Mercy

   

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MERCY

I. WHAT IS MERCY?

1. Mercy is justice tempered by wisdom.

“Mercy is simply justice tempered by that wisdom which grows out of perfection of knowledge and the full recognition of the natural weaknesses and environmental handicaps of finite creatures. ‘Our God is full of compassion, gracious, long-suffering, and plenteous in mercy.’ Therefore ‘whosoever calls upon the Lord shall be saved,’ ‘for he will abundantly pardon.’ ‘The mercy of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting’; yes, ‘his mercy endures forever.’ ‘I am the Lord who executes loving-kindness, judgment, and righteousness in the earth, for in these things I delight.’ ‘I do not afflict willingly nor grieve the children of men,’ for I am ‘the Father of mercies and the God of all comfort.’” (38.1) 2:4.1  Ps. 103:8. Joel 2:32. Isa. 55:7. Ps. 103:17; 106:1. Jer. 9:24. Lam. 3:33. 2 Cor. 1:3.

2. Mercy represents the technique of fairness.

“Divine mercy represents a fairness technique of adjustment between the universe levels of perfection and imperfection. Mercy is the justice of Supremacy adapted to the situations of the evolving finite, the righteousness of eternity modified to meet the highest interests and universe welfare of the children of time. Mercy is not a contravention of justice but father an understanding interpretation of the demands of supreme justice as it is fairly applied to the subordinate spiritual beings and to the material creatures of the evolving universes. Mercy is the justice of the Paradise Trinity wisely and lovingly visited upon the manifold intelligences of the creations of time and space as it is formulated by divine wisdom and determined by the all-knowing mind and the sovereign free will of the Universal Father and all his associated Creators.” (38.5) 2:4.5

3. Mercy delays are not interminable.

“But these mercy delays are not interminable. Notwithstanding the long delay (as time is reckoned on Urantia) in adjudicating the Lucifer rebellion, we may record that, during the time of effecting this revelation, the first hearing in the pending case of Gabriel vs. Lucifer was held on Uversa, and soon thereafter there issued the mandate of the Ancients of Days directing that Satan be henceforth confined to the prison world with Lucifer. This ends the ability of Satan to pay further visits to any of the fallen worlds of Satania. Justice in a mercy-dominated universe may be slow, but it is certain.” (616.7) 54:4.8

4. Mercy is not a contravention of justice.

“Mercy is the natural and inevitable offspring of goodness and love. The good nature of a loving Father could not possibly withhold the wise ministry of mercy to each member of every group of his universe children. Eternal justice and divine mercy together constitute what in human experience would be called fairness.” (38.4) 2:4.4

II. GOD’S MERCY IS REPLETE

1. The richness of the divine mercy.

“The ‘richness of the goodness of God leads erring man to repentance.’ ‘Every good gift and every perfect gift comes down from the Father of lights.’ ‘God is good; he is the eternal refuge of the souls of men.’ ‘The Lord God is merciful and gracious. He is long-suffering and abundant in goodness and truth.’ ‘Taste and see that the Lord is good! Blessed is the man who trusts him.’ ‘The Lord is gracious and full of compassion. He is the God of salvation.’ ‘He heals the brokenhearted and binds up the wounds of the soul. He is man’s all-powerful benefactor.’” (41.1) 2:6.3  Rom. 2:4. Jas. 1:17. Deut. 33:27. Ex. 34:6. Ps. 34:8; 111:4. Isa. 61:1.

2. God’s mercy is all-knowing.

“The Universal Father is the only personality in all the universe who does actually know the number of the stars and planets of space. All the worlds of every universe are constantly within the consciousness of God. He also says: ‘I have surely seen the affliction of my people, I have heard their cry, and I know their sorrows.’ For ‘the Lord looks from heaven; he beholds all the sons of men; from the place of his habitation he looks upon all the inhabitants of the earth.’ Every creature child may truly say: ‘He knows the way I take, and when he has tried me, I shall come forth as gold.’ ‘God knows our downsittings and our uprisings; he understands our thoughts afar off and is acquainted with all our ways.’ ‘All things are naked and open to the eyes of him with whom we have to do.’ And it should be a real comfort to every human being to understand that ‘he knows your frame; he remembers that you are dust.’ Jesus, speaking of the living God, said, ‘Your Father knows what you have need of even before you ask him.”’ (49.1) 3:3.2  Ex. 3:7. Ps. 33:14. Job 23:10. Ps. 139:2. Heb. 4:13. Ps. 103:14. Matt. 6:8.

3. God is naturally and everlastingly merciful.

“God is inherently kind, naturally compassionate, and everlastingly merciful. And never is it necessary that any influence be brought to bear upon the Father to call forth his loving-kindness. The creature’s need is wholly sufficient to insure the full flow of the Father’s tender mercies and his saving grace. Since God knows all about his children, it is easy for him to forgive. The better man understands his neighbor, the easier it will be to forgive him, even to love him.” (38.2) 2:4.2

III.THE MERCY MINISTERS

1. The Eternal Son is mercy—applied love.

“God is love, the Son is mercy. Mercy is applied love, the Father’s love in action in the person of his Eternal Son. The love of this universal Son is likewise universal. As love is comprehended on a sex planet, the love of God is more comparable to the love of a father, while the love of the Eternal Son is more like the affection of a mother. Crude, indeed, are such illustrations, but I employ them in the hope of conveying to the human mind the thought that there is a difference, not in divine content but in quality and technique of expression, between the love of the Father and the love of the Son.” (75.10) 6:3.5

2. The Eternal Son is the great mercy minister.

“The Son shares the justice and righteousness of the Trinity but overshadows these divinity traits by the infinite personalization of the Father’s love and mercy; the Son is the revelation of divine love to the universes. As God is love, so the Son is mercy. The Son cannot love more than the Father, but he can show mercy to creatures in one additional way, for he not only is a primal creator like the Father, but he is also the Eternal Son of that same Father, thereby sharing in the sonship experience of all other sons of the Universal Father.

“The Eternal Son is the great mercy minister to all creation. Mercy is the essence of the Son’s spiritual character. The mandates of the Eternal Son, as they go forth over the spirit circuits of the Second Source and Center, are keyed in tones of mercy.” (75.6) 6:3.1

3. The Infinite Spirit is also a mercy minister.

“Though in every way sharing the perfection, the righteousness, and the love of the Universal Father, the Infinite Spirit inclines towards the mercy attributes of the Eternal Son, thus becoming the mercy minister of the Paradise Deities to the grand universe. Ever and always—universally and eternally—the Spirit is a mercy minister, for, as the divine Sons reveal the love of God, so the divine Spirit depicts the mercy of God.” (92.7) 8:2.6

4. Mercy ministry is the purpose of the bestowals.

“The purpose of these creature incarnations is to enable such Creators to become wise, sympathetic, just, and understanding sovereigns. These divine Sons are innately just, but they become understandingly merciful as a result of these successive bestowal experiences; they are naturally merciful, but these experiences make them merciful in new and additional ways. These bestowals are the last steps in their education and training for the sublime tasks of ruling the local universes in divine righteousness and by just judgment.” (1308.4) 119:0.4

5. Jesus is a merciful friend.

“Jesus knows about the thoughts and feelings, the urges and impulses, of the evolutionary and ascendant mortals of the realms, from birth to death. He has lived the human life from the beginnings of physical, intellectual, and spiritual selfhood up through infancy, childhood, youth, and adulthood—even to the human experience of death. He not only passed through these usual and familiar human periods of intellectual and spiritual advancement, but he also fully experienced those higher and more advanced phases of human and Adjuster reconciliation which so few Urantia mortals ever attain. And thus he experienced the full life of mortal man, not only as it is lived on your world, but also as it is lived on all other evolutionary worlds of time and space, even on the highest and most advanced of all the worlds settled in light and life.” (1425.4) 129:4.5

6. To obtain mercy you must show mercy.

“They who would receive mercy must show mercy; judge not that you be not judged. With the spirit with which you judge others you also shall be judged. Mercy does not wholly abrogate universe fairness. In the end it will prove true: ‘Whoso stops his ears to the cry of the poor, he also shall some day cry for help, and no one will hear him.’ The sincerity of any prayer is the assurance of its being heard; the spiritual wisdom and universe consistency of any petition is the determiner of the time, manner, and degree of the answer. A wise father does not literally answer the foolish prayers of his ignorant and inexperienced children, albeit the children may derive much pleasure and real soul satisfaction from the making of such absurd petitions.” (1639.1) 146:2.6  Matt. 5:7; 7:1,2. Prov. 21:13.

MERCY AS PRESENTED IN THE BIBLE

1. The divine compassion is over all.

“The Lord is good to all, and his compassion is over all that he has made.” Ps. 145:9.

2. God is the Father of mercies.

“The Father of mercies and the God of all comfort.” 2 Cor. 1:3.

3. God is rich in mercy.

“But God, who is rich in mercy, out of the great love with which he loved us—.” Eph. 2:4.

4. We are betrothed to God in mercy.

“I will betroth you to me in righteousness and in justice, in steadfast love, and in mercy.” Hosea 2:19.

5. Mercy seat on top of the ark of the law.

“And you shall put the mercy seat on top of the ark.” Ex. 25:21.

6. God is merciful and gracious.

“But thou, O Lord, art a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness.” Ps. 86:15.

7. Goodness and mercy follow us.

“Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life.” Ps. 23:6.

8. The Mercy Psalm.

In the King James version, every one of the twenty-five verses of the 136th Psalm ends with “For his steadfast mercy endures forever.” In the Revised Version, this reads: “For his steadfast love endures forever.”

Among many other passages when mercy is translated “love,” are Ps. 25:10; 57:10; 85:10; 130:7. Hosea 6:6; 10:12.

9. The merciful shall receive mercy.

“Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy.” Matt. 5:7.

10. We should show mercy with cheerfulness.

“He who gives aid, with zeal; he who does acts of mercy, with cheerfulness.” Rom. 12:8.

Note: Words used in place of mercy in Old Testament and New Testament are: compassion, pity, goodness, kindness, and loving kindness.