The Mercy of God

“Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God—this is your true and proper worship.”

- Romans 12:1

I’ve fallen in love with the mercy of God.

Too many of us rarely consider the riches of God’s mercy. Additionally, we have often confused mercy with grace. And so we have overlooked the beauty of God’s merciful love.

What do you think of when you think of mercy?

When I think of mercy, I think of a criminal being brought before a just king. The criminal has committed a horrible crime. A treason against the king that’s so deep it’s truly deserving of the death penalty. It would be right for the king to give him death—and no one would argue with him.

And as the sword is prepared to come down on him, the criminal cries out to the king for pardon. But, because the criminal has broken the law, the king has no obligation whatsoever to show him mercy. Knowing this, the criminal understands that if pardon were to come it would only be because the king was unthinkably merciful. Not because he deserved it in any way.

This is our relationship with God.

If we’re honest, many of us don’t feel we need mercy. We think, “Mercy for what? I need Jesus to save me from sin, of course. But mercy? I don’t know that I would put it that strongly.”

But Romans 6:23 says, “The wages of sin is death.”

To fully comprehend, we must understand the nature of “wages.” Wages are what you are rightfully owed for doing something. They are what you are due.

Imagine you were hired for a job that pays $15 an hour. On the first day, you work exactly one hour. But when your paycheck arrives, it’s only for $10. You would go to your employer and say, “This isn’t what you owe me! You owe me more than this. This isn’t right!”

Romans 6:23 is essentially saying that what sin is owed is death. That’s the correct payment. Anything less than that would be less than what we’re due. It wouldn’t be right.

Our sin is a far worse crime than we give it credit for. And biblical death isn’t simply physical. It’s also spiritual. The death our sins deserve is separation from God forever.

Now, here I want to pause. Maybe you’ve grown up in church and you’re thinking, “Luke, I get it. I’ve heard this a thousand times.” But I’m not asking if you’ve heard it. I’m asking if you know it in the depths of you. In your guts, you understand how badly you need mercy.

Because until we understand that death is what we’re rightfully owed, we’ll never think we need God’s mercy. But oh the joy that’s found in simultaneously knowing our need for mercy and knowing that God is willing to pour it out!

This is the beauty of the Gospel: to be utterly convinced of your need for mercy and, at the same time, utterly convinced of God’s willingness to give it.

In the words of Charles Spurgeon, “God's mercy is so great that you may sooner drain the sea of its water, or deprive the sun of its light, or make space too narrow, than diminish the great mercy of God.”

In the experience of God’s mercy, our hearts erupt into devotion. Now, offering our lives to God isn’t simply obligatory, but rather the longing of our hearts.

Show me someone who doesn’t long to give God everything and I will show you someone who doesn’t understand the depths of God’s mercy.