Mercy.

The Mercy of King Louis XII

Painted by, Jean Bourdechon

I must confess, I don’t post as often as I used to because I feel inadequate, in so many ways, to write about God. I have accidentally upset some people I’ve communicated with online. I feel so bad about that, that I have let those feelings hinder me. It’s all about me, me, me. 

One time, a woman posted a picture of the construction of her new driveway. I noticed it was going to be circular with greenery in the center and wrote, “Oh, how elegant!” Well, in the picture there was mud and a bulldozer. I guess she thought I was being snide. I just meant the driveway would be elegant. 

There were a few incidents like this, because I don’t think things through. One of the horrible thoughts of my mind is me hurting someone’s feelings; and here I was doing it.

Well, I know Satan wants to discourage me from writing online. I must pray more about this. I must not let him make me look at myself and feel no good. I want to praise God. I want to lift him up and show people how truly wonderful he is. I’m so grateful to him for all the good he does in the world and in my family. I know we mostly read news about the evil that goes on in the world; but there is also so much good done every day by people who love people. I like what Joyce Meyer says about that, “Trust the Lord and do good.” Don’t be discouraged by evil – dwell on what’s good.

Psalm 103:11-14

For as high as the heavens are above the earth,

so great is His loving devotion for those who fear Him.

As far as the east is from the west,

so far has He removed our transgressions from us.

As a father has compassion on his children,

so the LORD has compassion on those who fear Him.

For He knows our frame;

He is mindful that we are dust.

Matthew 5:7

Blessed are the merciful.  They shall obtain mercy.

Today, I read this meditation about God’s mercy. I thought it was beautiful. It was written by, Lloyd John Ogilvie, in God’s Best for My Life.

“This beatitude (Matt. 5:7) gives us another quality of family likeness we can have with God. He is merciful and wants to reproduce that crucial aspect of his nature in us. We are truly happy – blessed – when we are receiving his mercy and are communicating it to others. When we have felt God’s mercy in our failures and needs, we become merciful to others in their inadequacies and mistakes. Christ is God’s mercy incarnate. As he lives his life in us, our minds are captured by his amazing grace, our emotions are infused by tender love, and our wills are liberated to do whatever people need to feel loved again.

Mercy is profound identification. The Hebrew word implies living in another person’s skin, to feel, know, and experience what he or she is going through: empathy, sensitivity. The outer manifestation of our inner experience of God’s mercy is a graciousness which offers understanding, gives others another chance, and freely forgives. The qualification for receiving the continuous flow of God’s mercy is to give out what he has put in.

Psalm 103 has been a charge and charter for me in attempts to live this beatitude. The steadfast love of the Lord endures forever. Nothing can change it. Note all the things that quality of mercy overcomes. That gives us assurance and courage, strength and endurance. Reread the psalm as a prayer from your own heart as your expression of gratitude for mercy and as a commitment to be merciful. Now turn to Lamentations 3:19-26 and read again the good news that the mercy of the Lord never comes to an end; it never ceases; it is fresh every morning and all through the day, all because of the faithfulness of God. Blessedness is receiving and reproducing mercy.”

It isn't always easy to show mercy and forgiveness. I remember when all the audio equipment was stolen from a church I attended. The pastor was very angry when he went up front to preach and promised to repay the ones who did the stealing.

In the 1940's, my mother and father took a homeless man into their home and got him a job. They came home from church one day and he was gone, along with my father's best coat and a camera his brother had gotten him in Japan.

These are the kind of things God want us to forgive and be merciful about. It isn't easy. The only way to do it is to pray until our feelings match our knowledge of what God wants. Be determined; know that it is not only for their good, but for ours.

I Got The Message Bible.

I was reading something, can’t remember what, and the writer quoted from, The Message Bible. The words were so wonderful and alive that I kept reading those verses for days.

So, I looked up The Message Bible online and found out it was written by pastor Eugene Peterson, a scholar, theologian, poet and author, who reads Hebrew and Greek. This is what he said of his reason for writing The Message.

“While I was teaching a class on Galatians, I began to realize that the adults in my class weren’t feeling the vitality and directness that I sensed as I read and studied the New Testament in its original Greek. Writing straight from the original text, I began to attempt to bring into English the rhythms and idioms of the original language. I knew that the early readers of the New Testament were captured and engaged by these writings and I wanted my congregation to be impacted in the same way. I hoped to bring the New Testament to life for two different types of people: those who hadn’t read the Bible because it seemed too distant and irrelevant and those who had read the Bible so much that it had become ‘old hat.'”  Eugene Peterson.

“Vitality and directness,” that is what I have found in reading The Message.

“For more than two years, Eugene Peterson devoted all his efforts to The Message® New Testament. His primary goal was to capture the tone of the text and the original conversational feel of the Greek, in contemporary English.” : https://www.biblestudytools.com/msg/

I had read his translation was idiomatic. I looked for descriptions of that and found this at:

https://examples.yourdictionary.com/idiom.html

“Idioms exist in every language. They are words or phrases that aren't meant to be taken literally. For example, if you say someone has "cold feet," it doesn't mean their toes are actually cold. Rather, it means they're nervous about something.

Idioms can't be deduced merely by studying the words in the phrase. If taken literally, you would think that someone with cold feet has… cold feet. But, after living with a certain group of people for a period of time, you'll start to pick up their expressions. Let's explore some idiom examples in American everyday language, international language, and the language of the arts.

The examples below demonstrate how you can't really deduce the meaning of these expressions without knowing what they mean. The next time someone says they're feeling "under the weather," you'll know it has nothing to do with weather patterns, but rather that they're feeling quite ill.”

·         Getting fired turned out to be a blessing in disguise. - Getting fired (normally a negative event) turned out to be a good thing.

·         These red poppies are a dime a dozen. - These red poppies are very common.

·         Don't beat around the bush. - Just say what you really mean.

I guess this is going to be a long post.

 I’ve been walking with God for 50 years. Of course, my walk looks like this:

 --__--__**--__==--__***####++___---***--

God’s walk looks like this: ********************

 Still, that’s okay. He’s beside me all the way. When I read The Message’s story of creation I thought, “This is the God I know!”

I’ll share some of the verses from The Message and you can see what you think.

Genesis 1:2-15

God spoke: “Light!”
        And light appeared.
    God saw that light was good
        and separated light from dark.
    God named the light Day,
        he named the dark Night.
    It was evening, it was morning—
    Day One.

^6-8 God spoke: “Sky! In the middle of the waters;
        separate water from water!”
    God made sky.
    He separated the water under sky
        from the water above sky.
    And there it was:
        he named sky the Heavens;
    It was evening, it was morning—
    Day Two.

^9-10 God spoke: “Separate!
        Water-beneath-Heaven, gather into one place;
    Land, appear!”
        And there it was.
    God named the land Earth.
        He named the pooled water Ocean.
    God saw that it was good.

^11-13 God spoke: “Earth, green up! Grow all varieties
        of seed-bearing plants,
    Every sort of fruit-bearing tree.”
        And there it was.
    Earth produced green seed-bearing plants,
        all varieties,
    And fruit-bearing trees of all sorts.
        God saw that it was good.
    It was evening, it was morning—
    Day Three.

^14-15 God spoke: “Lights! Come out!
        Shine in Heaven’s sky!
    Separate Day from Night.
        Mark seasons and days and years,
    Lights in Heaven’s sky to give light to Earth.”
        And there it was.

The creation verses go on longer, but I’m just showing an example. For me, this translation shows God’s strength. I don’t know why, but the regular translations of, “And God said, “Let there be light,” seem passive.

I’ll show you the beginning of the Beatitudes from, The Message. Matthew 1:3-

³ “You’re blessed when you’re at the end of your rope. With less of you there is more of God and his rule.

⁴ “You’re blessed when you feel you’ve lost what is most dear to you. Only then can you be embraced by the One most dear to you.

⁵ “You’re blessed when you’re content with just who you are—no more, no less. That’s the moment you find yourselves proud owners of everything that can’t be bought.

⁶ “You’re blessed when you’ve worked up a good appetite for God. He’s food and drink in the best meal you’ll ever eat.

⁷ “You’re blessed when you care. At the moment of being ‘care-full,’ you find yourselves cared for.

⁸ “You’re blessed when you get your inside world—your mind and heart—put right. Then you can see God in the outside world.

⁹ “You’re blessed when you can show people how to cooperate instead of compete or fight. That’s when you discover who you really are, and your place in God’s family.

¹⁰ “You’re blessed when your commitment to God provokes persecution. The persecution drives you even deeper into God’s kingdom.

^11-12 “Not only that—count yourselves blessed every time people put you down or throw you out or speak lies about you to discredit me. What it means is that the truth is too close for comfort and they are uncomfortable. You can be glad when that happens—give a cheer, even!—for though they don’t like it, I do! And all heaven applauds. And know that you are in good company. My prophets and witnesses have always gotten into this kind of trouble.

Salt and Light

¹³ “Let me tell you why you are here. You’re here to be salt-seasoning that brings out the God-flavors of this earth. If you lose your saltiness, how will people taste godliness? You’ve lost your usefulness and will end up in the garbage.