“Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy.” (Matthew 5:7)
“You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against the sons of your own people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself…” (Leviticus 19:18)
“Then Peter came up and said to Him, ‘Lord, how often will my brother sin against me, and I forgive him?'” (Matthew 18:21)
“Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice. Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.” (Ephesians 4:31, 32)
Now that we have had a Sabbath rest, it is time to get back to the work of simplifying our lives. With each beatitude, Jesus is continuing to lead us deeper into the blessedness of following Him wholeheartedly. He has challenged us to empty ourselves and mourn over our sin. He then directed us to be humble (meek) and organize all our life around the one passion…to be right with Him. Now He calls us to be people of mercy.
As people of the cross, we must be merciful. This is not a new thought in the Scripture. We are encouraged from the Old Testament to the New Testament to forgive one another and love each other…to be merciful. Jesus said that the most distinctive characteristic of His disciples would be that they “love one another” (John 13:35). So, why is it so difficult to show mercy to others? Why do we have such a hard time forgiving people and many times, our own friends and family?
Have you ever heard of the “grudge closet”? Most of us have one or two in our spiritual house. It is where we stockpile the hurts and offenses committed against us. This is where the scoreboards for each person in our life are kept. When someone wrongs us we log it in on their scorecard and keep it in the “grudge closet” for future reference. Like us, the disciple Peter was a score keeper. This became clear when Jesus talked about forgiveness and Peter asked “how many times should I forgive?” In other words, what’s the limit to forgiveness? At what point do I have permission to hold the grudge…to seek revenge…to cut them out? Jesus answered Peter with a story that challenged him to exhibit unlimited mercy.
We all have these closets in our spiritual lives where we harbor those hurts. It is a form of selfish pride that centers on us…our pain…our notion that we deserve better. Many of our “grudge closets” are bursting at the seams. Soon there may be an explosion and it will all come out. Today, let’s continue to simplify our spiritual lives by starting to clean out our “grudge closet”. We must hear the words of Paul to the Ephesians above and rid our house of “unforgiveness” and get on with loving one another.
“Blessed are the merciful…”