It Happens Both Ways

 

 

Bad things happen to good people

And good things happen to the bad,

Neither appears to be just and fair

And thus, neither makes us glad.

 

Bad things should happen to bad people

That’s the way we generally feel,

That is the working out of justice

We all consider that to be ideal.

 

Good things should happen to good people

How we wish it would always be so!

That for us would be utopia

And good would be the way to go.

 

Hey, but bad things happen to bad people

Isn’t this what we desire?

As a matter of fact this is true

But only the bad should face that fire.

 

Good things should only happen to good people

Never the bad or the contrary,

This is what is considered fair

 And this, even the bad should see.

 

 

Jesus was good, wasn’t he?

Yet he experienced the ultimate bad-

Death on a cross for you and me,

Don’t you also consider that sad?

 

You and I were the bad

From it we derived the ultimate good,

The righteousness of Christ imputed to us

The good did for the bad what the bad never could,

 

Salvation came to the bad not the good

For the good has no such need,

Christ came not to save the righteous

But it is for sinners that he pleads.

 

None of us is good, no not one

Yet Christ is the good that happened to us,

Was it not for the bad the good had died?

Yes!  The only good is Jesus.

 

 

It happens both ways I do need to repeat

It is the hope for the sinner man,

The goodness of God reaching down to all

The murderer, the thief, the damned.

 

If good things only happened to the good

Not a single soul could have been saved,

For sin had corrupted the human race

And such influenced the way we behaved.

 

But one day good came down to earth

And transformed the penitent bad,

I can testify of that experience

And now I am eternally glad.

 

Stewart Russell (c) August 2019