Readings:
Sermon:
Practicing random acts of kindness has caught on, not only as a phrase to inspire us to goodness, but as a movement – there are organisations, foundations and groups deliberately, intentionally, and some might say, wantonly being kind. It is without doubt a good thing. All of us desire kindness and all of us feel good for being kind. But the act of kindness is more than a simple moral exchange of goodness.
Whilst we are called to be kind there is a deeper calling for Christians which builds on kindness: the call to be merciful. Mercy is the foundation of all our prayer, for it is only through God’s mercy that we can approach God. That does not necessarily need to create a relationship as awkward as it sounds – far from it; it is because of the generous mercy of God that we can pray at all. It is in the generous love of God that he mercifully listens to our prayers and supplications.
God’s mercy is shown to us daily – not only in the forgiveness of our sins and the acceptance of our prayers, but most chiefly in the gracious mercy which goes beyond word and thought in the compassion and love through which we even exist. God is all merciful – not simply in showing mercy but in creating us. The mercy of God is creating, redeeming and sanctifying.
At every eucharist we pray for God’s mercy – whether it is in the responses to the commandments at the Book of Common Prayer Communion, ‘Lord have mercy on us and incline our hearts to keep this law’, or the Kyries said or sung in preparation while gathering as God’s people, or simply in our intercessions where we rely on grace and mercy for our prayers to be heard and answered.
The Bible unfolds the mercy of God to his people beginning with his Covenant and the constant recalling and renewing of that Covenant through the prophets. And then in the new covenant through which God’s tender mercy is seen in the full, perfect, and sufficient sacrifice, oblation and satisfaction for the sins of the whole world, made once and for all by his Son Jesus Christ suffering death on the cross.
Just as the mercy we receive from God comes from this defining act of love, so then our defining actions as God’s people should be centred on showing mercy.
Replacing random acts of kindness with random acts of mercy may result often in the same thing: goodness and beauty, freedom and love showered liberally. But mercy demands something more: it asks that we have the deep pity and compassion which is God’s and, in behaving like this, we shall not only be kind, but we shall be radically, daringly, wantonly proclaiming a new life which brings freedom to all in Jesus Christ our Lord.
Questions:
- In what ways do I experience God’s mercy?
- To whom might I be called to be more merciful?
- Where in the world is mercy starved of its healing power?