The Happiness Series: Part V
The Happiness Series: Part V
By Pastor Kent Munsey
March 21, 2021
Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy.
Matthew 5:7 (NIV)
In this verse we are called to become people who are merciful. This text is Jesus’s first recorded sermon, and it is setting up the most famous of Jesus’s messages, the Sermon on the Mount. As we follow Jesus’s teachings, we realize that we cannot do some of the things that Jesus instructs without first being whom he has called us to be. When we enter the kingdom of God, we are not just recipients of mercy; we become merciful people.
Merciful means to be full of mercy. God is not just merciful; he embodies mercy. God is also fully just. Justice means giving a person what they deserve. Mercy means not giving a person what they deserve. Grace means giving a person what he does not deserve. So, how can God give us what we deserve, and not give us what we deserve simultaneously? How can God be justice and mercy at the same time?
God doesn’t just do justice; he is just. Justice is giving people what they deserve according to how they measure up against the standard. There is a standard of righteousness. Often, we tend to think that if we do enough good, it will cancel out the bad. Or, some of us may feel that we have done so much bad, there is not enough good we can do to cancel out the bad.
What we are missing completely is the standard. God is righteousness, which means he is the highest standard of justice. The Bible says that our righteousness is like filthy rags to God. God is an eternal, infinite, immeasurable amount of righteousness and goodness. Our righteousness is like a feather on the scale of justice, even if we have been doing everything we can for God. We will always come up short, spiritually bankrupt and found wanting.
Often, we have a wrong view of mercy because we don’t fully understand what justice looks like. It is actually justice for God to send us to hell. It is mercy for him not to send us to Hell. It is grace that we get to go to Heaven. The Bible says, “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness (1 John 1:9 (NIV)).”
God is both justice and mercy. Psalm 136:1 says that God’s mercy endures forever. In other words, God would have to cease to exist for his mercy to run out. The cultural definition of mercy is to have or show compassion on the poor or guilty. From the Beatitudes, we know that we are poor and guilty before God. But, God is mercy in action. This mercy is available to us, and we are happy if we receive it and pass it on.
The cultural definition of mercy is to have or show compassion on the poor or guilty. We’ve learned from the Beatitudes that we are both poor and guilty. In religious culture at this time Jesus is speaking about mercy to a legalistic, law-abiding, arrogant, religious society. The political landscape of the day was Roman politics and power, and Rome was anything but merciful. The Roman culture was so brutal that it was legal at that time for fathers to take the lives of any of their children or servants who they felt were being rebellious. In this context, Jesus says that the merciful are blessed.
In our world today, we realize that just because we show mercy does not mean that we’re going to receive mercy. This verse means that if we show mercy, we will be happy, and we will obtain mercy. The Greek definition for mercy is to compassion-ate, which is a verb, not an adjective. This is the action in compassion. Jesus is mercy in action. He saw that the scales were tipped in a way that we could never actually live in harmony and in relationship with him, so in his justice, he sent his son to pay the price and take the judgment of our sin. When we are weighed and found guilty and wanting under God’s law, Jesus steps on the scale of our life, and God the Father sees that we are now justified through faith. Because of God’s mercy, we do not get what we deserve, but rather Christ took upon himself what we deserved so that we can receive mercy. If we want to be happy and godly, then we engage in the act of demonstrating mercy just as we have been shown mercy.
In the Greek the verse means to continue to receive and obtain mercy, because we are receiving it from an unending supply. Happy or blessed are those who “compassionate” for they will receive or obtain mercy. There are only two times we see this verb, “compassionate,” to put compassion into action, and one is in Matthew 5. It means to care for people who don’t deserve care, to fight for people who don’t deserve service. Happy are people who put action or legs to mercy for they will receive mercy from the one who is mercy. In Hebrews 2:17 the scripture describes Jesus as merciful, with the same verb: compassion in action. Jesus is our high priest, and he understands every temptation because he walked in our shoes. The word for merciful or compassionate is illustrated by the word picture to get into someone else’s skin. We might rephrase that in English as, “to walk in someone else’s shoes.” Jesus put on our skin and walked in our shoes, and because of that, he shows us mercy. He doesn’t give us what we deserve but instead he pours out his love and grace and gives us what we don’t deserve.
It is so easy for us to be harsh and judgemental when we have never walked in someone else’s shoes or considered what it’s like to be them, but we have a savior who demonstrated his love for us by acting in compassion and mercy and walking in our shoes and ultimately giving his life and paying the price for our sin. Because we have a God who is just, who is mercy, who is grace, then we can be merciful because we have been shown mercy.
Reflection/Discussion Questions:
1. When do you find it challenging to show mercy to others?
2. When was a time that someone showed you mercy you didn’t deserve?
3. How does your understanding of God’s mercy empower you to be more merciful toward others?
4. Who do you need to extend mercy to in your life?
5. How can you put compassion into action this week?