Faithbase

We must be people who practice mercy. You see the word kindness right here is better in our culture understood as mercy. And if you've been in church any amount of time you've probably heard the definitions of grace and mercy. That grace is getting something we don't deserve. That when God gives us things that we do not deserve, when God gives us forgiveness, when God gives us meaning in this life, God gives us eternal life, when God gives us all these blessed wonderful things that we could never possibly earn, that there's not a one of us, especially me, that's righteous enough, that's powerful enough, that's gifted enough to ever earn those things, yet God gives it to us anyways. Why? Because he's gracious. Grace is getting things we don't deserve. You know what mercy is? Not getting what we do deserve. And we need to really camp on that sometimes. Because when we really camp on what it means to not get what we do deserve, we understand what our sin cost Jesus and what Jesus was willing to endure for you and for me. That everything that Jesus endured on the cross was rightly, justly, righteously due to me. I should have taken that. That should have been my pain, my hurt, my rejection. Why? Because it's my sin. It's my sin. I can't blame that on anybody else and I can't pass that off on anybody else. That punishment was due me. Yet what did Jesus do? He took it for us. In his mercy, he withheld the punishment that was due all of us. See, it's in the mercy of Jesus that we truly understand how much he loves us. What he was willing to sacrifice so that we could be in a right relationship with him. And listen, as a human race, generally, the general mercy of God has been shown to all of humanity. Because when Adam sinned in the garden, would God have been just, would God have been righteous to completely wipe Adam and Eve off the planet? He could have. In Noah's age, did God show mercy to Noah? You know, Genesis says that, and again, we mistranslate this word perfect. It says that Noah was perfect. You know what a better translation that word is? It means mature. See, not even Noah and his family was sinless. Not even Noah and his family were completely righteous before the Lord. God would have been absolutely right and just to wipe off every single person off this planet. And God would be righteous and just to do it today. Because there's not a person on this planet today that hasn't sinned against his holiness. God would be righteous to wipe us all away. Yet he doesn't. Why? Because he is full of grace and what, church? Mercy. Because of his mercy, he lets us breathe another breath. Because of his mercy, he lets us wake up in another year. Because of his mercy, he lets us experience another day. That is all due to his mercy. Every single person on this planet should be grateful for the mercy of God when they wake up in the morning. Specifically, God has shown his mercy on our lives through what Christ did on the cross. Again, what Jesus took on the cross was due me. I can't blame anybody else. I can't follow Adam's example. I can't follow Eve's example. I can't follow anybody else's example that wants to blame herself to somebody else. Every single sin of mine is my responsibility to bear. Yet God showed unbelievable, unfathomable mercy to me and took my sins on the cross. And in his grace, gave me forgiveness, gave me mercy, gave me purpose. You know what else he gave me? A wonderful wife, a wonderful, wonderful kids, a wonderful church, a wonderful—everything we got, folks. There ain't nothing on the list. If you count these many blessings, name them one by one, count these many blessings, see what God has done. That ain't purely because of his grace and his mercy. Every one of them. See, we've experienced his specific, his individual mercy, and here's the reason that I've camped on that, folks. That it is now required of us to extend that to other people. It is the epitome of hypocrisy for me to accept God's mercy, for me to accept the fact that he took my punishment for me, and I accept his mercy, and be so unbelievably arrogant and rebellious that I won't extend that same mercy to others. It's the epitome of hypocrisy for us as believers not to extend mercy to other people and say that we accept God's mercy. Now, that goes against everything our nature tells us, and it goes against everything our culture tells us. Our culture loves to quote an eye for an eye, don't they? An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. You hit me, I'm gonna hit you back. What did Jesus say in Matthew chapter 5? Twice. Twice in one chapter, what did Jesus say? He says at the beginning of Matthew chapter 5, blessed are the merciful because they'll be shown what? Mercy. Listen, folks, if you want to experience mercy in this life, be a distributor of it. Because we do reap what we sow. Forget that financial garbage that you hear from the prosperity preachers. It's about grace and mercy is what it is. When we sow mercy into other people's lives, guess what we're gonna receive in those times where we're arrogant and we're rebellious and we sin against others. What have we now sowed in others? Mercy. See, blessed are the merciful. Blessed are us when we extend mercy to other people, when we sow mercy into other people, because now what we've done is we've sown that into them so when the time comes when we need it, they'll show mercy to us. But then later, he says in verses 38 through 42, he said, yeah, I know you've heard an eye for an eye. I know you've heard a tooth for a tooth, but here's what the gospel says, that when somebody in your church, somebody in your family, somebody at work, when somebody insults you, when somebody hurts you, turn the other cheek. Do not repay evil for evil, but repay evil with what church? Good. You know what that word good actually means? The word righteous. The very first thing that we saw, that when somebody hurts us, somebody speaks ill against us, when somebody does us wrong, it is our sinful nature and it is our culture that tells us, get back at them. Make them feel it. But it is the gospel that teaches us, show mercy. Show them the same mercy that Jesus showed you. Now let me ask you, is that easy? No. If it was easy, the world would do it. Letting our emotions guide our decisions is easy. Being a hothead, having a short fuse, all that stuff, that's easy. Little children do it. You know what's hard? You know what's mature? You know what's the sign of a real believer? Being in control of your emotions and extending mercy to those that have hurt you, because that's hard. That's tough. But that's what the gospel has called us to do. The gospel has called us to be people who practice mercy, because it's one of the most Christ-like things that we can do. The way that Jesus showed mercy to us is a way that we are to show mercy to others.