Do we have to deserve mercy?

Is it wise to show mercy to someone who refuses to learn? Is it a good idea to give mercy to someone who is just going to turn around and hurt others, someone who never had any intention of changing? No, we don’t know people’s hearts, and we can’t read people’s minds, and we should never judge. And we are commanded to love everyone. But are love and mercy the same?

 

Snow on the chicken wire at Safe Haven Farm, Haven, KS

Today’s verses are Jeremiah 7:5-7.

But I will be merciful only if you stop your evil thoughts and deeds and start treating each other with justice; only if you stop exploiting foreigners, orphans, and widows; only if you stop your murdering; and only if you stop harming yourselves by worshiping idols. Then I will let you stay in this land that I gave to your ancestors to keep forever.

We often refer to God as being merciful because of the sacrifice Christ made on the cross for us. But even God’s mercy only extends so far, especially when the ones who are asking for it don’t hold up their end of the bargain. But what do these verses actually mean? Do we have to deserve mercy? Because if we have to deserve mercy, I think that would defeat the point. We deserve damnation. We deserve to be punished because of the way we live. That’s where mercy comes in.

But think about it this way: What’s the point of showing mercy to someone who has no intention of using it? Mercy is something that is given to you to use, but we have a choice in how to use it. We can either use it to help other people, or we can forget about it. We can conveniently misplace it. It can be like the Christmas present you got that you don’t think you need, that gets stuffed in a closet somewhere. But how are we to know who will use mercy and won’t? How can we tell?

Maybe I’m wrong, but this is the way I see it: We don’t know.

I can’t tell you what you are thinking in your heart. I can’t know the thoughts you have. Sometimes I have a pretty clear idea, but even the people I think are an open book can turn around and become someone completely different at the drop of a hat. And it turns out I didn’t know them at all.

Sometimes believers get full, I think. We get so full of the good things that God has done in our lives, and that’s awesome. Because if you are living the way God has told you to live, God blesses you. That’s the way it works. And the closer you get to God, the more He changes you to be like Him, the more blessings you receive. And there are times when I just stand and marvel at the life that God has given me, because I don’t deserve any of it. But I have the life I have because I chose to follow God even when it didn’t make sense. That was my choice. But it’s easy to get caught up in that and forget how merciful God really is.

Because you see, God does know our hearts. He knows my heart, and He knows your heart. He knows what we’re all thinking right now and what we’ll be thinking tomorrow and ten years from now. And because God knows whether or not we will take advantage of His mercy, He has every right to withhold it until we come to our senses and live the way He’s told us to live. But that’s God. He has that prerogative and right, and He is justified.

But I’m not God. I’m nobody. I’m just a little beggar who made a choice.

Maybe this is a poor example, but I finally got to see Les Misérables the other day. And this morning, at reading this verse, the only thing I can think of is one of the beginning scenes when Jean Valjean is taken in by that priest. Frightened and broken, Jean Valjean steals all that silver from the church and runs away, but he’s captured and dragged back by the police, but he claims that the priest gave him the silver. The police put him before the priest and ask if it’s true. The priest has every right to be angry; he’d showed kindness to a man who had nothing, and in return that man had stolen from him. But the priest doesn’t condemn him. He verifies to the police that he had indeed given the silver to Jean Valjean, and then he turns around and gives him the two silver candlesticks off the table.

Mercy. Mercy in spite of the fact that he deserved condemnation.

I can’t see people’s hearts. So I really don’t know people. But because God has been merciful to me and because God’s mercy is a part of my life, I want to live a life that shows mercy to others.  I can’t determine whether or not someone will take advantage of the mercy I’ve shown them. Granted, if I show them mercy and then they turn around and bash me over the head or stab me in the back, then I’ll know. And then there are other steps to take, but until you take a chance with people, you’ll never know for sure. And while one might crush your hopes and dreams, another might turn out to be the biggest blessing you’ve ever had.

So don’t be afraid to show mercy to people, especially if they don’t deserve it.

We’ve missed the point

I saw a story on Yahoo! about the Doomsday Clock yesterday, just in passing. I didn’t really read it because the Doomsday Clock isn’t a “real” clock; it’s just a symbolic representation of how close the world is to a global catastrophe, whether it’s nuclear war or environmental issues. Admittedly, it made me smile because if it’s not the Mayan calendar telling us the world is going to end, it’s the Doomsday Clock. And the real irony is that you don’t need either of those, or any of the other symbols of impending doom, to know that our world is in a lot of trouble.

Nobody knows the day that doom is going to come, but it’s going to come. And we need to be ready for it.

Stairwell in Glen Eyrie Castle, Colorado Springs, CO

Today’s verses are Acts 17:30-31.

God overlooked people’s ignorance about these things in earlier times, but now he commands everyone everywhere to repent of their sins and turn to him. For he has set a day for judging the world with justice by the man he has appointed, and he proved to everyone who this is by raising him from the dead.

If you have a second, you should read the portion of Acts where these verses are from, Acts 17:16-34. It’s a part of the early Church history where Paul is on a missionary journey, and he ends up in Athens, preaching to the people there. This is his famous message about the Unknown God. What Paul said to the people of Athens is true for us today: We may be very religious, but we’ve missed the point.

What it comes down to is our choice. We can choose to change our minds about God and about what God says is wrong, but we don’t have to. God hasn’t forced anyone to do anything–ever. There’s no point to that anyway. God has told us we need to change our minds about sin. God has said it loud and clear for everyone to know.

He has told us what sin is. He has told us how to have eternal life. He has told us how to have a relationship with Him. The rest is up to us to decide if that’s the path we want to take.

But the truth of Paul’s statement is chilling because whether you choose to follow Christ or not, judgment is still coming. Nothing will stop the end of the world. The world has been dying since our first parents turned against God. It’s been winding down, slowly but surely, getting worse every day, getting darker every hour. And like a clock with batteries that are nearly drained, the day is going to come when it stops keeping time altogether. And when that day gets here, are we going to be ready? Are we going to have an answer for the charges laid against us?

Our culture now is practically free of real consequences. We can do whatever we want with no one to check us. The United States was founded with a checks and balances system, three branches of government designed to keep each other in order. In recent years, it’s become pretty obvious that even they aren’t interested in keeping each other honest; they’re just covering their own backsides now, doing what they want. And the People don’t know enough about what the United States was intended to be to hold them accountable for it.

But a day is coming when all of us will have to face the consequences for our choices, and there won’t be second chances. You’ll have two options. Either you chose to follow Christ in this life or you didn’t. Either you trusted Christ to pay the price for your sins or you chose to cover the debt yourself.

So what does that mean for us today? I’ve already accepted Christ. I trust Him with my life and my future, but that doesn’t mean I know what’s going to happen tomorrow. That doesn’t mean God is required to pull me out of trouble. It just means He won’t abandon me when trouble starts.

I look at the world and the state of this country, and I’m tempted to despair because I know what it used to be. I know what it was meant to be, and we’ve fallen so far from that place today. But I trust God. He knows what He’s doing, and nothing surprises Him.

I used to be afraid when I read scriptures about the end of the world. I used to be scared of the word judgment. But the older I get and the worse the world gets, the more I find comfort in that word. Because for those who know Christ, judgment isn’t something to be scared of. For those who know Christ, our slates are clean. Christ has taken our sins and put them far away from us, and when God looks at our record, all He sees is Christ.

Judgment is coming. The world won’t last forever. So get busy. Talk to people. Build relationships with people. And don’t give up. And if you need to change your mind about sin in your life, do it now rather than later. It won’t speed the end up or slow it down, of course, but it will get in the way of what you need to accomplish.