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Mercy . . . Me?
Mercy . . . Me?
I still have the first Bible I received after becoming a Christian in 1962. It was the old edition of the Scofield Reference Bible, and just about everyone in the independent Baptist church I called home used one. Like many believers of the day, I used the blank pages at the front and back of the Bible to write down various quotations from messages I heard.
One of those quotations has remained in my mind. I have no idea how to give credit to whomever originated the saying, but I’m grateful to him or her. It goes like this:
Jesus
Others
You
The acronym using the word joy offers at least one person’s suggestion about how to know true joy. The acronym also speaks to one practice that is central to our walk with the Lord Jesus. It’s the practice of mercy, or acts of compassion.
Choosing to follow Jesus places demands upon our lives. Jesus must come first. In His own words, Jesus told us that He did not come to be served but to serve. He focused on serving, usually those who were in the most need. He taught and modeled a humility that included putting others before Himself. That sounds very much like the acronym for JOY.
Compassion, acts of mercy, didn’t start with Jesus. It’s as old as the Law of Moses, and it was always a big deal with God. Micah may have put it in focus better than any of the prophets when he said,
He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the LORD require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God? (Micah 6:8 ESV)
The word kindness in Micah 6:8 is often translated mercy. Both words have the same idea: love doing gracious things for others, especially those who most need grace. God clearly expects us to invest our lives in acts of mercy, compassion, and grace.
The early church leaders may have seen two benefits of doing acts of mercy. First, they saw the need for new believers to live selflessly, to walk humbly with God. They may have also realized that learning to live with a “mercy mindset” reflected the heart and mind of Jesus. Learning to love kindness is learning to walk like Jesus.
We’ve seen the billboards urging us to do “Random acts of kindness.” That’s not a new thing. God thought of it several millennia ago. Our impetus for loving kindness doesn’t come off a billboard. It comes right from the heart of God.
What act of mercy might God want you or me to offer today in His name? – John Strain is Senior Pastor of First Baptist Toms River and a frequent Freedom Fighter contributor
Compass Pointers: In my twenty-seventh year, while riding the metro in Leningrad (now Petersburg) I was overcome with a despair so great that life seemed to stop at once, preempting the future entirely, let alone any meaning. Suddenly, all by itself, a phrase astonished: 'Without God life makes no sense.' Repeating it in astonishment, I rode the phrase up like a moving staircase, got out of the metro and walked into God's light. Adrei Bitov
Anchored to the Rock: God will do nothing on earth except in answer to believing prayer. – John Wesley
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