Blessed Are the Merciful

Blessed are the merciful, for they and they only shall receive Mercy Our outline is the same as it has been for the last four Beatitudes We are going to begin by defining the condition What does the Bible mean when it talks about mercy? And tonight I want to look at it specifically for you, and then comparatively, I want to compare it to some other terms to help you understand what mercy is

And hopefully, you'll leave with a better understanding as to this condition, its consequences, its characteristics, and of course, your course of action as you seek to show mercy to those who are unmerciful to you Number one, defining the condition, point A, specifically The word merciful, this word Used as an adjective is used only two times as an adjective in the New Testament Matthew 5, verse 7 Hebrews chapter 2, verse number 17, where it says that Jesus Christ, our merciful and high priest, Christ is the supreme illustration of mercy He healed the sick He healed the crippled

He gave sight to the blind He gave hearing to the deaf He wept with those in sorrow He comforted the lonely He had compassion that was not passive, but compassion that was very active Why? Micah 7:18 tells us, it says that God delighteth in mercy Boy, that's good, man God delights in mercy The verb form of this word mercy is used several times in the New Testament To have mercy on, to give help to the wretched, to rescue the miserable Mercy gives attention to those Who are in misery And whatever you do to benefit someone in need is an act of mercy Mercy goes beyond feeling the need

Mercy actually meets the need You know the story well It's Luke chapter 10 Christ gives the illustration about the Good Samaritan It follows a series of discussions between Christ and a lawyer Wh wanted to know what it meant to inherit eternal life? And Christ asked him, What was written in the law? What does it read to you? And he answered, You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, with all your strength, and with all your mind, and with your neighbor as yourself And he said to him, You have answered correctly Do this And you will live

But wishing to justify himself, he said to Jesus, Who is my neighbor? Who is my neighbor? Christ gives the parable of the Good Samaritan You know it well The point of the parable is: any in need is your neighbor And so when Christ asked him the question, after the priests passed by, after the Levite passed by, the man that was beaten on the side of the road, and the Samaritan went down, knelt down, nursed his wounds, took him to an inn, placed him there

Christ would then ask in verse number 36, which of these three do you think proved to be a neighbor? To the man who fell into the robber's hands? And he answered: The one who showed mercy That's the one The Good Samaritan was the man who helps us understand what mercy is all about You can walk by the person on the side of the road and feel bad for that person You can have some semblance of sorry for that person But unless you reach down and meet the need of that person, you have not shown mercy to that individual The lawyer knew that

So to Jesus, so Jesus said, Go and do the same. A clear understanding of mercy is seen better when we compare it with other qualities Understand this, that mercy exceeds forgiveness Mercy exceeds forgiveness Titus 3:5 According to his mercy, he saved us What made God save us? Well, according to Titus:, it's his mercy Ephesians 2, verses 4 to 5 says that God, who is rich in mercy, has made us alive in Christ Because of the abundance of his mercy, he has raised us up in Christ No doubt that mercy and forgiveness are linked together

Yet mercy is bigger because God is merciful to us when we don't sin, just as we can be merciful to somebody when they don't sin So mercy exceeds forgiveness, but mercy emanates From love Mercy exceeds forgiveness, but mercy emanates from love Ephesians chapter 2 Verse number four says this: But God being rich in mercy, because of his great love, with which he loved Us God's mercy emanates from His love Because He is a God of love, He therefore shows mercy to people who are in desperate need And although that mercy exceeds forgiveness, it emanates from the love of God

Love does a lot more than just show mercy Mercy presupposes a problem And love can act when there isn't a problem Love loves even when there is no wrong to forgive or no need To be met The Father loves the Son, and the Son loves the Father But there is no need for mercy from the Father to the Son or the Son to the Father Mercy exceeds forgiveness, yet mercy emanates from love And number three, but mercy, I like this one, escorts grace Mercy escorts grace There is a close relationship between grace Mercy They both go hand in hand

And Paul distinguishes them between them in 2 Timothy 1, verse 2, and 2 Timothy 1, verse 2 He mentions them as two separate things about grace and mercy, and peace be unto you But God, in His grace, gives me what I do not deserve, and in His mercy, He does not give me what I do deserve Mercy eliminates the pain, and grace grants a better condition Mercy deals with the consequences of sin Grace deals with the sin itself Mercy shows pity Grace Bestows pardon Mercy says, no hell Grace says, heaven You get that? And lastly, mercy emphasizes the just of God Mercy emphasizes God's justice

How? God's mercy says to the sinner this. I know you have rebelled against me. I know you have blasphemed my name. I know that you have challenged my authority But I love you And because I love you, I will be merciful unto you And because I am merciful unto you, therefore I will Forgive you Now, why can God do that? God can do that because He is completely just in doing so God can do that because He paid the price His justice requires for our sin by His death on the c You see, mercy never overrides the demands of justice Wrongdoing cannot ever be overlooked God can never overlook your sin

He had to pay for that sin You had to pay for that sin You could not pay for that sin So he paid for the sin The justice of God was satisfied at Calvary And because it was satisfied at Calvary, his justice then is em when he demonstrates mercy to those who should receive condemnation That's our God Folks, that's the condition That's mercy And Jesus says, Blessed are the merciful For they and they only obtain mercy Which is the point number two: describing the consequences Number one, mercy is received That's the positive The negative is this: mercilessness is Rebuked That's point number two

But number one, mercy is received Jesus said that if you are merciful, you will live a blessed life You will obtain mercy That does not mean if you are merciful to other people, they in turn are going to be merciful back to you Because Jesus was the most merciful person that ever lived Yet, when it came time to condemn him and to hang him on a tree, there was no mercy Shown to him by those that received mercy from him So, when Jesus says, Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy, he does not mean that you will obtain mercy from those in whom you show mercy to

Now, you might receive mercy from them But don't ever expect to receive mercy from someone that you bestow mercy upon So, what is Jesus saying? Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy Does that mean that in order for us to receive the mercy of God, we must be merciful to other people? No, because that would be contrary to what Other passages of scriptures teach about God's mercy being freely bestowed upon us because of His wonderful gift of grace and how He loves us uncond

So, to understand that mercy is a gift from God given to us at the new birth, it is only for those who have met the standards of the Beatitudes What it means is this Those who are truly God's children, those who have been objects of his mercy, will themselves be merciful and receive mercy In the end, show mercy is evidence that we ourselves have received mercy Did you get that? Showing mercy to someone else is the evidence that we ourselves have received mercy Follow this through very carefully

If you are not a merciful person, you then are portraying that you yourself have never received mercy How do I know that? Turn to Romans chapter 1 Paul spells it out very clearly for you as he describes the ungodly man Romans chapter 1, verse number 28 And just as they did not see fit to acknowledge God any longer, God gave them over to a depraved mind to do those things which are not proper Being filled with all unrighteousness, wickedness, greed, evil, full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malice, they are gossips, slanderers

Haters of God, insolent, arrogant, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, without understanding, untrustworthy, unloving, and what? Unmerciful The ungodly man is unmerciful So, whenever you are unmerciful to somebody else, guess what? You portray un Because the character of a godly person Is to bestow mercy upon those people who are in desperate need of a helping hand Do you follow me so far? Listen very carefully Second Samuel 22:2 With the merciful, thou will show thyself merciful You see, God shows him merciful to those who are merciful

Why? Because you see, they have received mercy from God And the only way you can be merciful to somebody else is because you have received mercy from God The ungodly man can't do that The ungodly man bestows no mercy Now he might do some good deeds, he might help the poor He might build a house to help the drug addicts He might give money to help other people out But is that showing mercy? Not according to God's standard, it's not Because you see, to show mercy, it's going to cost you much grief and much pain And those who are ungodly are un people by nature Those who are godly are merciful

By nature So mercy is received, that's the blessing But mercilessness Is rebuked It's rebuked James 2:1 for judgment will be merciless To one who has shown no mercy Psalm 109, verses 14 and 16 Let the iniquity that is the mercilessness Of his fathers be remembered before the Lord, and do not let the sin of his mother be blotted out Let them be before the Lord continually, that he may cut off their memory from the earth Because he did not remember to show mercy or loving kind, but persecuted the afflicted and needy man and the despondent in the heart to put him to death

God says, Look, man, if somebody's in need, you have got to forgive them You cannot withhold forgiveness You cannot withhold loving kind You cannot withhold mercy from someone else After I have bestowed so much mercy upon you for a debt you could never pay That's the point Let's move on We'll explain this in more detail here in a moment By detailing the characteristics of how do you show mercy upon someone Two ways I want to show you: number one, physically, and number two, spiritually On how you bestow mercy upon someone else First of all, physically You show mercy to someone

Let me demonstrate it this way: Christ did in a parable, Matthew 25 He said, Depart from me, because when I was hungry, you did not feed me When I was thirsty, you did not give me anything to drink When I was naked, you did not clothe me And when I was in prison, you did not visit me And they say, well, Lord, when did we see you hungry? When did we see you thirsty? When did we ever see you in prison? And, Lord, God forbid, when did we ever see you naked? And God said, when you didn't do it to the least of these my brethren, you did not do it as unto me

You see, you demonstrate mercy by feeding those who are hungry You demonstrate mercy by clothing those who are naked, by visiting those who are in prison Someone who is in need, you tangibly, physically, actively meeting that need That is mercy That is compassion in act And that's what Jesus did Proverbs 14:2: He who despises his neighbor sins, but he who has mercy on the poor, happ is he

John would say over in 1 John 3, verse number 17, if you see your brother who has a need and you shut up your bowels of compassion, he asked the question, how dwelleth the love of God in you? Making it a question that says, You can't tell me that God's love dwells in you when you see a brother who is in desperate need of your assistance And you shut up the bowels of compassion to meet that need Why? Because you see, God was merciful, and God expects his children to show mercy Upon others So you show mercy to people physically, but you also show it to them spiritually

Thomas Watson in his book on the Beatitudes quotes St Augustine and he says these words, If I weep for the body from which the soul is departed, how should I weep for that soul for which God is departed? The point being is that a merciful person weeps for those who are unsaved We go to a funeral and we weep for those who have died Why? Because the soul has departed from the body But do we weep for those who have not God in their body? You see? That's the point And so we show mercy to people spiritually when we pray for their salvation, when we preach the good news of the gospel

In fact, the greatest way you can show mercy upon someone is to show them the God of all mercy who died for their sins They somehow might obtain that mercy It says over in Acts 7, verse number 60, that Stephen pitied the souls of lost men, and as they began to stone him, he would pray, Lord, lay not this sin against their charge Jesus would say something very similar in Luke 23:3 when he said, Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they do That 's meeting the need spiritually So, what do we do? Where do we go from here? What's my course of action? Let's determine that Four things

Number one Experience mercy Experience mercy Have you experienced the mercy of God? Peter would say over in 1 Peter chapter 1, verse number 3, these words: 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 through the resurrection of Jesus Christ From the dead to obtain an inheritance which is imperishable and undefiled and will not fade away, res in heaven for you who are protected by the power of God

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who, according to his great mercy, have you received, have you experienced the mercy of God? Psalm 103, verse 11 records these words, As the heaven is high above the earth, so great is his mercy toward them that f him That's how great his mercy is As high as the heaven is above the earth Have you experienced the mercy of God? If you have not, you cannot show mercy to someone else It is spiritually impossible to do so But if you have, point number two, you need to extend mercy to someone else

Luke 6:3 says, Be ye therefore merciful as your Father also is merciful Memorize that verse Put that one into practice tomorrow Be ye therefore merciful, even as your F in heaven is merciful You see, here is the way that above all other ways is your number one opportunity to demonstrate God to other people Because God is seen at his greatness when mercy is at stake, when forgiveness is at stake The Christian is at his greatest point when it comes to Christ-, when he has the opportunity to bestow forgiveness on another brother who has so desperately wronged his life

That's when you can display God Now, if you're not interested in displaying God, if you're not interested in showing other people who God is and what God is really like, then don't forgive your brother Be unmerciful But remember, it's the ungodly that's unmerciful, not the godly So experience it If you have If you experience the greatness of the mercy of God, then extend it to those in need Number three, exemplify mercy Exemplify it Psalm: The wicked borroweth and payeth not again, but the righteous showeth mercy and give

Ephesians 3. 19 says that we are to be filled with all the fullness of God, and when we are filled with his fullness, guess what? That includes his mercy His mercy We're filled with all of who God is, and that should be all of our objective That should be our passion, should it not? To be full of God So much of God that His mercy is there His holiness is there His love is there His justice is there His righteousness is there Everything about God is there so that when we reach out to extend it, it's exemplified Fight in all that we do And lastly, I like this one the best

Not only do you need to experience it Not only do you need to extend it, and not only do you need to exemplify it as you extend it, but you need to exclaim it as well Exclaim, mercy It means to cry out in pleasure The verse, Psalm 59, verse 16, I will sing aloud of thy mercy That's exclaiming mercy. I will sing aloud of thy mercy Lamentations 3:2 It is of the Lord's mercies That we are not consumed

Therefore, I will scream al to everybody about the mercy of God. I will exclaim it from the highest rooft with the loudest of all voices. I will sing it to the To the nth degree, as loud as I can, because it's because of His mercies that I'm not consumed Every one of us here today should have been consumed at the point of conception because we were conceived In iniquity, but it's because of God's mercy He allowed us to go through the nine-month womb Allowed us to be born Allowed us to live We live only because of his mercy For without it, we'd be consumed. I close with this

Psalm 108 says this: My heart is steadfast, O God. I will sing, I will sing praises even with my soul Awake, harp, and leer. I will awaken the dawn. I will give thanks to thee, O Lord, among the peoples, and I will sing praises to thee among the nations For thy mercy is great above the heavens, and thy truth reaches to the skies Is that you? Is that your attitude? Will you leave this place shouting and exclaiming the mercy of God after all He's done for you?