Judgment and mercy don’t seem to go together. This thought
has been plaguing me for the last 3 weeks. Judgment has such harsh connotations
and seems to contradict the very idea of mercy. Yet, according to God, you can
have, and practice, both at the same time.
Micah 6:8 says “He has told you, O man, what is good; and
what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and love mercy, and walk
humbly with your God?”
It’s my belief that the end of that verse tell you how to
successfully accomplish the first part: if you are walking humbly with God,
then you will understand how to “do justice and love mercy”. I cannot help but think about the fact that
those things were accomplished first by God.
Justice required death for the payment of our sins. Mercy was offered by
Him sending His very own Son as payment for those sins. Romans 6:23 – “For the
wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus
our Lord.”
It didn’t take us humans long after God made us before we
thought we were above the law. (See Genesis 3) We broke the law of our own free
will, ironically because we felt like we were” justified” in our determination
to know more than what we felt like God was telling us! We were warned ahead of
time that the payment for breaking that law was death and separation from God,
and yet, we did it anyway. God rightly could have only meted out justice. It’s
all that we deserved. But he showed mercy. God showed mercy by doing whatever
it took to reconcile us to him. He humbled himself, became man in Jesus,
sacrificed himself to save us, to reconcile us while we were still in our
undeserving state. That’s mercy.
Philippians 2:8 “And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.”
And because he showed us mercy, our hearts were moved to repentance and love. Justice didn’t move us to repentance. Mercy, in the face of justice, moved us to repentance, because of a humbled act of sacrifice.
See. They all three work together well. But separately,
the result would not have been the same. One without the other, well, you can’t
see God in that. Only through all three
do you see God’s grace. And we are
called to offer that same thing to others.
Psalm 51:17 "My sacrifice is a humble spirit, O God; you
will not reject a humble and repentant heart."
Is it easy? NO.
I don’t think you heard me.
NO!
It’s so hard. But it’s so rewarding.
The peace and joy and contentment that follow are
amazing. And, honestly, I feel like it’s in those moments of humbleness and
mercy that we truly get a glimpse of what perfect reconciliation with God is
like. We feel compete again. And two seconds later, when we make another
mistake, that’s ok. Because God is there, offering us His unending mercy,
drawing us back to himself. Calling us
to shake off those chains of justice, and put on his freedom.
And we are to offer that same mercy to EVERYONE around us
the same. No matter what they do. Just like WE are a work in progress through
God’s mercy, that concept is a work in progress. God does clearly tell us time and again in
His Word how to work on it though!
Colossians 3:12-15
“Put on therefore, as the elect of
God, holy and beloved, bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness,
longsuffering; Forbearing one another, and
forgiving one another, if any man have a quarrel against any: even as Christ
forgave you, so also do ye.
And above all these things put on
charity, which is the bond of perfectness.And let the peace of God rule in your hearts, to the which also ye are called in one body; and be ye thankful.”
When someone hurts you, or wrongs
you, and you don’t feel like they deserve your kindness or forgiveness or
mercy, well, that’s when they need it most. I like how the verses above say
that charity (or love) is the “bond of perfectness”. When I think of bonding I think of gluing
something together, fixing something that’s broken…reconciling.
No matter what’s broken in our
lives, through Christ and his example, it can be “bonded” if we are willing to
humble ourselves.
