up in the summer fun that they would forget about sun screen, and forget about how fair their skin was. And then would come the end of the day and they would change into their street clothes only to find out that they were blistered! Their parents would call several days later to find out what they should do for the severe burns on their child. My mother would just shake her head and say "they had too much of a good thing."

Well, that phrase may be true when it comes to being in the sun, but it's not true with God. My Bible says that God alone truly gives good things. James said:

"Every" good thing and "Every" perfect gift is from God above! I want to remind you that it is God alone who truly gives "good things." And that if God has given something, then it is truly a "good thing." I've found out later that the reason that you have too much of the sun, is that "being in the sun" is not a good thing at all. It was fun for a moment for my fair-skinned friends, but the agony of the damage that they did to their pigmentation outlasted the fun! And even the years that I spent darkened by the sun with a "good tan," I've now found out were doing irreparable damage to my skin and when I am older I'll probably have skin cancer and melanoma and whatever else that they call that stuff. That "good tan" that was admired by all really wasn't "good" you see, because it was the bodies defense to the damage that I was doing to my outer layer by submitting it to the ultraviolet rays of the sun.

"What are you trying to say preacher?" I'm just trying to tell you that if you can look at something and say "that's just too much of a good thing;" If you can get too much of something so that it is bad for you; if something gives you temporary pleasure but has a hook, or a dark side, or in the end leaves you sorry, then it is NOT really a "good thing" at all! The reason that my mother was able to say about being in the sun too long "it was too much of a good thing" was because really being in the sun is not a good thing at all. If something is truly a "good thing" then you can never get "too much" of it!

But you can get too much of something that pretends to be a good thing and yet is doing damage to you. What is true about the sunburn in the natural is true about sin in the spiritual. Paul was writing to the church in Corinth about their boastful attitude. They were boastful because they thought that they were more spiritual than other people, and Paul said:

Sin is like yeast. A little bit affects your whole life. Sin is NOT a "good thing." The Bible states that there is a "pleasure of sin for a season." Sin is fun for a short little while. But it is not a good thing. Because after the season of pleasure is over, then there is a lifetime of heartache to reap the damage that has been done. Sin is NEVER a good thing. Because it has a hook. It has a dark side. It will always damage your life. It will kill your relationships. And it doesn't take a whole lot to affect your entire future and life. Sin is like the sun on a fair-skinned little boy. It may be fun at first, but there are many nights of anguish coming as a result of the few moments of pleasure. You can get too much of sin. In fact, a little bit is way too much.

Nothing illustrates this precious truth like the story of Moses. He was born to a Hebrew mother while Israel were slaves in Egypt. The Pharaoh was scared at the fast rate that the Israelites were having babies and had decreed for every new born male child to be slaughtered. Moses' mother had her baby at home by herself and took a basket that she lined with pitch to make it water proof and placing her baby into the Nile river decided to put her baby in the hands of a merciful God rather than the certain death to come by the soldiers of Egypt. God was in that decision because the Bible says that the Pharaoh's daughter was bathing down stream and noticed the little basket. She drew it up out of the water and decided to adopt the little lad. And so we find Moses living in the finest of palaces, being schooled by the finest teachers, eating the finest foods, and being treated like royalty even though he was a Hebrew boy who was supposed to have been killed. When God is on your side and you are obedient to His commands, there are going to be some "good things" happen in your life.

But there was a call of God on Moses life. And Moses hadn't been put in that palace to rule Egypt but rather to get ready to lead the people of God out of there and take them to a Promised Place! And so there came a day that Moses had to make a decision. He had to choose between the temporary pleasures of sin, or the lasting blessings of God. There were some so called "good things" happening in his life, but God had promised him much better good things, even though he had never seen them. It was decision time, but the Bible says that:

Moses knew that the palace and the royalty status and such looks like a "good thing" but it has a hook; it has a catch: to stay here is to not trust in God completely or to depend upon Him for my salvation. He knew that the pleasures of sin were for a season and so he had too much of that "good thing" which really was not a "good thing" at all. And so Moses chose to trust God for His promises rather than to keep living in a sinful lifestyle of temporary luxury.

Years later after Moses had led the children of Israel out of Egypt and had seen the miraculous hand of God in his life. They are finally standing on the edge of the Promised Place that God has for them. Moses' time of leadership is over and he is about to hand the reins over to Joshua to take the children of Israel into the Promised Land. The book of Deuteronomy is his farewell speech and toward the end he reminds God's people:

"God has promised you some mighty good things, and you will receive what He has promised! You will rejoice in them!" And sure enough they did! God had made lots of big promises. He had promised them houses that they did not build and vineyards that they did not plant. He said that the houses would not be empty but would be full of "good things" (Deut 6:11). He had promised them that the land would be so plentiful that it would be called the "land flowing with milk and honey." He had promised them peace with each other and protection from their enemies. He had promised to fight their battles for them and to drive out the giants that inhabited the land called theirs. Did God keep His promises? Yes, He did. In Joshua's farewell speech, he reminds the children of Israel in a very powerful scripture:

"There failed not ought of ANY good thing which the Lord had spoken...!" Somebody ought to write that on your mirror in the morning. I've come today to remind somebody that we serve a good God. He has your best interests in mind. And He is the purveyor of good gifts and good blessings. He has filled a book with promises of good things that He wants to give to you and I! And He will keep His promises! The writer of Hebrews called Jesus Christ the "High Priest of good things" (Hebrews 9:11). And if God gives us something then I want you to know that there is NO catch. There is no hook. There is no down side. There is no hidden detriment. If God calls something good, then it is completely and totally and fully good! Now, maybe you understand what Paul was saying in our text:

"It is good to be zealously and passionately affected and moved and involved in ALWAYS in a good thing!" What Paul was saying was if something is really from God. And if it is something that God has called a "good thing" then you can't have too much of it! Because there is no catch. There is no worry of "small print." His promises are "yea and amen." They mean what they say. There is no hidden agenda with God. He is good and He gives good blessings because of His goodness. He can't help Himself. Therefore if God has called something a "good thing" then you can't possibly get too much of it! With God, you can't have too much of a good thing!

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Now let me preach to you. If all that it is true -- and what I've preached to you so far is true because it's from the scriptures -- then what exactly are the "good things" of God? We don't want to label things ourselves as "good things" because we might make a mistake. But if God labels something as a "good thing," then we know that we can go overboard on that! That's something that we can be zealously affected ALWAYS with. It's the things that God labels as "good things" that we will never over do and get too much of for our own good.

So I did a little Bible searching and here are some things that God has labeled as "good things:"

1. Praise and Thanksgiving

In our other text, in Psalms somebody wrote:

It's a good thing to give thanks unto the Lord and to sing praises unto Him! Praise and Worship and Thanksgiving are a "good thing." You can't do it too much! You can't have enough of it! You will never reach a place where you don't need to praise Him! We are commanded to praise God according to His excellent greatness! We are commanded to praise Him with outward motions. We are to outwardly express our thankfulness and love and adoration to Him with emotion and with zeal! Praise is a good thing! You can't over do it! You can't be too zealous about praising God! Let me remind you that we are commanded to:

Praise God in Singing New Songs with LOUD music.

Praise God with outward motions. We find in scripture that people raised their hands to worship God and leaped and sang and clapped their hands and, yes, even danced before the Lord. Moreover, many of these scriptures command us to praise God this way. It is a command to:

If you've got breath in your body, you ought to praise God with everything in you! You ought to be free to clap your hands and lift your voice and shout and praise and dance and leap and worship Him! And it is okay and even commanded to use musical instruments such as drums and stringed instruments and such to praise Him! To do all of this the scriptures say "is a good thing!"

But some people treat praise as something that they are afraid of over doing. Some people treat praise as if it's going to hurt them or something. As if there is a catch or something. They'll really praise God all out four or five times a year, or if they just happen to be having a good day, but it's like they are really afraid to really let go and worship God with everything in them all the time!

But let me remind you: to give God praise and thanksgiving is a "good thing!" And you can't have too much of a good thing! All it's going to do is bring the glory of God into your life. It's going to push the pride and the condemnation away. When people will not praise the Lord openly and freely, it is usually because of either pride or condemnation. Either they think that they are too good to do such things or not good enough. Somebody needs to remember what the Psalmist said: "It is a good thing to give thanks unto the LORD, and to sing praises unto thy name!"

Let me just stay here for a little while longer and make one other point. The Psalm goes on to say:

It's a good thing to praise God in the morning and in the evening. I don't have time to go into it now, but the first thing on your lips every morning ought to be a praise. The last thing that you think about at night ought to be the goodness of God and a prayer of thanksgiving for Him having been faithful to you.

The Pulpit Commentary makes an interesting point about this verse. In scripture, the instruments of "ten strings" mentioned here was the most often used instrument at the temple worship services. Few people had such an instrument at home. In addition to this, most of the psalms have titles that illustrate the purpose of the psalm or further musical instruction. The title to the 92nd Psalm is "a song for the Sabbath day." "What are you trying to say, preacher?" The writer was writing not about individuals worshipping at home, but about coming to the house of God and worshiping God corporately. He was talking about coming to the house of God and worshipping with other believers. And in so doing, he says "it is a good thing!"

Some people act like too much church might hurt them. They can only handle a service here and there. It's like they are afraid of getting too much of a good thing. But if God has labeled it a good thing, then you can't get too much of it! You can't praise God too much and you can't come together with His people to praise Him too much! It won't hurt you, but it will help you. Don't come to church just every now and then and say "well, nothings changed in my life." If you make church going and active corporate worship a regular part of your life, it will forever change your life! And it will do so in a positive way! There is no catch! You can't over do it! You can't have too much church! You can't have too much worship! It's a good thing!

2. A proper relationship with your spouse

Maybe this one caught you by surprise, but it's truth. The scripture says:

Now the catch is that there is something implied in the Hebrew that doesn't translate well into English. It's not just getting married that is a good thing, but having a relationship with your spouse with God in the center of it. We've got to take scripture with scripture so don't anybody go run out and get married to the first person that you find. Remember that the scripture also says, twice no less:

Perhaps the Amplified will helpfully expound here:

So we know that the scripture is not instructing us to just get married just for the sake of getting married, but we want to make sure that we have the right one at the right time and all of that. So what does the scripture mean when it says that to find a wife is to find a "good thing?"

Other versions of scripture add stuff like "he who finds a true wife" (AMP) or a "good spouse" (The Message). What God is saying is that marriage was created to be a wonderful thing; a good thing.

I'm not too keen on jokes and humor and the viewpoint of "my old man" or "my old woman." Too many people view marriage as "a ball and chain." But if you view it that way, you have not had a marriage where Jesus Christ was the focus and the center of both spouses! When Jesus Christ gets involved in a marriage, He puts it back together and it becomes a "good thing!"

Husbands, you can't do too much to love your wife and to show her how much you care and to spend time with her. It's a good thing to strengthen your relationship and you can't have too much of it! If you feel like your wife is not your best friend, then you need to allow the Holy Ghost to change your relationship to what it is supposed to be! It is supposed to be a good thing!

Wives, you can't do too much appreciate your husband and to build him up with words of edification and praise. He wants to know that you appreciate him. But some of you think that you might over do it. You don't want to treat your husband too good because you are afraid that he will get used to it. You won't treat him right until you see a change. Maybe if you would go overboard in praise and love and attention he would change! To build your husband up and to not tear him down and to make him fell appreciated is a good thing. And you can't have too much of a good thing!

3. Obeying the Written Commandments of God's Word

I've got to hurry, because once again, I've bitten off more than I can chew in one sermon! But there was a rich, young ruler that came to Jesus:

We could preach an entire message about why Jesus replied like He did in verse 17. We know that Jesus was God and thus was good so why did He tell the young man "there is none good but one, that is, God?" It was because this young man had obviously asked this question before and of many people and was obviously trying to take the advice that he was getting and weigh it out before following it. Jesus cut through the religiosity by reminding him: "you're calling me good, but there is only one good, and that is God." In other words, "what I'm about to tell you is not just some good teacher's words that you can take or leave, but is the pure, truth of the Word of God!" Jesus was saying "realize who I am, boy!" "What I'm about to tell you is truth whether you accept it or not!"

The boy said "what good thing shall I do, that I may have eternal life?" And the good thing that Jesus replied with was "keep the commandments." He was talking about the commandments of God written in the Word of God.

Some people have this viewpoint that they will obey some of the Word of God -- the parts that are convenient or that they like -- but there are some parts that they would rather not obey. Maybe they don't see the point or the blessing. Maybe it would cause them a bit of sacrifice. But I want to remind you that to obey the Word of God is a good thing! And you can't get too much of a good thing! If God has commanded something either to do something or to NOT do something in His Word, then even if you don't understand it and even if you can't see it right now, understand that there will be a blessing if you obey it! God is good and everything that He has said is for our good! The Psalmist said it like this:

God will give all good things to them that walk as they are supposed to in this world. When you obey the Word of God and it's commandments, you are walking in such a way that God can bless you! He will be the "sun" shining light into your life and driving the storms away. He will be the "shield" in your life protecting you from things that are trying to destroy you. Even if you don't understand why it's a big deal to God, if God has commanded it then obey it because to do so is a "good thing!" And you can't be too overzealous about obeying the Word of God. You can't get "too good." You can't get "too blessed." Obey the Word of God and reap the blessings of those who do so. That is a good thing and you can't have too much of a good thing!

4. Jesus Christ

I wish I had time to preach to you as I feel. But the scriptures say when Philip went and told Nathanael that they had found the Messiah and that He was from Nazareth, Nathanael replied:

Yes, Nathanael, something good did come out of Nazareth! His name is Jesus and He is definitely a "good thing!" I could probably preach an entire message on that fact, but let me suffice to say that you can never have "too much Jesus." Our church has been accused of being "Jesus only" but really we are "Jesus everything" and that is not a fault because you can NEVER major on Jesus too much! You can never exalt Him too much! You can't elevate Him too high! He is Almighty God! You can't talk about Him too much! Why? Because He is a good thing and you can't have too much of a good thing!

Some of you are worried about whether or not we are a little overboard on this "Jesus thing." We pray to Jesus, we baptize in His name, we know that the scriptures teach that He is God in flesh and not another person of some mystical Godhead invented by men. We meet in the name of Jesus. We pray in the name of Jesus. We study His life. We believe that He still lives among and within the lives of men today. To you who are feeble minded in that manner: don't worry! Jesus is a good thing and you can't have enough of a good thing! It's impossible to over do lifting Him up!

5. Sound Apostolic doctrinal teaching and truths

The scriptures say:

We can never study Acts enough. We can never hear about the truth of baptism in the name of Jesus Christ too much. We can never hear about the truth of the baptism of the Holy Ghost too much. We should never get tired of "turning to Acts 2." It should never get old! This message of the mighty God in Christ should never be "old hat" to us. This message of the power of the saving Gospel of Jesus Christ and His ability to take unworthy sinners and cause them to be "born again" of the water and of the Spirit into a new life as sons and daughters of God and as join heirs of Christ: that message should never get old to you! To study the basics of this Apostolic way is a good thing! To be grounded in God's grace and redemption plan is a "good thing." You can't hear too many sermons on it. You can't study it too much in the Bible. It's a good thing, and you can't have too much of a good thing!

6. The Holy Spirit

I close with this. Jesus said in Luke:

We have a parallel verse in Matthew. Everything is the same except one phrase:

Matthew substituted "good things" for "the Holy Spirit." Contradiction in scripture? No, because the Holy Ghost is a good thing and brings nothing but "good things!" They are interchangeable terms!

The Holy Spirit refers to the one Spirit of God moving in and among men. Our praise ushers it in. Our family life allows it to stay throughout the week. It comes to help us to fully obey the Word of God. It is nothing more than Jesus in Spirit form in our bodies and lives. And our Apostolic message and doctrine enables the Holy Spirit to stay active in our church and lives. Simply put, it's all about letting God's Spirit transform us with power and with love and with purpose and with faith and with gifts!

The Holy Spirit is a "good thing" and if that is so, then we can't have too much of it! I know some preachers and churches that act like they are afraid of running out of the Holy Ghost, because they only allow it or expect it "to move every once in a while." Unfortunately, I know some people with the same viewpoint. But I'm here to remind you today that the Holy Ghost actively moving through and in your life is a good thing! And if it's a good thing, then we can NEVER have too much of it!

It's a simple thought but truth nonetheless: God has given us good things in abundance. And with God, you can't have too much of a good thing! "But it is good to be zealously affected always in a good thing" Let us so walk and live as to fulfill this scripture!