BEATITUDES (7) Blessed Are the Merciful

“Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy.” (Mt 5:7)
 
Review
We’ve been talking about the Beatitudes Jesus taught on the Mount. Now we are halfway through them. The first four beatitudes mainly deal with the inner attitudes of our hearts and minds.
 
For us to be poor in spirit means that we see our spiritual poverty and thus realize our absolute need for God and desperately seek Him. The kingdom of heaven is given to those who have this kind of heart. God promises in Proverbs, “those who seek me find me” (Pr 8:17)
 
The second blessing is given to those who mourn. When they see their own sins and others’ sins and their terrible results, they mourn for them out of God’s grieving heart that is poured out in them. They are blessed because they find God’s great comfort from heaven when they mourn.
 
We’re also called to be meek. Meekness is a quality of strength under control, like tamed horses that obey their master out of complete trust and reliance on them rather than insisting on their own opinions and plans. Those who are meek submit their lives to God. They simply go where their master wants them to go and do what He wants them to do whether they understand it or not. So, some important characteristics of the meek are humility, gentleness, and submission. 
 
Last Sunday, we talked about what it means to hunger and thirst for righteousness. We defined the word “righteousness” as “the condition we need to be in for us to be acceptable to God and stand before Him.”
 
Because God is so good, holy, and righteous, no sinner can stand before His presence. Only those who are righteous according to God’s standard can. The problem is that no one can meet God’s righteous standard on their own because, as Paul said,
 
“There is no one righteous, not even one… for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Rom 3:10,23)
 
Yet God is not only righteous but also merciful, gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in love. Out of His great mercy God has given us the way to be saved from our sins and out of His great love God has generously offered the greatest gift of salvation through Jesus Christ. As Paul said,
 
“All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.” (Rm 3:23-24)
 
Now, we’re able to meet the righteous standard and stand before God not because we ourselves are righteous but because we came to have Jesus’ righteousness by faith through His death on the cross.
 
We call this justification or regeneration. When we believe in Jesus Christ, accepting everything He did to save us as truth, His precious blood and His righteousness immediately begin to work in us and justify us and we’re born again spiritually.
 
Now, those who are freely forgiven and made righteous by God’s grace come to have the desire to actually live righteously like Jesus. They are not satisfied with the fact that they are justified. They want to be sanctified to reach the fullness of Christ in every aspect of their lives. We call this process “sanctification”.
 
And, as God’s people, we seek for God’s will, His kingdom, and His righteousness to be firmly built up around the world.
 
These are the three kinds of righteousness we are to hunger and thirst for as Christians—justification, sanctification, and God’s righteousness, namely His will and His kingdom. When we desperately hunger and thirst for them, God will surely fill us with His righteousness.
 
The Merciful
All right. Today, we’re going to move on to the fifth blessing, the blessing that is given to those who are merciful. Let’s read today’s Bible verse together again.
 
“Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy.” (Mt 5:7)
 
This blessing is a little bit different from the past 4 blessings we’ve covered because it puts more emphasis on our deeds, rather than our inner attitudes. The previous 4 blessings are more related to the status of our hearts, but when Jesus talked about mercy here, He meant our deeds toward others.
 
In the Bible, mercy is not an abstract concept. We can’t be merciful without it affecting someone else. Mercy is an outward expression of our inner attitude.
 
Mercy vs Grace
Before we start learning about what it means to be merciful, it would be helpful for us to compare mercy to a similar concept, grace.
 
As Christians, we are often reminded of the importance of grace and mercy in our daily lives. These two concepts play significant roles in our relationship with God and our understanding of His wonderful salvation and unconditional love for us.
 
They do not mean the same thing, but they are inextricably related to one another. They could be considered two sides of the same coin when it comes to God’s salvation. When God saves a person, He gives both mercy and grace.
 
But, even though these terms are commonly used interchangeably, they have distinct meanings. Simply put, mercy can be defined as not receiving what we deserve while grace can be defined as receiving what we don’t deserve.
 
I want to say it one more time. Mercy is for us not to receive what we deserve but grace is for us to receive what we don’t deserve. These definitions presume that all people are sinners and that they need something special to pay for their sins, since “the wages of sin is death” (Rom 6:23). 
 
We need both God’s mercy and grace to solve the problem of our sins. In other words, mercy and grace are God’s remedies to save us from our sins.
 
We just defined mercy as not receiving what we deserve. Then, what do we deserve as sinners? We deserve God’s wrath, judgment, punishment, and eternal death. The Bible clearly states that God is so holy and righteous that He hates every kind of sin, whether big or small, and His wrath is poured out on it. So, if God gave us what we deserve, we all would be condemned for eternity right now.
 
But as I said earlier, God is not only righteous, but abounding in love. God loves us so much that He is patient with us instead of just giving us up, leaving us alone in our sins, and allowing us to receive what we deserve because of them. We see God’s mercy in His great patience and forgiveness.
 
As the prophet Jeremiah said, “Through the LORD'S mercies we are not consumed, Because His compassions fail not. They are new every morning; Great is Your faithfulness” (Lm 3:22-23)
 
So, mercy is God’s compassionate and forgiving nature toward us. We’ve done terrible things in our sins, but God has been so merciful to us that in His willingness He has withheld the wrath and judgment that we deserve.
 
Then, what is grace? If mercy is not to receive what we deserve, grace is to receive what we don’t deserve. As sinners, we deserve nothing good from God. But still, God loves us so much that He has given us His only Son—Jesus Christ—to save us even though we don’t deserve it at all.
 
So, grace can be simply defined as “unmerited favor.” Grace is God’s gracious gift that He generously offers all people without requiring anything in return. We don’t deserve it and we could never earn it on our own, but God still freely gives it to us out of His abundant love.
 
As Paul said in Romans 5:8 and Ephesians 2:8, “God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” (Rom 5:8)
 
“It is by grace you have been saved, through faith - and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God” (Eph 2:8). Amen!
 
Therefore, mercy is closely tied to the concept of forgiveness while grace is related to His sacrifice. In fact, that’s what made true forgiveness possible.
 
In understanding the differences between grace and mercy, we come to comprehend the depth and richness of God’s love for us more. It is through His mercy that we are forgiven and accepted, and it is through His grace that we are saved and become children of God.
 
Mercy and grace are especially evident in our salvation through Jesus Christ. We only deserved judgment, but in Christ we receive mercy from God and are delivered from judgment. What’s more, we receive eternal salvation, forgiveness of sins, and abundant life in Christ Jesus.
 
And if we really understand it and believe in it, our proper response to God’s mercy and grace should be giving thanks to Him and worshiping Him for His great love for us. We should continue to go before His presence where we can experience His mercy and grace more deeply. As Hebrews 4:16 says,
 
“Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.” (Heb 4:16)
 
Be Merciful
But that’s not the only response we can show. If we really believe that we’ve been saved by God’s mercy and grace, we should convey them to others around us through our words and deeds.
 
As believers, we are called to emulate God’s grace and mercy in our lives. In doing so, we not only deepen our relationship with God, but we also live a more Christ-centered life in our relationships with others. That is one of the main themes of the book of Colossians that we talked about before.
 
Colossians 3:12-13 says, “Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you.” (Col 3:12-13)
 
I believe this is what Jesus meant when He said, “Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful” (Lk 6:36). What God expects from us is for us to become more merciful like Him so that His grace and mercy can be revealed through our lives so that others who don’t know Him yet might see and experience His love and return to Him.
 
However, becoming merciful doesn’t only mean that we change our hearts toward others because as I said earlier, it’s more closely related to our outward actions than our inner states.
 
God’s mercy wasn’t revealed in an abstract manner. His mercy for sinners was most clearly shown on the cross. Out of His mercy, God sent His Son Jesus Christ to earth and made Him die on the cross to forgive all our sins and give us salvation.
 
That’s how we know that God is merciful. He is merciful not only because of His compassion for us, but because of His actual, sacrificial acts that come out of it.
 
So, when we think about the concept of ‘mercy’ in the Bible, we should keep in mind that biblical mercy doesn’t only mean our emotions. Specific acts must come from the emotions. God had mercy on us, sinners, by sacrificing His precious Son. That’s how God’s mercy was revealed to us.
 
Now God also wants us to have mercy on others. And it must also be revealed in practical, sacrificial ways. As the apostle John said,
 
“This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters. If anyone has material possessions and sees a brother or sister in need but has no pity on them, how can the love of God be in that person? Dear children, let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth. This is how we know that we belong to the truth and how we set our hearts at rest in his presence” (1Jn 3:16-19).
 
For us to be merciful means that we take actual actions toward others for their good. To those who are rude and do wrong to us, we need to show God’s mercy by being patient with them, speaking kindly to them, and praying for them rather than repaying them evil for evil.
 
To those who are in need, who need help, we need to show God’s mercy by reaching out to them, helping them, and giving them what they need. That’s how God has been merciful to us. Then, that’s how we must be merciful to others as those who have received His mercy.
 
This is definitely not easy. As human beings, we’re selfish by nature. It’s much easier to repay evil for evil rather than showing goodness to our enemies. It’s naturally hard for us to have mercy and sacrifice our time or money for others.
 
Nevertheless, the Bible asks us to be merciful. That’s not because we can be merciful on our own, but because God first had mercy upon us and we received His mercy freely.
 
We can have mercy on others because we received God’s mercy first. In other words, we can be merciful as much as we understand, experience, and are filled with His mercy toward us.
 
This is similar to what we already talked about when we learned the biblical meaning of blessing. In Gen 12, God called Abraham and blessed Him. Then God told him, ‘you will be a blessing’. This command is based on the previous blessing that God gave Abraham.
 
So, how can we be a blessing? The answer is simple. We can be a blessing when we have received God’s blessing. It’s actually our responsibility as God’s blessed people to be His blessing in this world.
 
In the same way, we can and should be merciful because we received God’s mercy and He wants us to be merciful just as He is merciful to us. That’s not a choice. If we’re really Christians, we should make every effort to be merciful to others.
 
I believe that’s one of the important keys to maintaining a close relationship with God. Jesus said, “Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy.” (Mt 5:7)
 
It means that if we are not merciful to others, if we refuse to have mercy on others the way God has done to us, we won’t be able to receive His mercy either. James gives us an important insight in this subject.
 
James 2:13 says, “judgment without mercy will be shown to anyone who has not been merciful. Mercy triumphs over judgment” (Jms 2:13)
 
If we are not merciful to others as Christians, we’ll face nothing but God’s judgment without mercy. This verse corresponds to what Jesus said, “If you forgive other people when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive others their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins” (Mt 6:14-15)
 
What we see from these verses is that God requires our mercy and forgiveness toward others as the condition for Him to continue to have mercy on and forgive us.
 
If we don’t forgive others as those whose enormous debts of sin were freely forgiven, God won’t forgive us anymore. If we, who have received God’s great mercy out of His love, are not merciful to others, God won’t be merciful to us anymore. Then, what will be waiting for us? We’ll face judgment without mercy or forgiveness before the judgment seat of Christ on the last day.
 
So, being merciful to others is not only good for them but actually good for us. That’s because it’s one of the things that guarantees that God will be merciful to us. In other words, we can continue to remain in God’s mercy by trying to be merciful to others as He is.
 
In that sense, being merciful is truly a blessing. Now, let’s wrap up the sermon by reading today’s verse one more time.
 
“Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy.” (Mt 5:7)
 
Let’s pray.
 
[Closing Prayer]
Heavenly Father, thank You for giving us this opportunity to think about how great Your mercy is.
 
We thank You for faithfully being merciful to us. We confess that if it hadn’t been for Your mercy, none of us here could stand where we are now. It’s only because of Your mercy and grace, and Your love and compassion, that we can be saved and become Your children.
 
Out of Your mercy, You have been patient with us, and out of Your grace, You gave us a way to live a new life by sacrificing Your only Son. We deserve nothing but Your wrath and punishment, but You poured out Your wrath on Your Son instead of on us. By doing so, You achieved perfect salvation and freely gave it to us. How amazing are Your grace and mercy toward our lives!
 
Now Lord, we want to become more merciful just as You are merciful and have had mercy on us. We want Your mercy and grace to be revealed through our lives. But we don’t have mercy. We don’t have love like You do. So we rely on You and desperately ask You to pour out Your mercy, grace, and love on us so that we can be more merciful like You.
 
We thank You again for everything You’ve done to save us out of Your mercy.
 
We love you, Lord. We pray in Jesus’ precious name. Amen.
 
[Reflection Questions]
1.     What do you think is the biggest difference between mercy and grace?
 
2.     Have you experienced God’s mercy and grace deeply? When and how?
 
3.     Why do you think being merciful is described as the condition to receive God’s mercy in the Bible? What are some practical ways you can be merciful to others around you?