A sermon for Dalkeith Road Church of Christ 7/3/21
“Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy” (Matt. 5:7 NIV).
“Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy” (Matt. 5:7 ESV)
This sermon finds you in the middle of the Beatitudes, so perhaps this has been said before. But in order to understand why we are to be merciful, it is important to begin with some context. That context is the wonderful truth that Jesus Christ is the king who has inaugurated or ushered in the kingdom of God. So I am going to give a quick explanation of the kingdom of God (or what Matthew’s Gospel calls the kingdom of heaven).
The Old Testament saints longed to see the arrival of the kingdom of God, the ultimate reign of God over all the world. The LORD God has always been the king but his reign over the world has not always been manifest. When the kingdom of God comes, God will judge the wicked and bring justice for the oppressed. His righteousness and justice will be evident to all.
Something amazing happens in the New Testament. When Jesus began his ministry, according to Matthew, the first thing he said was, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near” (Matt 4:17). After this, Jesus began calling people to follow him, teaching in the synagogues and healing people and casting out demons (4:18-25). The ministry of Jesus was the indication that the kingdom of God had arrived in Jesus; he is the king of that kingdom.
It is in the context of the arrival of the kingdom of God that Jesus preached the Beatitudes. Those who are part of that kingdom are blessed or extremely happy because what they had been waiting for has arrived. The righteousness and justice of God are near at hand. God’s kingdom is not like the kingdoms of the world, which are often oppressive. God’s kingdom is different because it is ruled over by a God of love and mercy. This is the reason for the radical ethic that Jesus taught. Those who are privileged to be part of God’s kingdom are so happy. Things have changed. The kingdom of God has not fully arrived; it will not be complete until Jesus returns for his people. Yet, the king of the kingdom is here and the citizens of heaven rejoice and live like they are in the kingdom.
With that bit of context behind us, now let’s look at the fourth Beatitude: “Blessed are the merciful for they will be shown mercy.” The central point I want to make in this sermon is simple: God has been merciful to us and therefore he asks us to be merciful to others. Why do Christians show mercy? Because they have received mercy. This point is the central theme of one of the stories which Jesus told. The story is about a king who was extremely merciful and his servant who did not pass on that mercy to others. I am going to read the first half now and the second half of the story a little later.
“21 Then Peter came up and said to him, ‘Lord, how often will my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? As many as seven times?’ 22 Jesus said to him, ‘I do not say to you seven times, but seventy-seven times. 23 Therefore the kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who wished to settle accounts with his servants. 24 When he began to settle, one was brought to him who owed him ten thousand talents. 25 And since he could not pay, his master ordered him to be sold, with his wife and children and all that he had, and payment to be made. 26 So the servant fell on his knees, imploring him, “Have patience with me, and I will pay you everything.” 27 And out of pity for him, the master of that servant released him and forgave him the debt’” (Matt 18:21-27).
The man in the story owed the king a truckload of money, more money than the GDP of the nation of Judah at that time. It was so much money that he could never repay it in a hundred lifetimes. Even if the man and his whole family were sold into slavery to pay the debt, it would never be repaid. But when the man begged for mercy the king had pity on him and released him from the debt. The king’s mercy was huge, even overwhelming, given how huge the debt was. The king, of course, represents Jesus, and you and I are the man who owed an enormous debt. The debt represents human sinfulness.
Like the man in the story, we have a debt to God that is enormous and impossible to repay. Each one of us is a sinner. A major part of becoming a Christian believer is first realizing this fact. Before we can be saved, we must understand that we desperately need God’s mercy. Since the penalty for even one sin is death, there is nothing we can ever do ourselves to fix our sin problem. No amount of working hard to be good or trying hard to please God on our own merits will ever be enough to pay the debt we owe to God. It is impossible. Our only hope is God’s mercy.
The king in the story was extremely merciful. He forgave in full the debt that the man owed. This was undeserved and unprecedented. In terms of what God does to redeem sinners, Jesus took upon himself the consequences of our sin even though he had no sin of his own. He did this by dying upon a cross. His death to pay for our sin is the greatest expression of God’s mercy that is possible. There is an old song that some of you may know that gives voice to this idea:
I had a debt I could not pay,
He paid the debt He did not owe,
I needed someone,
To wash my sins away.
And now I sing a brand-new song,
“Amazing grace” all day long,
Christ Jesus paid the debt,
That I could never pay.
My point in relation to the Beatitude is that those who are part of God’s kingdom should show mercy to other people because God has first been overwhelmingly merciful to us. The fact that God has been merciful to me by forgiving my sins because of the death of Jesus is reason to have mercy on other people. If we look at the second half of the story which Jesus told about the king who had mercy, we find that the man who experienced mercy was supposed to then pass on that mercy to others.
“28 But when that same servant went out, he found one of his fellow servants who owed him a hundred denarii, and seizing him, he began to choke him, saying, ‘Pay what you owe.’ 29 So his fellow servant fell down and pleaded with him, ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay you.’ 30 He refused and went and put him in prison until he should pay the debt. 31 When his fellow servants saw what had taken place, they were greatly distressed, and they went and reported to their master all that had taken place. 32 Then his master summoned him and said to him, ‘You wicked servant! I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me. 33 And should not you have had mercy on your fellow servant, as I had mercy on you?’ 34 And in anger his master delivered him to the jailers, until he should pay all his debt. 35 So also my heavenly Father will do to every one of you, if you do not forgive your brother from your heart” (Matt. 18:28-35).
The unmerciful man lost the mercy he was given because he did not show mercy to his fellow servant. He shows us what NOT to do. God’s mercy has been made available to us and we are able to receive it through faith in Christ. But the unmerciful servant in the story did not grasp the magnitude of the king’s mercy. If he had he would have shown mercy to his fellow servant.
This does raise a question: Is showing mercy to others a requirement for receiving God’s mercy? I don’t think that this is the point of the story so much as showing mercy to others is the result of God’s mercy to us. The order is really important. We don’t earn salvation by doing good works. There is no amount of good works that could bring about our salvation. We do good works because God has saved us by the death and resurrection of Jesus. In light of this general truth, I can say that we don’t get God’s mercy by showing mercy, but we show mercy because we have already received God’s mercy. We should be careful not to confuse the order of these things. The right response to mercy from God is to show mercy to others. If we understand that we have received God’s mercy because of Christ, then we will show mercy to others.
The mercy that God has shown to us in Christ is totally undeserved. None of us has anything to give to God that he has not already given to us. There is nothing we can do to repay that mercy, nothing in us that would necessitate that God be merciful to us. But the nature of mercy is something unmerited, something undeserved. It is giving something good to someone who has not done anything to deserve it or earn it. When Jesus told us to be merciful to others, he did so on the basis that he has already been merciful to us.
This brings us to the question: What does mercy look like? I have already alluded to the fact that mercy involves forgiveness. But there is more to mercy than forgiveness. Jesus lived out mercy in his ministry. His healing ministry alleviated suffering. Two blind men asked Jesus for mercy and he gave them their sight back (Matt 9:27ff; another set of blind men in 20:30ff). A Canaanite woman asked for mercy and Jesus healed her daughter of demon-possession (Matt 15:22ff). A man whose son had epilepsy asked Jesus to have mercy on his son and Jesus cast out a demon and healed the boy (Matt 17:15-18). The demoniac whose demons were sent into a herd of pigs is described as someone on whom God had mercy (Mark 5:19), because his suffering was taken away.
It was not merely that Jesus alleviated human suffering. He also loved the people that others did not love. He ate with outcasts and sinners. “9 As Jesus went on from there, he saw a man named Matthew sitting at the tax collector’s booth. ‘Follow me,’ he told him, and Matthew got up and followed him. 10 While Jesus was having dinner at Matthew’s house, many tax collectors and sinners came and ate with him and his disciples. 11 When the Pharisees saw this, they asked his disciples, ‘Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?’ 12 On hearing this, Jesus said, ‘It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. 13 But go and learn what this means: “I desire mercy, not sacrifice.” For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners’” (Matt. 9:9-13 NIV). Jesus did not just hang about with those who thought themselves pious but also with the people who were rejected. Tax collectors were hated because they collected taxes for the Roman occupation and were considered traitors. They also collected extra money to line their own pockets. Jesus was found eating with these rejects in their homes. He knew what they were but loved them anyway. That is mercy.
We cannot necessarily heal every person who is sick the way that Jesus did, but we can alleviate human suffering. Human suffering is everywhere, even in a country like Australia. What kind of suffering do you see around you? Homelessness, poverty, emotional pain, loneliness. Sometimes we need to deliberately look for people who need mercy, like asylum seekers. There are ministries you could become involved in. But most of the time, you don’t need to go far to find people who need mercy. Talk to the lonely lady in the supermarket, help the homeless guy sitting on a park bench, care for your next-door neighbour, treat people who are different with dignity.
In conclusion, I will tell a couple of stories. I definitely don’t get this right all the time or possibly even most of the time. Therefore, I will include one good example and one terrible example for balance.
One day, I was on my way to the supermarket to do the grocery shopping and a homeless woman was sitting on the bench outside Woolworths. I thought to myself that I would give her some money. But a voice in my head, which I think was the Holy Spirit, said to me that she is a person and needs to be treated like a person. So I bought her some food, gave her some money and talked to her. She is not merely an object of charity but a human being whose story matters. I listened to her and chatted for a bit. I think this is more dignified than just receiving a handout in passing.
My second story is also about a homeless person. On this particular night, I was on the way to the Anglican Cathedral for my friend’s ordination and saw a homeless man on the street. I was in a hurry and did not stop to see what the homeless man might need. I felt convicted about how I had neglected the man in need. But on the way back to the train station, when church was over, the homeless man was gone and I had failed to show mercy.
I failed but God does not fail. His mercy has already been shown to us in Christ, who died for our sins. We have received mercy and so we strive to show mercy to others.