Mighty, Yet Merciful!

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Well, we come again tonight to the character of God. I don't know about you, but I really appreciate, in this sort of litigious society in which we live, all the warning labels. Some of them are downright funny. For example, maybe you saw the one, if you purchased an iron recently, that says in the information package you get with your iron for your clothes, "Caution! Do not iron clothes while they are on your body." Now I'm not going to ask how many of you have ever tried to iron clothes while they're on your body. I'm certainly not one of them. Another favorite of mine is, in southern California we often—because there were so many sunny days, and it was just so hot—we often put sun visors in the front windshield of the car. And a number of the visors that you'd put in front to shield the car while it was parked—and it was kind of an accordion. You'd fold it up and stick it away when you were ready to drive. A number of them said on the back side (that you could see when you got in your car to crank it up), in huge letters, "Caution! Do not attempt to drive car with shield in place." I'm wondering how many people really have ever tried to drive their car with the shield in place. Another one that's pretty interesting and is probably actually important is, you're sitting in the driver's seat and you look over at the driver's side window, and in small print down there, usually engraved in the mirror, it says, "Caution! Objects are closer than they appear." Now that's actually a pretty good caution, because it is somewhat confusing, it can mess up your perspective.

As I thought about that mirror in my car (that's probably on yours as well), I thought, you know what, there are a lot of times in our spiritual lives when our perspective can be just as easily scrambled. Things that are small somehow come to look large, and things that are large somehow come to look small. Things that should be important to us, in fact, aren't, and things that really aren't that important at all loom large in our vision as if they were everything.

The Pharisees were experts at this. Turn to Matthew 23. Let me show you one of the things that Christ says to them. This chapter, chapter 23, is a fascinating one, because Christ begins, in the first 12 verses, teaching His disciples what not to do. He uses the Pharisees and as sort of a negative example and says whatever you do, don't be like them. But beginning in Matthew 23:13 and down through the rest of the chapter, Christ turns to the Pharisees and speaks to them directly. Now you have to understand the scenario here. It's the Passion Week, the last week of our Lord's life. It's Tuesday of the Passion Week. Christ has essentially taken over the temple compound during the celebration of Passover, Passover Week. He, of course, will be killed at the end of the week. But on Tuesday of that week He holds court, as it were, in the absolutely jam-packed temple grounds. People there from all over the world, certainly all over Israel, for the feast of Passover. He teaches His disciples, and the crowd listens in, were told. But then, shockingly, on their own turf, as it were, Christ turns to the Pharisees, those rulers of Israel, and He begins to unload with all guns blazing.

One of the ones that fascinates me though is (what I was talking about earlier) how the Pharisees managed to ignore the warning in the mirror that says things are larger than they appear. But they got it the other way around: warning things are smaller than you think they are. Notice what Christ says to them. Verse 23, "Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint and dill and cumin." These are garden herbs. They were so fastidious as to tithe their herbs. I mentioned this a while back, and Gary told me we still hadn't gotten any parsley in the slots in the back wall. And I appreciate that. But they did; they tithed mint, dill and cumin. But watch this: "You... have neglected the weightier provisions of the law." Your perspective is all messed up. Those things that are not that important loom huge to you, and those things that really are important, you just don't get it at all. And notice what He says: "Justice and mercy and faithfulness… these are the things you should have done without neglecting the others." He said these are the weighty provisions of the law. You and I are to be merciful. It's extremely important to God, and the reason it's important to God is because it's a reflection of who He is.

Tonight we're examining the attribute of God that is most often referred to as His mercy. I put this picture up on the screen of this incredible tornado and this building in the Midwest that's about to be sucked into it (You can see pieces flying off of it. A photographer caught it just in the middle of being twisted to pieces.), because I am struck with the contrast in Scripture. God is portrayed as a violent storm, a whirlwind or tornado. He's portrayed as mighty, and yet at the same time, Christ says a smoking wick He will not extinguish. That's why I've entitled our discussion of mercy tonight "Mighty Yet Merciful." Our God is an amazing contrast: a violent storm that won't extinguish a wick; that is, that won't extinguish the least of His children.

Let's look at what this means when we talk about God being a God of mercy. Several definitions I would give you. When you look at this, basically, mercy is God's disposition to relieve the misery of fallen creatures. In both Greek and Hebrew the words have a strong emotional content. God, as it were, is deeply moved. Here are a couple of the definitions that I like that are offered. Louis Berkhof, in his Systematic Theology, says, "It is the goodness of God shown to those who are in misery or distress, regardless or irrespective of their desserts." Doesn't matter what they deserve, God is good to those who are in misery and distress. Tozer writes, "It is an infinite and inexhaustible energy within the divine nature which disposes God to be actively compassionate." Frame, in his book on The Doctrine of God, writes, "It is a sympathetic view of another's distress motivating helpful action." Now I put this on there, because there are a couple of elements there that are important. One is sympathy. But compassion or mercy in God is more than sympathy. It involves a motion, a movement to help, to relieve that distress.

There are very similar words that are used in Scripture that we sometimes get confused, the words grace, mercy and patience. Let me differentiate those for you as we begin our study of mercy tonight. Grace is God's goodness to those who deserve only punishment. Patience is God's goodness to those who sin, in withholding for a time the punishment they deserve. Mercy is God's goodness to those in misery and distress. Let's look at it together. By the way, those words often occur together. For example, Psalm 103:8 and a number of references throughout the Old Testament have all of those concepts woven together, because all of them (as we saw last week) are an expression of the goodness of God. You see, there's a common misconception that the God of the Old Testament was a God of justice and wrath, and that Christ is a God of mercy. That's absolutely wrong. The truth is, the Old Testament has more to say about God's mercy than the New Testament.

Now the primary word groups—if you want to study this more on your own—the primary word groups that contain this concept of mercy are two: the words mercy, merciful, extending or showing mercy; and compassion. Those are the words, primarily, that wrap up this concept. Let me show you that the Scriptures are eager to describe God in this way. Turn back to a passage we've looked at several times, Exodus 33. And I won't set the scenario for you again, because we've done that before. But just to remind you that this is immediately following the golden calf. Moses asked for God to show him who He is. And Exodus 33:19, God says, "I Myself will make all My goodness pass before you, and will proclaim the name of the Lord before you, and I will be gracious [on] whom I will be gracious, and will show compassion on whom I will show compassion." Now we'll come back to that a little later tonight. But I want you to skip down, then, to how God reveals Himself in 34:6. "[So] the Lord passed by in front of him and proclaimed, '[Yahweh, Yahweh Elohim], compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in lovingkindness and truth.'" Compassionate. God says this is how I want to be known: a God who is filled with mercy and compassion.

There are a number of other references we can look at, and we will in just a moment. But I think the most graphic illustration, to help you understand what mercy really is, is an illustration that God Himself uses. We don't even need to turn there, because you're very familiar with it. I touched on it several weeks ago on a Sunday night. It's found in Psalm 103. In Psalm 103:13, God says through the pen of the psalmist, "Just as a father has compassion on his children, so the Lord has compassion on those [that] fear Him." You want to know what mercy looks like, what compassion looks like? There's an illustration of it. Compassion or mercy is what you feel when you look down at that tiny, helpless baby that belongs to you. A child, a grandchild. You see them. They're crying. They're in need of food or a change or whatever it might be. But they have some sort of misery and distress, and your heart is moved to meet that misery and distress. You want to take action to solve the problem, to help that little one. That's what this word mercy means. It's seeing someone in deep distress and misery and being motivated to help.

Now, toward whom does God express this mercy? Who are the recipients of His mercy? God is always merciful. It's what He is. But the exercise of God's mercy is a reflection only of His sovereign will. Nothing outside of God obligates Him to show mercy. Let me say that again. Nothing outside of God obligates Him to show mercy to any particular person. A. W. Pink, in his book, puts it this way:

It is not the wretchedness of the creature which causes God to show mercy, for God is not influenced by things outside of Himself as we are. If God were influenced by the abject misery of leprous sinners, He would cleanse and save all of them, but He does not. Why? Simply because it is not His pleasure and purpose to do. Still less is it the merits of the creature which causes Him to bestow mercies upon them, for it is a contradiction in terms to speak of meriting mercy. No, mercy arises solely from God's imperial pleasure.

God bestows mercy on whom He will. We read it a moment ago in Exodus 33:19. I will show mercy on whom I will show mercy; I'll have compassion on whom I choose to have compassion.

Now, on whom does God choose to show compassion and mercy? Well first of all, on all of His creation. Everybody He made, to some extent, gets God's mercy. And we'll talk about how in a moment. But Psalm 145:9 says, "The Lord is good to all." We saw that last week. And watch this: "His mercies are over all his works." Nothing God has made doesn't at some point enjoy God's mercy.

But God also picks out a special group of people, and He says I'm going to show My mercy to those who fear Me, to those who put their trust in Me. Psalm 103:13, "Just as a father has compassion on his children [we said just a moment ago], so the Lord has compassion on [whom?] those who fear Him." Those who fear Him. And Mary, in her Magnificat, says, "And His mercy [that is, God's mercy] is upon generation after generation toward those who fear Him."

But amazingly, not only does God show mercy to all His creation, not only does He show it to those who put their trust in Him, who fear Him, but He even shows it to those who don't. In Luke 6:35-36, God says, "For [God] Himself is kind to ungrateful and evil men. Be merciful, therefore just as your Father is merciful." God shows mercy even to His enemies, but it's important to note that this is a different expression of God's mercy. God's mercy to those who will never place their trust in Him involves only their temporal needs, the needs of this life. But God's heart is still moved with their trouble, with their distress. You see even unbelievers expressing some expression of interest in God's care, and God extends it. One of my favorite examples is Ahab. Ahab, undoubtedly, will not be in heaven. And yet what happened when Ahab expressed some little bit of regret? For a day he wore sackcloth and ashes and expressed despondency. What did God say? God said well I won't do what I was promising to do in his lifetime. God showed even Ahab, wicked Ahab who made Israel to sin, were told, like no one since Jeroboam the son of Nebat, God showed him mercy. That God's character.

Sadly, many unbelievers think that when they stand before God that God will be merciful in that He will give them another chance. You've heard unbelievers say things like, "Well, I just don't think God will send me or anyone else to hell, He's just too merciful." One writer said,

Such a hope is a viper. If it's cherished in their bosoms, it will sting them to death. God is a God of justice as well as mercy, and He has expressly declared that He will by no means clear the guilty. God is merciful, and God is merciful even with his enemies. But if they continue to be His enemies, His mercy is only for this life and not for eternity.

You know, when you think about that and you think about how people put their hope in that (that somehow when they stand before God, God's going to give them mercy even though they didn't avail themselves of the mercy He extended to them in this life), imagine for a moment that a city decided that it was tired of all the expenses of having, you know, the sewage pipes and the care of those under the city and all of the things to dispose of the waste and refuse of the city. And so they decided that they would just allow filth and raw sewage to accumulate and to sort of stagnate everywhere. Well first of all, the population would probably dwindle. They would say well, listen, God is merciful, and so God will not allow us to contract disease from living in this filth and pollution. You'd say that's silly. You see, those who neglect the laws of health get sick and die, in spite of God's mercy. Those who neglect the laws of spiritual health will forever suffer what the Bible calls the second death, in spite of God's mercy. But God shows mercy in this life even to those who will never come to put their faith in Jesus Christ.

Now what are the expressions of God's mercy? There are several different ones. The first one I've put up here is care and provision, general care and provision. Matthew 15:32, "Jesus called his disciples to [Himself], and [He] said." Watch this. I love this. In the ministry of Christ we see this mercy, this compassion of God coming out. "[Jesus] said, 'I feel compassion for the people, because they have remained with Me now three days and have [had] nothing to eat; and I do not want to send them away hungry, for they might faint on the way.'" This has nothing to do with their spiritual health at this point. Christ is simply exercising a concern, a sympathy that's motivated to help, to relieve their misery for physical concerns. That's the heart of God. God shows mercy in caring and providing for His creatures regardless of their relationship to Him. We looked at this this morning, but Acts 17:25 says, "[God] Himself gives to all people life and breath and all things." That's an expression of God's mercy. It's His care, even as we see in Matthew 15.

Another expression of God's mercy, not only care and provision, but also physical deliverance. That is, deliverance from danger in this life, whether it's some life-threatening illness, whether it's an accident, whether it's anything that threatens physical life. We see it in a number of passages. Starting in the Old Testament, Nehemiah 9:30, "You bore with them." Talking about Israel here, Nehemiah's praying, reminding God of all that God did for His people. And He says, "You bore with them for many years, and [You] admonished them by Your Spirit through Your prophets, yet they would not give ear. Therefore You gave them into the hand of the peoples of the lands." In other words, You cast them off, You dispersed them. But watch this, God's mercy still extended: "Nevertheless, in Your great compassion You did not make an end of them or forsake them, for You are a gracious and compassion God." He delivered them even from their physical enemies in spite of what some of them were, because He's compassionate.

Psalm 69, the psalmist cries out,

Answer me, O Lord, for Your lovingkindness is good;

According to the greatness of Your compassion, turn to me,

And do not hide Your face from Your servant,

For I am in distress; answer me quickly.

Here you see the psalmist crying out for God to help him in the midst of difficulty and trouble, and what he calls on, what he relies on is the mercy of God. "God, You see I'm in trouble. You see I'm in distress, and You delight in helping those who are in distress. Save me!"

Matthew 9:27, again, you see this mirrored and modeled in the ministry of Christ, the mercy and compassion of God. Matthew 9:27, "As Jesus went on from there, two blind men followed Him, crying out [saying], 'Have mercy on us, Son of David!'" And of course, He did, and He healed them. Matthew 14:14 says, "When [Christ] went ashore, He saw a large crowd, and [He] felt compassion for them and healed their sick."

When you and I experience physical deliverance, when we're sick, when we find ourselves needing surgery, when we find ourselves in even life-threatening situations and we're delivered out of those, it's a reflection of the mercy of God. He sees those in trouble, and especially those who cry out to Him He delights in answering. Does He always deliver us the way we want to be delivered? No, He doesn't. But He's a God who delights in mercy.

There are other passages. Matthew 20:30-31 (The story's also told in Mark and Luke.) says,

Two blind men were sitting by the road, hearing that Jesus was passing by, cried out, "Lord, have mercy on us, Son of David!" The crowd sternly told them to be quiet, but they cried out all the more, "Lord, Son of David, have mercy on us!"

And watch Jesus' response. I love this. [Verse 34], "Moved with compassion, Jesus touched their eyes; and immediately they regained their sight and followed Him."

We saw this several weeks ago in Philippians. You remember Paul was deeply concerned about Epaphroditus and about the Philippians who had sent him, because Epaphroditus almost died. And so he writes this. [Philippians 2:27], he says, "Indeed [Epaphroditus] was sick to the point of death, but God had mercy on him." Here it is. God delivered him from physical illness. "And not on him only but also on me so that I would not have sorrow upon sorrow." The rescue from physical death is an expression of the mercy of God. Second Corinthians 1:3, "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of Mercies." I love that. "The Father of Mercies and [the] God of all comfort."

But not only does God's mercy express itself in physical deliverance, not only does it express itself in general care and provision, but God's mercy also expresses itself in eternal salvation. In Luke 18, you remember the tax collector in the story Christ told. He didn't cry out for salvation in the way many of us did. It was quite unique, actually. He stood some distance off, we're told, and lifted up his eyes to heaven. He beat his breasts, and here's what his prayer was: God, show me mercy, the sinner. Show me Your mercy. He was crying out for eternal salvation. He was crying out to be justified, and Christ said he went down to his house—what? Justified. He did. God responded to the cry for mercy, and the expression of God's mercy to him was eternal salvation.

Ephesians 2:4-5. You know, Paul has gone through all of what we used to be. He dredges up all of the past and how we used to live according to our lusts and how awful we were. And then He says this:

But God, being rich in mercy [being rich in mercy], because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved).

Here you see both grace and mercy working together in the salvation of all of us. Paul puts it this way in his testimony. He says I used to be—in 1 Timothy 1:13 he says, "I was formally a blasphemer and a persecutor and a violent aggressor. Yet I was shown mercy because I acted ignorantly in unbelief." Verse 16, "Yet for this reason I found mercy, so that in me as the foremost, Jesus Christ might demonstrate His perfect patience as an example for those who would believe in Him for eternal life." Titus 3:5 continues the same theme. "He saved us [God saved us], not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness, but according to His mercy."

I don't know if you've ever thought really about God's mercy lying back of our salvation. We often express it in terms of God's grace, and that is true: God's goodness to those who deserve punishment. But it was also God's mercy, God's goodness to those in deep distress and misery. First Peter 1:3, "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His great mercy has caused us to be born again to a living hope." Jude 21, "Keep yourselves in the love of God, waiting anxiously for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ to eternal life." Listen, we're not done experiencing mercy. When Christ comes back we're going to get more than we can ever imagine. That's what He's saying, waiting for the mercy that comes with Christ.

So God's mercy expresses itself in the eternal salvation of sinners, but here's an interesting thought. God's mercy—and this is quite amazing really—is the ultimate ground of your election. If you're in Christ, God chose you before the foundation of the world. But why? It was because of His mercy. Turn to Romans 9. What moved the heart of God to save you and to save me? What moved Him to choose us? Let's start at verse 15. Paul writes, "For He says to Moses, [And here's the quote we read earlier.] 'I will have mercy on whom I [will] have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.' So then." Here's His conclusion. Here's what that means, He says, let Me interpret it for you. It means, "It [that is, God's mercy and the display of it] does not depend on the man who wills." In other words, God didn't show you mercy because you exercised your will. Nor is it "the man who runs." God didn't save you because of your own effort, because you ran after Him or after holiness or after anything else. Because of your effort is the idea of the concept with running. It's not your will, it's not your running, so why did He do it? Well it depends, he says, "on God who has mercy." Verse 18, "He has mercy on whom He desires, and He hardens whom He desires."

Now, I don't want to get sort of sidetracked here. But let me just comment on that last phrase, because it bothers a lot of people. What does it mean God hardens people? Well, it doesn't mean that God works some sort of active evil in the hearts of people to turn them against Him. What it means is God withdraws those influences in the heart that would naturally soften them, and He simply allows that sinner's heart to take its own course. You see, God's mercy is not because of the exercise of your will, it's not because of your effort. God's mercy is free of obligation, and it's given solely according to what? His sovereign choice.

There's another interesting passage. Turn over to Romans 11:30. As Paul is talking about Israel and the fact that God has now allowed the Gentiles to experience God's mercy, he says something very interesting. Romans 11:30:

For just as you [that is, you Gentiles] once were disobedient to God, but now have been shown mercy because of their [that is, the Jewish people's] disobedience, so these also now have been disobedient [that is, the Jewish people], that because of the mercy shown to you they also may now be shown mercy. [Now watch verse 32.] For God has shut up all [both Jews and Gentiles] in disobedience [why?] so that He may show mercy to all.

This seems to intimate that the ultimate reason God allowed the human race to fall into sin was so that He could extend mercy in providing salvation, God could put Himself on display and His great compassion, His heart of mercy for those in misery and distress.

You say, how do you respond to that? Well, Paul teaches us. Look at the next verse, verse 33: "Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and [the] knowledge of God!" Really, this is the end of everything he's said in the first eleven chapters, but it also stems from what he has just said as well.

Oh, the depths of the riches both of the wisdom and [the] knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and unfathomable His ways! For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who became His counselor? Or who has first given to Him that it might be paid back to Him again? For from Him and through Him to Him are all things. To Him be the glory forever. Amen [and amen].

God shows His mercy in eternal salvation. So what do we do with God's mercy? How are we to respond? Well, let me give you several practical applications from the mercy of God that come from the Scripture. First of all, when you really understand God's mercy you should overflow with gratitude and praise to the Lord. Psalm 89:1 is just one of a myriad of verses that talks about giving thanks and praise and expressing gratitude to God for His mercy and these similar expressions of His compassion.

But it also means that God's mercy should serve as an encouragement to seek salvation from sin and its eternal punishment. If you're here tonight and you're not sure that you belong to Christ, you're not sure that you've been forgiven, right now God's mercy for you is only in this life, but because God is so merciful He extends an invitation to you. Turn to Isaiah 55. Basically, the beginning verses of Isaiah 55 are an invitation to salvation, an invitation to experience the forgiveness that comes in God. But notice how he expresses it in verse 6: "Seek the Lord while He may be found; call upon Him while He is near." Here's how you respond. "Let the wicked forsake his way." That is, your patterns of behavior, your habits. This is biblical repentance. Turn away from what you know displeases God.

Let the... unrighteous man [turn away from] his [wicked, unrighteous] thoughts;

And let him return to the Lord [let him turn to God],

And He will have compassion on him,

And to our God,

For He will abundantly pardon.

Pardon is one of those rich words, isn't it? Pardon, it's what every guilty person wants, and we stand guilty before God. And God says you turn to Me, you cry out to Me, you leave your sin, you leave your patterns of behavior and you turn to Me seeking My forgiveness, and I promise you something. I will have compassion on you. I will show you mercy, and I will even abundantly pardon.

You say how in the world can God do that? Well, look at the next verse. He says,

"For My thoughts are not your thoughts,

Nor are your ways My ways," declares the Lord.

For as the heavens are higher than the earth,

So are My ways higher than your ways

And My thoughts [higher] than your thoughts."

He said you want to know how I can do it? It's because I'm God, and I don't think like you think. I'm merciful. I would urge you tonight, if you're not absolutely confident that you have experienced the forgiveness of God, take this verse home with you. Find yourself a quiet place and cry out to God. Turn from your sin and plead the mercy of God for His pardon, and He's promised to give it.

For the rest of us who already are in Christ, it also means (this knowledge of God's mercy) that we should extend to others the same mercy that you've been shown. And in two different ways. First of all, we should extend mercy to others in this sense: we should assist the poor and others in misery. You know, I think sometimes Christians tend to be cold and callous toward the poor. You know, we see government programs gone awry, and pretty soon we develop this sort of cold callousness toward those who are in misery and need. That's not God, and God says you shouldn't think that way just as I don't think that way. Proverbs 14:21 and 31—we won't turn there—talk about doing good to the poor, talk about helping the poor and how that honors God. Daniel 4:27 is an interesting reference, because that's God talking through Daniel to Nebuchadnezzar. And you know what He says to proud, unbelieving Nebuchadnezzar? Daniel says if you'll turn from your ways and if you'll help the poor, then God may hold off His judgment on you.

But I want you to turn to Luke, because Christ puts it so clearly in Luke 6. Verse 35, He says I want you to do something that you won't believe. I want you "to love your enemies," and I want you to "do good, and lend, [to them] expecting nothing in return." Literally, "not despairing at all." "And your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the most high." You're going to show yourself to truly belong to God, to be a son of God. "For [God] Himself is kind to [the] ungrateful and evil men. Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful." Here He's not talking about forgiving them, He's talking about doing good to them. He's talking about caring for them, being concerned for them. Just as God exercises this concern to relieve the misery of others, you and I should be concerned, even about those who are our enemies, even about those who are God's enemies, to relieve the misery that they experience.

Turn over to Luke chapter 10, a few pages over, verse 37. Christ tells the story of the Good Samaritan. You're all familiar with the story, and I won't take time to go through it. But here's the punchline. Verse 36, He said to the people who were listening,

"Which of [the] three do you think proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell into the robbers' hands?" And He said, "The one who showed mercy toward him." Then Jesus said to him, "Go and do the same."

Practice what I just taught you in the lesson of the Good Samaritan. Even if you don't know someone, even if your culture is at odds with their culture, be concerned about those in misery and distress. First John 3:17 makes the same point. It says look, you need, if you're a genuine believer, to be concerned about meeting the genuine needs of others in misery and trouble.

But extending the same mercy to others not only means assisting those in misery, but it means being quick to forgive. Look back at Matthew chapter 5. This word "mercy" is used in this sense as well. Matthew 5, in the Beatitudes, verse 7 says, "Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy." It's talking about being quick to forgive, being quick to set aside a wrong. Matthew 9:13, Jesus was reclining at the table with tax collectors and sinners, and the Pharisees didn't like it. They were complaining about it. And He says this to them in verse 13: "Go and learn what this means: 'I desire compassion, and not sacrifice,' for I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners." Here He puts compassion, again, into the terms of forgiveness, and He says that's how I want you to look on and treat others.

But more directly, Jesus teaches this in Matthew 18. Turn over to Matthew 18 for a moment. And I wish I had time to go through this in detail, but let me just make the salient points for you. Jesus has just been teaching about church discipline, and He says if someone repents, then you're to forgive them. And so Peter comes up with a fairly obvious question. He says, verse 21, "Lord, how often shall my brother sin against me and I forgive him? Up to seven times?" Now Peter thinks he's being real generous. He takes what the Pharisees taught, which was three, doubles it and adds one. He says well, seven times? Now if someone came to us seven times over the same offense, you would think they were being somewhat disingenuous in asking forgiveness, wouldn't you? So Peter's not being unreasonable here. Let's not be too hard on him. But "Jesus said to him, 'I do not say to you, up to seven times, but up to [four hundred and ninety times].'" Same offense. In a parallel passage it says, "in a day."

So then He goes on to tell a story, and you're familiar with the story. There's a servant who owes his master a great deal of money, and he's forgiven that money. Verse 27:

"The lord of that slave felt compassion and released Him and forgave him the debt. But [then, verse 28, when] that slave went out and found one of his fellow slaves who owed him a hundred denarii [a lot less money] and he seized him and began to choke him, saying, 'Pay back what you owe.' So his fellow slave fell to the ground and began to plead with him, saying, 'Have patience... I will repay you.' But he was unwilling and [he]... threw him in prison until he should pay back what [he] was owed."

So his fellow slaves report this. They were deeply grieved and they told their lord what had happened. Verse 32:

"[He's] summoning him, his lord said to him, 'You wicked slave, I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me. Should you not also have had mercy on your fellow slave, in the same way that I had mercy on you?' [Here's the point.] And his lord, moved with anger, handed him over to the torturers until he should repay all that was owed him. [Verse 35] My heavenly Father will also do the same to you, if each of you does not forgive his brother from your heart."

Show the same mercy in forgiveness that you have been shown. That's why Paul so often says be quick to forgive. Do you hold a grudge? You'd better read this passage very carefully and with a lot of deep thought, because that's a profound message from the lips of our Lord. Be quick to forgive.

A couple of other applications. First of all, expect and plead God's mercy in times of trouble. I love Psalm 107. Psalm 107, people find themselves in a variety of distresses, in a variety of troubles, and what happens every time? In some cases they've gotten themselves in it, because of their rebelliousness, it says. And yet what do they do? They realize what they've done, they realize where they are, and it says they cry out to God. And how does God respond? He hears their cry, and He moves to relieve their distress. Listen, when you find yourself in times of trouble, whether it be times of trial and difficulty or whether it be times even of temptation, cry out to God and plead His mercy. I love Lamentations 3:22. We won't turn there. But, of course, it's in the middle of a lament about the destruction of the City of Jerusalem. And in the middle of that Jeremiah reminds himself that God is filled with compassion and mercy, and He'll hear.

But I want you to turn to Hebrews, just to see how directly applicable this is. In 2:17-18 we're told that we have a merciful high priest. Because He was tempted, He's able to come to the aid of those who are tempted. But then in chapter 4, the writer of Hebrews puts it more directly applicable. Chapter 4, verse 14, he says,

Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. [And then he describes Christ this way. He says,] For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin. Therefore let us draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, so that we may [find] mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

Listen, Jesus Christ stands in the presence of God on our behalf. We can come before God pleading His mercy, and we'll find help in the time of our need, whatever that need is. Whether it's the ability to say no to temptation (as back in chapter 2 and here in chapter 4), whether it's trouble, whether it's trials, wherever we find ourselves, we will be able to find God's mercy.

James 5 talks about trouble. Hebrews primarily is talking about temptation, but in James 5 it talks about mercy to help in our trouble. James 5:10 says,

As an example, brethren, of suffering and patience, take the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord. We count those blessed who endured. You have heard of the endurance of Job and have seen the outcome of the Lord's dealings, that the Lord is full of compassion and is merciful.

You can find in the midst of your trouble, whatever it is (whether it's difficulties at home, whether it's difficulties on the job, whether it's sickness, whether it's illness, whether it's the struggles within your heart that nobody knows), you can find God merciful, because His heart goes out to those who are in distress.

Another ramification or application as a believer, be quick to confess and forsake your sin, and do it pleading God's mercy. That's what David does in Psalm 51:1. He goes and relies on the compassion of God. But turn to proverbs 28. Let me show you how important this is. Proverbs 28:13, "He who conceals his transgressions will not prosper, but he who confesses and forsakes them will find [what from God?] compassion," mercy. Listen folks, don't believe Satan's lie. When you sin you're tempted to say God doesn't want me to come, God doesn't want me in His presence, God doesn't want me at all, because look at the awful person I am. Well, that's true. But that shouldn't keep you from God, because God delights in extending mercy to those who are willing to confess and forsake their sins. So come immediately. Be quick to come to God pleading His mercy for forgiveness when you sin.

And then, finally, there are a number of expressions throughout the New Testament that teach us that we should wish for or want and pray for God to extend His mercy to others. And I'm not going to have you turn to all of these. Often they're in the introduction to letters (as you can see) where he says, "Grace and mercy be multiplied to you." He's saying I wish nothing but God's mercy for you. Other times it's prayed for. That's how we should pray for those who are going through difficulty in trouble. That's what we should plead when someone we know is in the midst of a life-threatening illness, facing a surgery, lost a job: "God, look down on them in their distress, in their misery, and show them mercy." It's an amazing truth about God that He is merciful. A. W. Tozer says this: "When through the blood of the everlasting covenant we children of the shadows [I love that] we children of the shadows reach at last our home in the light, we shall have a thousand strings to our harps, but the sweetest may well be the one tuned to sound forth most perfectly the mercy of God." Let's pray together.

Father, we do praise You and exalt You for Your great mercy. We have been the recipients so many times. Lord, we thank You. We pray that You would continue to extend us Your mercy, and that You would extend it to those even in our congregation, those we know who are going through difficulty and trouble, who are facing constant temptation. Lord, show them mercy. Help us to be merciful with others, so that we can receive Your mercy, not because we've earned it, but because that's the condition that You lay down to experience it. Father, we praise You; we exalt You as the Father of Mercies. In Jesus' name, amen.