Happy Are the Merciful

Matthew 5:7

Turn with me to Matthew Chapter 5 and we'll continue our study in the Beatitudes.  And let's read through the first 12 verses.  "And seeing the multitudes, He went up into a mountain and when He was seated, His disciples came unto Him and He opened His mouth and taught them saying.  Blessed are the poor in the spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.  Blessed are they that mourn for they shall be comforted.  Blessed are the meek for the shall inherit the earth.  Blessed are they who do hunger and thirst after righteousness for they shall be filled.  Blessed are the merciful for they shall obtain mercy.  Blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God.  Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the sons of God.  Blessed are they who are persecuted for righteousness sake for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.  Blessed are ye when men shall revile you and persecute you and shall all men are of evil against you falsely for my sake.  Rejoice and be exceedingly glad for great if your reward in heaven for so persecuted they the prophets who were before you."

If you've been with us for our study of Matthew, you know that this is the manifesto of the king.  Matthew presents Jesus Christ as king and here we hear the king present the manifesto of His kingdom.  Now we've been saying that this is a twofold presentation.  Our Lord is telling the truth about how you enter His kingdom and how you live while you're in His kingdom.  Only the poor in spirit enter.  Only the mourners enter.  Only the meek enter.  Only those who hunger and thirst after righteousness enter.  And once they enter, they continue to be poor in spirit, mournful, meek, and hungering and thirsting after even more righteousness.

And here we come to the fifth, verse 7, "Blessed are the merciful for they shall obtain mercy."  Beloved, I would say again, it's the same twofold thing.  In order to be in God's kingdom, you must be one who seeks mercy.  And when you are in God's kingdom, you will be one who gives mercy to others.  In other words, mercy is also a character, a characteristic of those in God's kingdom, being merciful.

Now the religion that Jesus faced in His day was shallow and superficial and external.  And we learn that the Lord was looking at a kind of Judaism which was very, very much ritualistic and on the outside not the inside.  The Jewish leaders thought they were secure and that they would surely be inhabiters of the kingdom.  They thought they surely would be the leading ones in Messiah's rule because they had a certain formalized, external, self-righteous religion.  They were proud, they were indifferent, they were selfish, they were self-seeking, and they believed that because of their superficial acts of "righteousness" they would surely be the choice ones.  But the fact of the matter is there was nothing happening on the inside.

In fact, our Lord said to these same people "on the outside you're white and clean, but on the inside, you're full of dead men's bones."  And that is why back in Chapter 3, if you'll note for a moment when John the Baptist arrived upon the scene.  His message was very directed to this issue.  In verse 7 of Chapter 3 when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees come for baptism, he said to them, "Oh generation of vipers who hath warned you to flee from the wrath to come.  Bring forth therefore fruits be fitting repentance."  In other words, they had the external, but they didn't have the stuff on the inside that indicates real repentance.  "And think not say within yourselves, we have Abraham as our father."

In other words, don't count on your external racial identity to save you.  "I say unto you, God is able out of these stones to raise up children unto Abraham, but now also the ax is laid to the root of the tree, therefore, every tree which bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down and cast into the first.  I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance, but he who cometh after me is mightier than I who's shoes I am not worthy to bear.  He shall baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire.  Whose fan is in His hand and He will thoroughly purge His floor and gather His wheat into the grainery, but He will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire."

Now John the Baptist was speaking of judgment.  He was speaking of a tremendous judgment of fire that would come on those who had nothing more than an external religion.  Who were going through the religious motions, but had none of the eternal reality.  That was to be judged by God.  The ax was falling.  The fire was beginning to burn.  And Jesus confronts this external self-righteous, selfish crowd of Jewish leaders and people as well and says to them, what really matters is what is on the inside.  The poor in spirit, the mourners, the meek, those who hunger and thirst after righteousness, the merciful, the pure at heart, the peacemakers.  Those are all internal qualities.  He bypassed all of the supposed credits that they had mounted to their own cause on the outside and went right to the heart of the matter.

Jesus Christ always puts the emphasis on the inside.  Oh He's not unconcerned with action.  He is concerned with action, but only as it is produced by what's inside.  The fruit of righteousness on the inside will produce the right action.  But you can falsify the action without the reality, and that's legalism.  What Christ wants is true action based on true attitude.  Jesus wants action that springs from right character.  And by the way, from the 6^th Chapter right through the 7^th Chapter of the Sermon on the Mount, it all deals with action.  It all deals with things we do or say or things we think.

But the premise on which it's all built is the right kind of heart attitude and that's what He's talking about here.  Martin Lloyd-Jones has well put it this way, "A Christian is something before he does something."  "A Christian is something before he does something."  To be a child of the king, to be a subject of the kingdom is first of all, to possess a certain kind of character.  A character of brokenness, a character of mourning over sin, a character of meekness, a character of hunger and thirst for righteousness, a character of mercifulness, a character of purity of heart, a character of a peacemaker.

You see, we are not meant to control our Christianity.  Our Christianity is meant to control us.  And legalism is us controlling Christianity.  The true spirituality is our Christianity controlling us and that's what Jesus was after.  He didn't want us to control certain external activities.  He wanted God in us to control those.  And so the principles that Jesus gives here are not superficial, they're not on the edge of life, they're deep down inside. 

And being a true Christian means there can be no veneer.  There can be no fasad.  Christianity is something that happens to us at the very center of our being and then it controls the very heart and from there it flows out to the activities of life.  God has never been interested in superficiality.  God has never been interested in only the blood of bulls and goats.  God has never been interested in all of the meaningless spiritual activity unless the heart is right.  And I go back to Amos Chapter 5 so often in my mind where God says, "Stop your worship and stop your sacrifices and stop your music, your hearts are not right."  And that's what God is always after.

God is concerned with the motives, the insides that produce the right external acts.  Now let's go back to Matthew 5 and see where we are.  Jesus confronted a bunch of externalists with some devastating statements.  He hits them right at the most vulnerable place in the first Beatitude when he says, "What you need to do is be spiritually bankrupt.  You need to recognize that you are destitute and debauched beggars who have nothing good to bring to God you're only hope is that you would see the beggarliness of your condition and that you would cower in the darkness of a corner and reach out a hand as a beggar who couldn't do anything for himself."  And boy that was really obtuse to those Jewish people.

And then He says further, "You must not be glad and satisfied about your self-righteousness.  You must weep great tears about your sinfulness.  You must be a mourner.  Further, you must not be proud because you have kept certain laws.  You must be meek before a holy God.  Not only that, you must not be smug about your self-righteousness, but you must realize you are starving a lack of righteousness and you must hunger and thirst for that."

Now let me kind of connect this to number 5 in the Beatitudes.  These first four Beatitudes were entirely inner principles.  They dealt entirely with an inner attitude.  They dealt entirely with what you see of yourself before God.  But now as He comes to the fifth Beatitude, this while being also an inner attitude, begins to reach out and touch others.  There is a manifestation in this that is the fruit of the other four.  Where it is true of us that we are broken as beggars in our spirit, that we are mournful and meek and hungering and thirsting after righteousness we will find ourselves being merciful to others as a result of it.

Someone has said, "They who in their poverty of spirit acknowledge their need of mercy begin to show mercy to others.  They who mourn their sin begin while they mourn to wash their hearts clean so they are also the pure in heart.  And the meek are the ones who are always making peace.  And they who hunger and thirst for righteousness are ever willing to be persecuted for righteousness sake."  Do you see how the first four line up with the last four?  The first four are the inner attitudes and the last four are the things they manifest.  Where there is poverty of spirit, then you realize you're nothing but a beggar.  You're going to be willing to give to somebody else who's nothing but a beggar and so you'll be merciful.

And where you are mourning over your sin, you will wash your heart pure with the tears of penitence and you will be the pure in heart.  And where you are meek, you will always be a peacemaker, because meekness makes peace.  And where you are hungering and thirsting for righteousness, you will be willing to be persecuted for righteousness sake.  So we've made a transition now.  Now we're going to talk about the character that is manifest when that inward attitude is there in the first four Beatitudes.

When you have those first four, there are going to be four characteristics of your character that will be made manifest, and we'll see them as we study these last four areas in this wonderful introduction.  Now let's look at what it means to be merciful.  Verse 7, Jesus said, "Blessed are the merciful for they shall obtain mercy."  And as we look at this one simple statement, I want you to know people this is so profound that there's no way that I can begin to cover it all.

You know, it's very simple to preach when you just have a little bit of material, because you hit your point and hit your point and hit your point and expand it a little bit and you're okay.  But when you've got just a Bible full of material, it's very difficult to pick out what's best.  This concept of mercy runs from one end of the scripture to the other.  From one end of God's history since the fall of man to the time of the consummation.  It is a gigantic reality, but I want to see if we can draw together at least four aspects of mercy for our study tonight.

Four aspects, the significance, the source, the substance, and the sequel; significance, source, substance, sequel.  What is the significance?  In other words, what does it mean to be merciful?  It says in verse 7, happy or "Blessed are the merciful."  What does it mean?  Boy I'll tell you to begin with that was a literal jolt to the Jews of that day.  They were merciless and the Romans of that day were merciless.  They were very proud, egotistical, self-righteous, condemning, they look down on others.  And what Jesus was saying really touched the inside need of their hearts. 

Now, you know, there are a lot of people who've tried to use this Beatitude in kind of a humanistic way and you hear people say well, blessed are the merciful for they shall obtain mercy and they use kind of like a human virtue.  Well, if you're good to everybody else, then everybody else will be good to you.  You know, Shakespeare in the Merchant Of Venice has a speech given by Porsche.  I remember seeing this when I was in college.  And Porsche says this, "The quality of mercy is not strained.  It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven upon the earth beneath.  It is twice blessed.  It blesses him that gives and him that takes.  Tis mightiest in the mightiest it becomes the throned monarch better than his crown."

Shakespeare says it is the most becoming thing a king can wear to be merciful.  Now even the Talmud recognizes that there's some sort of magnanimous human virtue in mercy.  And the Talmud says that Gamaliel said this, "Whenever thou hast mercy, God will have mercy upon thee.  And if thou hast not mercy, neither will God have mercy on thee."  And it seems to be sort of built into human thinking that if you're just good to everybody, everybody will be good to you.  Or if you are good toward God, God will be good toward you.  Now that's more true.  I'm not sure about the first one.

Now you hear people who want to raise money.  You say well, if you'll send us money, I'll promise you you'll get it back.  Many people see this is some kind of a give and take and even people who look at it theologically like Gamaliel did, apart from Shakespeare, who looked at it purely humanly, think well if I do this for God, God's going to do this for me.  You know, it's like you're putting God on the spot.  One writer paraphrase the verse by saying this, "This is the great truth of life.  If people see us care, they will care."  Want to bet? 

Unfortunately, it's not that simple.  It's far more than a human platitude.  I agree with Gamaliel.  If you bring God into it, there is a certain reciprocation.  If we are honoring to God, God will care for us.  But the world doesn't work that way believe me.  In fact, the Roman world didn't know the meaning of mercy.  In fact, if you want to hear what they thought of it, all you have to do is recall that the Roman philosopher said, "Mercy is 'the disease of the soul.'"  In other words, mercy was a sign of weakness.  Mercy was a sign that you didn't have what it takes to do what really should be done.  The Romans glorified justice and the glorified courage and they glorified discipline and the glorified power and they looked down on mercy, because mercy was a sort of a weak thing to do to show somebody mercy.

When a child was born into the world, the father had the right of patria potestas.  He could take the child and they could just...they would hold the child up and if you wanted the child to live he held his thumb up.  If he wanted the child to die, he held it down.  The child, if the thumb went down, was immediately drown.  There was no mercy.  If a Roman citizen didn't want his slave anymore, he could take out a knife and kill his slave and bury him and there was no recourse.  So you see if you're talking about Roman society, that kind of platitude doesn't cut it.

It is simply the idea that if you're merciful to everybody then everybody's going to be merciful to you.  That's wishful thinking in a Roman society and I'll tell you something else.  It's wishful thinking in our selfish grasping competitive society.  You know, in our society we could say you be merciful to somebody else and they'll step on your neck.  That doesn't always work.  But the best illustration of the fact that it's not just a human platitude is our Lord Jesus Christ.  He proves once and for all that it isn't a human platitude.  Jesus Christ came into the world and was the most merciful human being that ever lived.

Jesus Christ came into the world and never did anything to harm anybody, never.  Jesus Christ came into the world, He reached out to the sick and He healed them.  And He reached out to the crippled and He gave them legs to walk.  And He reached to the eyes of the blind and they saw and to the ears of the deaf and they heard and to the mouths of the dumb and the spoke.  And He found the prostitutes and the tax collectors and those that were debauched and drunken and He drew them into the circle of His love and He redeemed them and He set them on their feet.  He picked up the sorrow and He wept with them and He took the lonely and He made them feel like they were loved.  And He took little children and He gathered them into His arms and He loved them.  Never was there a human being who ever lived in the face of the earth with the mercy of this one.

Once He was going along the streets and funeral procession came by and He saw a mother weeping because her son was dead, and who would care?  No son, no husband.  And Jesus reached out in the midst of the funeral procession, stopped the casket, put His hand on it, and raised the child from the dead and gave him back to his mother.  In John Chapter 8 some men had caught a woman in adultery and they dragged that women into the presence of Jesus and He looked at that woman after He had talked with her and after He'd confronted her accusers and He forgave her and He said, "neither do I condemn thee, go and sin no more."  What mercy.

He ate with tax collectors.  He ate with sinners.  And when the scribes and Pharisees saw Him eat with the tax collectors and the sinners in Mark Chapter 2, verse 16, they said to His disciples, "how is it that He eats and drinks with publicans and sinners?"  He runs around with the rift-raft.  From start to finish the life of the blessed Lord Jesus was one of constant mercy.  He was merciful to everyone.  Listen, I'm telling you something people, mercy given doesn't mean mercy returned.  You can't work that human platitude in Jesus' case.  You know what, He was the most merciful human being that ever lived and they screamed for His blood and they slammed Him to a cross and they nailed Him there.

That's not a human platitude.  It doesn't make it.  That's not what it's talking about.  If mercy carried it's own reward, they wouldn't have nailed the most merciful being that ever lived to a cross and spit in His face and cursed Him.  The most merciful one whoever lived received from the people to whom He gave mercy no mercy at all.  Two merciless systems, the Roman system and the Judaistic system united to kill Him.

All you have to do is look at Rome and you can see how merciless they were.  Look at the Caesar's, the totalitarianism of unmerciful Rome was joined by intolerance of a merciless religious system to which Jesus was a threat.  And they took His life.  No, mercy talked about here is not some human virtue that brings it's own reward.  That's not the idea.  It isn't that you'll be merciful to others and they'll be merciful to you.  No, no, you say well what then does the Lord mean?  What is the significance? 

Well, beloved, just simply said, it's this.  You be merciful to others and God will be merciful to you.  That's what it's saying.  God is the subject of the second phrase.  God will give you mercy.  We're not talking about something that's human.  Now let's look at the word itself and we'll say more about that.  Let's look at the word merciful.  Eleemones, the word is only used twice in the entire New Testament.  Once it is used here and once it is used in Hebrews Chapter 2 and verse 17.  And there it says, "Wherefore in all things in behooved him to be made like his brethren that he might be a merciful and faithful," what, "high priest."  Christ is the great illustration of mercy.

He is our high priest who intercedes for us.  And it is from Him that mercy comes.  The verb form, however, is used many, many times in the Bible.  It is very, very common.  It is common in the Old Testament Septuagint, the Greek edition.  The Hebrew synonym would be kesev and it is also very common.  The word simply means to have mercy on, now listen, to succor the afflicted to give help to the wretched and to rescue the miserable.  It's a very broad idea.  Anything you do that is of benefit to someone in need, that's mercy.  Very broad idea, we think of mercy so much in terms of its aspect of forgiveness in salvation, but it's a very broad term.  It means compassion in action.

It goes beyond compassion.  It goes beyond sympathy.  I means compassion in action, sympathy in action towards anyone who has any need.  And when our Lord talks about it here, the real eleemones, the real stuff, is not a weak sympathy which carnal selfishness feels, but never does anything to help.  It is not that false mercy which really indulges its own flesh in salving of conscience by giving tokenism.  It is not the silent passive pity which could be genuine but never seems to be able to help in a tangible way.  It's not any of those superficial things.  It is genuine compassion with a pure unselfish motive that reaches out to help somebody in need.  That's what it is.

In other words, Jesus was saying to them, the people in my kingdom aren't takers, they're givers.  The people in my kingdom aren't condemners, they're mercy givers.  They people in my kingdom aren't the ones who set themselves above everybody, they're the people who stoop to help everybody.  And by such words, Jesus was hitting them right where they were.  They were elevating themselves, self-righteous, they wouldn't bother to give anything to anybody.  In fact, there's one story Jesus tells about a man who wouldn't even give the necessary funds to care for the life of his mother and father because he said, oh, I've already devoted it to God in a religious act and I dare not break my vow to God.  And our Lord said you are in deep trouble.  You have exchanged the commandment of God to honor your father and mother for a tradition you've invented yourself, and they were good at it.

They were merciless even to their own parents.  But our Lord says if you're a member of His kingdom, you're going to be merciful, full of mercy.  It doesn't just mean to sympathize.  It doesn't just mean to feel compassion.  It means to actually get in the skin of another person.  To actually get right in and think their thoughts and feel their emotions and then care for them in a very tangible way.  Mercy is when I see a man without food and I give him food.  Mercy is when I see a person begging for love and I give them love.  Mercy is when I see someone lonely and I give them my presence.  Mercy is meeting the need, not feeling it.  It goes beyond that. 

Now let me compare it with several words so you'll understand it's significance.  First of all, mercy and forgiveness, I'd like to compare those two words.  Would you think with me about that?  Mercy and forgiveness, is mercy forgiveness, is forgiveness mercy, and how are the distinct?  Now I want you to keep your hats on and think with me, okay?  In Titus 3:5, it tells us that "by His mercy or according to His mercy He saved us."  So that's important now.  Mercy then is an element that is there at salvation.  In Ephesians Chapter 2, it tells us that "God who is rich in mercy has redeemed us, made us alive."  So mercy is behind the scenes in salvation.  It is God's mercy that makes Him save us.  It is God's mercy that allows Him to redeem us.  So mercy is behind forgiveness.  No question.

So we do want to talk about mercy and forgiveness together because they belong together.  In Daniel Chapter 9, I think it's verse 9, I'm guessing, so I hope I'm right, but Daniel 9:9, "To thee," yes, "to the Lord our God," and I love this, "belongs," listen, "mercies and forgivenesses."  Isn't that good?  It links them together.  So mercy and forgiveness do belong together.  Psalm 130, by the way, also beautifully and wonderfully links those same things.  "Out of the depths have I cried unto thee oh Lord.  Lord, hear my voice, let thine ears be attentive to the voice of my supplication if thou Lord shouldest mark iniquities oh Lord, who shall stand," this is a confession of sin, "but there is forgiveness with thee that thou mayest be feared.  I wait for the Lord and my soul doeth wait.  And in His word do I hope.  My soul waiteth for the Lord more than they that watch for the morning.  I say more than they that watch for the morning.  Let Israel hope in the Lord, for with the Lord there is mercy."

Now here's an individual confessing sin, seeking forgiveness and knowing that forgiveness comes from the fountain of mercy.  So mercy and forgiveness are linked.  We cannot think of mercy without its expression and forgiveness.  We cannot think of forgiveness without its source mercy.  But, listen people, forgiveness is not the only expression of mercy.  Don't narrow down mercy to just a so tieriological thought or a salvation reality.  Mercy is infinitely bigger than just forgiveness.  That's part of it.  But listen Psalm 119:64 says, "The earth is full of thy mercy."  Genesis 32:10, "I am not worthy of the least of all the mercies."  2 Samuel 24:4, "Thy mercies are great."  Nehemiah 9:19, "Thy manifold mercies."  Psalm 69:13, "The multitude of thy mercies.  So mercies are far larger than just forgiveness.

Forgiveness is an act of mercy, yes.  But there is much more.  I can be merciful to someone when I forgive.  But there are many other ways I can be merciful that don't necessarily involve forgiveness.  In Lamentations, maybe the most beautiful of all the passages, it says this, "It is because of the Lord's mercies that we are not consumed because His compassions fail not, they are new," how often, "every morning great is thy faithfulness."  God's mercies are infinite.  But what about mercy and love, how do they compare?

We're getting now a definition.  We're dealing with the significance of mercy.  That's point one.  How do we compare it with love?  Well, let's back up.  Forgiveness flows out of mercy, mercy flows out of what?  Love.  Why has God been merciful?  It is based on love.  But God who is rich in mercy why?  For His great love where with He loved us.  You see the sequence?  God loves and love is merciful and mercy is forgiving among many other things.  And so love is behind mercy, but love is bigger than mercy.

You can imagine this.  You say, now wait a minute you said mercy was bigger than forgiveness.  That's right.  Mercy is bigger than forgiveness and love is bigger than mercy.  Because love can do a lot of things, a lot more than just show mercy.  Because mercy presupposes a problem and love can act when there isn't a problem, right?  The Father loves the Son, the Son doesn't need mercy.  The Son loves the Father and the Father doesn't need mercy.  The Father loves the angels and the angels love the Father and neither one of them need mercy.  Love is bigger than mercy.  Mercy is the physician.  Love is the friend.  Love acts out of affection, mercy acts out of need.  Love is constant, mercy is reserved for times of trouble.  But there's no mercy without love.  But love is bigger than mercy.

It's a tremendous thought isn't it?  You see how God's great love funnels down to our need under the category of mercy.  There's a whole other category too when we're righteous and don't need mercy, he still loves us.  He'll love us throughout all eternity, we don't need mercy anymore.  But love funnels down to us in this life through mercy and mercy narrows down to that one thought of forgiveness, but it's much broader than that too.

Could I add one more thought or maybe two?  What about mercy and grace?  People say well is mercy like grace and is grace like mercy?  Well, yes and no.  Now listen, you're going to really get a theological exercise so hang on.  The term mercy and all of its derivatives, listen, always deal with elements of pain and misery and distress.  Always the result of sin.  Whether it's individual sin or just the sin of the world, just the problem of being in a sinful world.  You see, mercy always presupposes problems.  It deals with the pain and the misery and the distress.  But grace deals with the sin itself.

Mercy deals with the symptoms, grace deals with the problem.  You see mercy offers relief from punishment.  Grace offers pardon for the crime.  You understand?  First comes grace and grace removes the sin and then mercy eliminates the punishment.  They're different.  You know, in three of his letters and he never does it in a letter to a church, he only does it in letters to individuals, 1 Timothy, 2 Timothy, and Titus, Paul says, "Mercy and grace and peace."  Mercy and grace are different.  Mercy eliminates the pain and grace grants a better condition.

Let me give you an illustration.  The Good Samaritan right, he's lying...the man's lying on the side of the road, he's been beaten to the point of the dying, he's been robbed and the priest goes by and walks along and doesn't want to get involved.  And the Levite goes by, doesn't want to get involved.  All of a sudden a half-breed Samaritan comes by and he sees this poor Jew all beaten and maimed and so forth and he goes over and he cares for him.  You know what mercy does?  Mercy relieves his pain.  Mercy pours oil in his wombs and mercy binds up his wounds.  And mercy relieves the suffering.  And you know what grace does?  Grace goes over and rents him a room so he can live in an inn.

You see, mercy deals with the negative and grace puts it in the positive.  Mercy takes away the pain and grace gives a better condition.  Mercy says no hell, grace says heaven.  Mercy says I pity you.  Grace says I pardon you.  So mercy and grac