Receiving Mercy by Giving Mercy

Catchy Introduction

Start with question—how many people here like to read?

How many wish they loved reading? Despise reading?

Is it okay for me to brag? I’m holding mic—question is irrelevant

How many don’t even know how to read

Last year I listened/read 25 books

I appreciate you hold your applause

That may not sound like a lot—big for me

I may pass that this year

I am listening to one book—It: How Churches and Leaders Can Get it/Keep it

Written by Craig Groeschel—favorite author

It’s a book on church leadership

Chapter 6 in this book is entitled “you enjoy it with other”

This chapter is about building a leadership team that enjoys being around one another

I’m Chris if you don’t know—Kevin lead pastor in Marion

In case you didn’t know—him and I get along

We will jab at one another—enjoy hanging out with each other

Each couple of months he gives me a new title

Once a month on Tuesdays all campus pastors are here in Americus

Those days can be busy b/c I will help out Robbie/others

Kevin thought it would be funny to call me “assistant to all, pastor to none”

I really enjoy Kevin b/c he’s merciful

In other words: compassionate, empathic

He have our silly moments but he can be series/compassionate too

Its enjoyable to be around merciful people

Whether you consider yourself merciful or not

My goal is that after today you will become a more merciful person

Realize the importance of mercy in our lives

Introduction to Teaching

If we haven’t meet I’m Chris

Kevin is Marion

We are continuing in a series called stranger things

We are learning to embrace the upside down kingdom of God

God’s way of life is counter-cultural—different from how most of us live

We have learned that in God’s space/world:

Less means more

How to find comfort when we mourn over our sins

Learned meekness is not weakness but it is in fact gentleness

How to live satisfied

In this series we have read these verses from

Sermon on the Mount —starts with beatitudes (blessings)

Jesus’ first words are:

(NIV) “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”

3 “Blessed are the poor in spirit,

Another word for blessed is happy

for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Blessed are those who acknowledge their

Happy are those who acknowledge they are spiritual helpless

complete spiritual bankruptcy,

Happy you will be when you realize you need God

for theirs is the kingdom of God.

(NIV) “Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.”

Blessed are those who mourn,

Happy are those who mourn over their sins

for they will be comforted.

We don’t like to acknowledge the wrong we’ve done—we like to hid it

Jesus promises that we will be blessed when we stop, pause, and grieve over how we have hurt God/others

As we pause and acknowledge—God will comfort us

(NIV) “Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.”

5 Blessed are the meek,

Through this we learned meekness is not weakness

for they will inherit the earth.

Meekness is power/strength under control

We are not doormats—we will be as blessed as we are gentle

Last week Kevin read (NIV)

“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.”

2,000 yrs ago—group of people called Pharisees

They held onto the belief that if they separate themselves from people they will be more holy

We are to hunger for more of God

We call this “self righteousness””—you are higher than everyone else

When we read “righteousness” in this verse—its “God righteousness”

Stop eating spiritual junk food, look to Jesus, live out of our fullness

With God’s righteousness we put others first—not last

This brings us to todays beatitude—verse 7

This kind of righteousness leads us to mercy

Connects us to our verse today

Teaching

(NIV) “Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy.”

This is 1 out of over 200 verses in the Bible on mercy

For the rest of our time today I will be reading all these verse on mercy

Bad preacher joke—only gets worse

I read to you , , ,

These beatitudes are all about depending on God

Depending on him for help, gentleness, righteousness

The beatitudes after these are about the outworking of that dependence

As we depend on God—we become more merciful to others

But we first have to realize how merciful God is to us

1 verse that has helped me recognize God’s mercy is

Read it first, back story afterwards

The New International Version Psalm 51

Have mercy on me, O God,

according to your unfailing love;

according to your great compassion

blot out my transgressions.

The New International Version Psalm 51

Have mercy on me, O God,

according to your unfailing love;

according to your great compassion

blot out my transgressions.

In there is a story about a king name David

King of Israel

After his “midday rest” he was on his roof and saw Bathsheba

David seeing Bathsheba was a mistake—turned into a sin when he didn’t stop looking

David—likes what he sees—invites her over—gets pregnant

He has her husband killed to cover it up and marries her

After all this real housewives drama—prophet named Nathan

Nathan points out to David the sin he thought he had gotten away with

After his sin is pointed out—David writes this song

He is pleading that God would have mercy on him

This is after his sin with Bathsheba was pointed out by Nathan

He asks for God to have mercy on him according to two things:

Unfailing love, Great compassion

You may hear this story and say, “Well I haven’t done much better than David”

God’s mercy is still active today

Its UNFAILING love and GREAT compassion

The Greek word for mercy in is eleemon

Mercy, sympathy, compassion, empathy

God had mercy, compassion, sympathy for David

And God still has this same mercy for you

When we grasp this—why would it be so hard to show it to others?

Matthew—who wrote this gospel—writes a parable Jesus told

Parables are stories Jesus used to bring a spiritual idea to life

Often times these stories are not true—good illustrations

In Peter asks Jesus about forgiveness

Mercy and forgiveness go hand in hand

Jesus says those who show mercy will receive mercy

He also says if you want to be forgiven you have to forgive

Peter asks Jesus about forgiveness—Jesus answers the question

Jesus then brings his answer to life with this story

(NLT) 21 Then Peter came to him and asked, “Lord, how often should I forgive someone who sins against me? Seven times?” 22 “No, not seven times,” Jesus replied, “but seventy times seven!”

Jesus’ answer: You forgive as many times as it takes

22 “No, not seven times,” Jesus replied, “but seventy times seven!

23 “Therefore, the Kingdom of Heaven can be compared to a king who decided to bring his accounts up to date with servants who had borrowed money from him.24 In the process, one of his debtors was brought in who owed him millions of dollars.[k] 25 He couldn’t pay, so his master ordered that he be sold—along with his wife, his children, and everything he owned—to pay the debt.

Then he gives a story to bring this principle to life

23 “Therefore, the Kingdom of Heaven can be compared to a king who decided to bring his accounts up to date with servants who had borrowed money from him. 24 In the process, one of his debtors was brought in who owed him millions of dollars. 25 He couldn’t pay, so his master ordered that he be sold—along with his wife, his children, and everything he owned—to pay the debt. 26 “But the man fell down before his master and begged him, ‘Please, be patient with me, and I will pay it all.’ 27 Then his master was filled with pity for him, and he released him and forgave his debt. 28 “But when the man left the king, he went to a fellow servant who owed him a few thousand dollars. He grabbed him by the throat and demanded instant payment. 29 “His fellow servant fell down before him and begged for a little more time. ‘Be patient with me, and I will pay it,’ he pleaded. 30 But his creditor wouldn’t wait. He had the man arrested and put in prison until the debt could be paid in full. 31 “When some of the other servants saw this, they were very upset. They went to the king and told him everything that had happened. 32 Then the king called in the man he had forgiven and said, ‘You evil servant! I forgave you that tremendous debt because you pleaded with me. 33 Shouldn’t you have mercy on your fellow servant, just as I had mercy on you?’ 34 Then the angry king sent the man to prison to be tortured until he had paid his entire debt. 35 “That’s what my heavenly Father will do to you if you refuse to forgive your brothers and sisters from your heart.”

New Living Translation Chapter 18

21 Then Peter came to him and asked, “Lord, how often should I forgive someone who sins against me? Seven times?”

22 “No, not seven times,” Jesus replied, “but seventy times seven!

23 “Therefore, the Kingdom of Heaven can be compared to a king who decided to bring his accounts up to date with servants who had borrowed money from him. 24 In the process, one of his debtors was brought in who owed him millions of dollars. 25 He couldn’t pay, so his master ordered that he be sold—along with his wife, his children, and everything he owned—to pay the debt.

26 “But the man fell down before his master and begged him, ‘Please, be patient with me, and I will pay it all.’ 27 Then his master was filled with pity for him, and he released him and forgave his debt.

28 “But when the man left the king, he went to a fellow servant who owed him a few thousand dollars. He grabbed him by the throat and demanded instant payment.

29 “His fellow servant fell down before him and begged for a little more time. ‘Be patient with me, and I will pay it,’ he pleaded. 30 But his creditor wouldn’t wait. He had the man arrested and put in prison until the debt could be paid in full.

31 “When some of the other servants saw this, they were very upset. They went to the king and told him everything that had happened. 32 Then the king called in the man he had forgiven and said, ‘You evil servant! I forgave you that tremendous debt because you pleaded with me. 33 Shouldn’t you have mercy on your fellow servant, just as I had mercy on you?’ 34 Then the angry king sent the man to prison to be tortured until he had paid his entire debt.

35 “That’s what my heavenly Father will do to you if you refuse to forgive your brothers and sisters from your heart.”

26 “But the man fell down before his master and begged him, ‘Please, be patient with me, and I will pay it all.’ 27 Then his master was filled with pity for him, and he released him and forgave his debt.

28 “But when the man left the king, he went to a fellow servant who owed him a few thousand dollars.[l] He grabbed him by the throat and demanded instant payment.

Through this story Jesus is saying—In God’s kingdom, things work differently

29 “His fellow servant fell down before him and begged for a little more time. ‘Be patient with me, and I will pay it,’ he pleaded. 30 But his creditor wouldn’t wait. He had the man arrested and put in prison until the debt could be paid in full.

31 “When some of the other servants saw this, they were very upset. They went to the king and told him everything that had happened. 32 Then the king called in the man he had forgiven and said, ‘You evil servant! I forgave you that tremendous debt because you pleaded with me. 33 Shouldn’t you have mercy on your fellow servant, just as I had mercy on you?’ 34 Then the angry king sent the man to prison to be tortured until he had paid his entire debt.

We have to get us

35 “That’s what my heavenly Father will do to you if you refuse to forgive your brothers and sisters[m] from your heart.”

Application

Conclusion

Before I introduce main point for today—can I say:

Conclusion

Sermon prep is an emotional process

There is so much back and forth

When I write a message ideas and prayers go back in forth in my head

My mind acts like a ship carnival ride

It is emotional b/c my job is to put language to spiritual complexities

I try to concentrate a lot on how I say something

After reading this parable I wrestled with how to phrase what I’m about to say

When we discover how merciful God has been to us, it’s ridiculous how unmerciful we can be to others. 

Ridiculous is the word I wrestled with—I didn’t know how else to put it

I read this parable and thought, “How ridiculous is this!”

One boss showed mercy but other one said, “bump that.”

Then I read he gets punished and I celebrate it

We feel his punishment was justified

But when we don’t show mercy—we make excuses

There are times we assume

There’s always a reason we didn’t show mercy

“They don’t understand” “They’ve hurt me in the past”

“At least I haven’t done x, y, and z”

We live in a culture that praises “paying it forward”

Some times the culture around us pushes

When someone at Starbucks pays for your drink you are more likely to pay for someone else’s

(Didn’t work on my dad—not always true)

As Jesus followers we are to:

Be bent towards mercy

Remember two words today—“Be Bent”

Being bent towards mercy means to ready to show mercy at any moment

To move past “I’m sorry” and be quick to show God-like mercy

We do this by concentrating on someone else and how they feel

A great way of doing this is by “getting into a person’s skin”

Trying to feel as they feel, think as they think

Atticus Finch—To Kill a Mocking Bird

“You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view, until you climb into his skin and walk around in it.”

This is God-like mercy—this is great compassion

Getting in someone else’s skin takes:

Listening, trying to understand where they are coming from

Asking questions, praying for them, not accusing them

As live bent towards mercy, we will find 2 benefits:

There are two benefits to being bent towards mercy:

1. Saves you from being kind in the wrong way

Have you ever heard of wrongful kindness?

It’s kind of kindness that is kind but it’s also burdensome

Let’s say there’s a death—person gets a lot of food

They don’t need food—they need someone to sit and talk

Being bent towards mercy—you get in their skin

You talk, listen, discover their true need

Often times we do for other people what we would do for ourselves

Here’s a secret, that person’s not you!!

They do not feel or think like you do

They do not have the same needs as you do

By being bent towards mercy you put your feelings aside and are compassionate in the way that is needed

2. It makes forgiveness so much easier

One principle we forget—there is usually a reason why people act and say the things they do

If we knew why they said or did something—forgiveness would be easier

To be bent towards mercy means stop assuming the worst about people

Not everyone is out to get you

Being bent towards mercy means considering, “Maybe they’ve had a bad day”

“I wonder if there is anyway to help them,” “I’ll pray for them”

When we assume the worst about people—we lean away from mercy

Forgiveness is often challenging b/c our assumptions get in the way of truth

Do you know what an assumption is?

Do you know what an assumption is?

It’s declaring something to be true when you have no proof

Conclusion

You want some truth?

Only those who give mercy receive it

Through Jesus, you’ve already received mercy

Why are you not giving it?

Spouse, kids, parents, family, friends, co-workers

Because of how we have betrayed God—He does not have to do what he does

He could left us here—without Jesus—no mercy shown

Mercy is an attribute of God—most fundamental attribute

Attributes means “what is true about God”

It is who he is—he is merciful

He can’t help it!

You can live bent towards mercy or away from it

As Jesus said—you won’t be happy till you lean in

Be bent

Demonstrate the same mercy God has given to you

STAND

Worship team is going to come—have time of prayer

Here’s the truth—Jesus’ coming—greatest display of God’s mercy

Jesus has changed my life—I could not live bent towards mercy without him

If you follow Jesus today—tell prayer team member—they will pray with you

This prayer time is for everyone who needs it

Pray