Sermon Tone Analysis

By Pastor Glenn Pease

Dr. A. J. Cronin was raised in the strict tradition that if one did wrong they were to be punished.

Justice demanded it.

In 1921 he took the post of medical officer in an isolated district in Northumberland, England.

He was young and inexperienced, but though trembling, he one night performed a tracheotomy on the throat of a small boy choking with diphtheria.

He inserted the tube and gave a sigh of relief as the boy's lungs filled with air.

He then went to bed leaving the sick boy in the care of a nurse.

Some time in the night the tube filled with mucus and the boy began to choke.

Instead of cleaning the tube, as any good nurse should have done, the boy girl fled in panic to get the doctor.

When Dr. Cronin arrived the patient was dead.

His anger blazed at such blundering negligence, and he decided right there he would ruin her career.

He wrote a bitter letter to the County Health Board and read it to her with burning indignation.

The 19 year old Welsh girl listened in silence half fainting with shame and misery.

But finally she stammered, "Give me another chance."

He shook his head and sealed the envelope as she slipped away.

That night he could not sleep.

Give me another chance kept echoing through his mind.

Deep inside he knew he wanted to send that letter for revenge, and not because of his love for justice.

When morning came the light of mercy came as well, and he tore up the letter.

Twenty years later he wrote, "Today the nurse who erred so fatally is matron of the largest children's home in Wales.

Her career has been a model of service and devotion."

Mercy, even on the human level, has saved many lives from being tragically wasted because of some sin, error, failure, or folly.

None are so godlike as those who can exercise the virtue of mercy.

In Shakespeare's Merchant Of Venice old Shylock wants revenge through justice, but Portia disguised as a young lawyer pays her tribute to mercy and says, "It is an attribute of God Himself; and earthly power doth then show likest God's when mercy seasons justice."

And then she says again, "Consider this-that in the course of justice, none of us should see salvation; we do pray for mercy; and that same prayer doth teach us all to render the deeds of mercy."

Shakespeare not only understood the teaching of Christ that the merciful are blest, but he understood the truth that David learned as well; that mercy is the only hope for the guilty.

There is no salvation for anyone in justice.

Justice leaves us all condemned, but mercy opens the door of hope and gives us another chance.

That is why David begins this great Psalm with a cry for God's mercy.

There is nowhere else to begin.

God's mercy is the only hope for the salvation of the sinner and the sanctification of the saint.

If you take a concordance and look at all the references to the mercy of God, you will soon understand why Andrew Murray called it the greatest wonder of God's nature.

He wrote, "The omniscience of God is a wonder.

The omnipotence of God is a wonder.

God's spotless holiness is a wonder.

None of these things can we understand.

But the greatest wonder of it all is the mercy of God.

Mrs. Helen E. Hammond wrote,

The great celestial bodies are

Most marvelous and grand,

And how they keep their courses

Men cannot understand.

But something far more wonderful

Than stars that brightly glow

Is the mercy of the living God

To creatures here below.

The basic meaning of the words for mercy in the Bible are kindness, loving kindness, and graciousness.

The Psalms deal so much with the mercy and loving kindness of God that the Jews have always made this theme a major aspect of their songs and prayers.

In the 12th century the Jews in Spain sang a hymn on the Day of Atonement, and it sounds very much like the opening verse of this Psalm.

Lord, blot out our evil pride,

All our sins before thee;

Our Father, for Thy Mercy's sake

Pardon, we implore Thee.

The Jews have always recognized that their hope is in God's mercy, and over and over again they sang that the mercy of the Lord endures forever.

Psa.

25:10 says, "All the paths of the Lord are mercy."

His mercy is not only everlasting, but it is also universal.

Psa.

145:8-9 says, "The Lord is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.

The Lord is good to all, and His compassion is over all that he has made."

Both the Psalmist and the prophets explain God's mercy by saying He is slow to anger.

This is a very important thing to grasp to understand how God can be so merciful and still be a God of justice.

The Bible makes it clear that in spite of God's all-encompassing mercy He is also a God of judgment.

How can the two be combined?

It is all a matter of speed.

His mercy moves swiftly and gives the sinner every chance to repent and be forgiven before His slow moving wrath ever reaches the sinner.

Spurgeon, in a sermon on Nah.

1:3, which says the Lord is slow to anger, explained it with these eloquent words: "When mercy cometh into the world, she driveth winged steeds; the axles of her chariot wheels are glowing hot with speed, but when wrath cometh, it walketh with tardy footsteps; it is not in haste to slay, it is not swift to condemn.

God's rod of mercy is ever in His hands outstretched; God sword of justice is in its scabbard, not rusted in it-it can be easily withdrawn-but held there by that hand that presses it back into its sheath crying," sleep, O sword, sleep, for I will have mercy upon sinners, and will forgive their transgressions."

God is not quick to destroy rebels, for he knows that many can be brought back to loyalty and allegiance.

If He was speedy in His judgment, none would be saved.

It is the combination of His swift mercy and slow justice that makes salvation possible.

Because of this combination God's judgment is never unfair.

Mercy is always given first chance, but if mercy is rejected, then no one can complain when justice catches up and does its work.

All through history we see God gives a warning before His wrath falls.

People were warned through Noah long before the flood came.

Israel was warned in advance by the prophets before she faced judgment and captivity.

Nineveh was warned by Jonah before God's anger struck, and because they responded with repentance and cried out for mercy they were spared.

When the warning is not heeded, however, and when the offer of mercy is not received, God, with all His loving kindness, cannot spare the sinner.

Jesus said of the evil working Jezebel, who was destroying the church at Thyatira in Rev. 2:21, "I gave her time to repent, but she refused to repent of her immorality."

There was no alternative but judgment.

We see that the Lord even spares the worse just as long as He can.

He reverses the pattern of nature and sends the thunder of warning long before the lightening of judgment.

Heaven is God's will, and He is not willing that any should perish, but when mercy is refused then judgment is inevitable.

Hell is the destiny men choose for themselves because they reject the mercy of God.

Mercy and justice are perfectly combined in God so that one or the other deals with all evil.

Mercy is the alpha and justice is the omega.

In our impatience we often wish God's judgment was not so slow.

Like Jonah we want God to destroy the wicked pagans before He gives them a warning and an offer of mercy.

Mercy sometimes seems almost like a crime when it is offered to one that you think is deserving of wrath.

David felt this way when the prophet Nathan told him of the rich man who took the poor man's only lamb and killed it for his meal.

David was not like God, but just the opposite.

His sense of justice was swift, and he was ready to reek immediate vengeance on the wicked man.

He only reverse his rush toward revenge when Nathan said, "Thou art the man."

David then realized that he was the scoundrel whose sin had made him so mad.

When he saw that he was the one under condemnation, then mercy became far more precious than justice.

We tend to want justice for the other guy, but mercy for ourselves when we are the ones who are guilty.

The truly godly man will learn to love mercy for everyone.

God required that the godly man combined mercy with justice just as God combines it in His nature.

Mic.