Billy Joe Daugherty - Mercy and Grace

Mercy and Grace

By

Billy Joe Daugherty

Contents

God Has Always Been a Merciful God

The Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in lovingkindness .

He will not always strive with us; neither will He keep his anger forever.

He has not dealt with us according to our sins, nor rewarded us according to our iniquities.

For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his lovingkindness toward those who fear him.

As far as the east is from the west, so far has He removed our transgressions from us.

Just as a father has compassion on his children, so the Lord has compassion on those who fear Him.

For He Himself knows our frame;

He is mindful that we are but dust.

As for man, his days are like grass; as a flower of the field, so he flourishes.

When the wind has passed over it, it is no more; and its place acknowledges it no longer.

But the lovingkindness of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting on those who fear Him, and His righteousness to childrens children;

To those who keep His covenant, and who remember His precepts to do them.

Psalm 103:8-18, NAS

God's mercy is often relegated to the New Testament under the ministry of Jesus. Many people see God in the Old Testament as a God of judgment, and they believe when Jesus came, God changed and became the God of mercy.

I have good news for you: GOD DOESN'T CHANGE! Malachi 3:6 says, "For I am the Lord, I change not..." He has always been a merciful God. The entire Bible speaks of mercy, not just the New Testament.

God Is Longsuffering Toward Us

In Genesis, when God created man and put him in the garden, scripture says everything He made was "very good" (Genesis 1:31). That was God's mercy. Man didn't merit or earn His mercy.

Then when Adam and Eve sinned, they were driven from the garden, but that was for their protection. If they had partaken of the fruit of the tree of life in the state they were in, they would have been eternally lost. God covered them and, in a sense, the covering was God's mercy.

Sometimes people think about the flood as judgment, but Noah preached for over 100 years while he was building the ark, and the Bible very clearly tells us the time frame was the mercy of God, giving the people a long period of time to repent. Noah was called "the preacher of righteousness." He preached an illustrated sermon every day!

All of the people could have helped Noah build the ark, and no doubt each person would have been allowed entrance into the ark before the flood if they had simply received the mercy of God.

In Peter 3:9, the scoffers and mockers were asking, "Where is the promise of Christ's coming? You New Testament Christians have been saying that He is coming soon." Peter answered that mocking statement: "The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to usward , not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance."

God's will is that not one person would be lost; therefore, He is longsuffering. The time until Jesus' return is a time for people to receive the mercy of God.

When the Israelites were in bondage in the land of Egypt, God, in His mercy, raised up a deliverer in Moses. Then when Joshua brought the Israelites into the promised land , we see God's mercy again. The people who loved the Lord obeyed Him and were blessed , but when they began to worship idols, they came under oppression and bondage. Finally, they repented and God raised up new deliverersSamson, Jephthah , Barak, Deborah and on and on, one after another.

Even though the Israelites were in rebellion, when they repented, God raised up a new deliverer. The mercy of God continually came on the Israelites. Years later, the Israelites asked for a king. The first king was Saul, then David and later Solomon. After Solomon, the kingdom split. The ten northern tribes became the nation of Israel, and the two southern tribes became Judah. We see the mercy of God upon these two groups of people.

Israel continually went into idolatry, but God sent the prophets to them. Remember the situation with Elijah and Ahab: the demonstration of the fire falling from heaven to show the people that the God of heaven was their God and that they weren't to worship Baal was God's mercy. Still, they turned backward and finally, the Assyrian army took the people captive and replaced what was known as Samaria with aliens and foreigners. The Samaritan religion came out of that mixture.

Judah was no different. God sent prophet after prophet to them. Eventually, they hardened their hearts and were carried into captivity by the Babylonians.

Many times we have the concept of the prophets only pronouncing judgment, but their message was, "There is mercy if you will turn to the Lord, but there will be divine judgment and destruction if you do not repent." They proclaimed the mercy of God to those who would repent.

O satisfy us early with thy mercy; that we may rejoice and be glad all our days.

Psalm 90:14

This Is an Age of Mercy

We are in an age of mercy right now. In fact, all of us have had mercy that we don't even know about. Ezekiel 18:20 says, "The soul that sinneth , it shall die.... " God said to Adam in Genesis

2:16 ,17 , "...Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat: But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die." Romans 6:23 says, "For the wages of sin is death...." Romans 3:10 says, "...There is none righteous, no, not one." Romans 3:23 says, "For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God."

On the basis of these verses, there isn't one of us who wouldn't have already been stamped out if God had judged us according to our sins. We would already have been roasted and toasted! But thank God, He has not rewarded us according to our sins nor dealt with us according to our iniquities. He has dealt with us on the basis of His mercy.

Every verse in Psalm 136 ends with, "...For his mercy endureth for ever." It is important that we understand God's mercy. Psalm 103:11 says, "For as the heaven is high above the earth, so great is his mercy toward them that fear him." To fear Him means "to reverentially worship, honor and obey God."

In one sense, every person on earth has benefitted from God's mercy. Wicked people still eat, they still have houses, and they still drink the water that is on the earth. That is God's mercy. He doesn't have any obligation to those who don't love Him, serve Him, or obey Him. God has a right on the basis of His commandments and the fact that He is a holy God to annihilate us the moment we sin. You may question, "Why hasn't He?" Because He is a merciful God!

Why does God extend His mercy? He is a good God. He is a merciful God. He lets it rain on the just and on the unjust. He sends His goodness upon all, yet only those who honor and reverence the Lord receive the full benefit of His mercy.

Salvation, deliverance, healing, love, joy, peace and righteousness come from God alone to those who meet His conditions for mercy. We can't earn the mercy of God. It is a gift.

Possibly you can explain the difference between love, lovingkindness , longsuffering, mercy and grace, but they are, in a sense, synonymous. They express the same truth, so I will speak of them as one and the same.

Scripture says grace and mercy have come to us in the person of Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ is the mercy and grace of God revealed from heaven so that we can have mercy and grace here in the earth and for all eternity.

Grace and mercy have come in Jesus Christ.

Salvation Comes Through God's Mercy