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Blessed are the Merciful
Nov 11, 08:45 PM
Blessed are the merciful for they will receive mercy. (Matthew 5:7)
The Beatitudes build on each other. No one of them stands alone. While they may be seen as virtues, they actually constitute a way of life, especially as it concerns interpersonal relationships. Remember, the Beatitudes open the Sermon on the Mount and thus become the Preamble to the Constitution of the Kingdom of God. It is the Kingdom way of life. For example, it is not enough simply to hunger and thirst to be personally righteous. True right-ness before God is not an individualistic endeavor. It necessarily includes how one regards and treats others. Righteousness must be bathed in mercy. E. Stanley Jones in his book, The Christ of the Mount, writes, “Righteousness unmoved by mercy is a hard, unlovely, Pharisaical, sour-visaged thing.” (p. 73)
Mercy has two characteristics. It is first active. Mercy is more than just the absence of retaliation; it is showing active and intentional kindness. Secondly, mercy is not performed as a mere fulfillment of a command but is motivated by genuine inner compassion. Mercy is both a compassionate feeling of the heart and the action of extended kindness. Mercy is built on the refusal to exercise retribution (even when retribution may be perfectly legal) and compassion for the suffering and needy. Inasmuch as the hunger for righteousness in Mt 5:6 is both an inner disposition of the heart and outward behavior, so, too, mercy is both a compassionate feeling and active kindness.
It is important to note that when Jesus sat on the mount and issued this declaration of Kingdom life, He did so at a time when mercy was painfully absent from society. Political and religious life was devoid of it. Rome was a horribly tyrannical empire. Religious life was equally repressive and in some ways even more so. Suffering was seen as divine recompense for sin. To show mercy was to deny God’s due justice. Thus, Jesus’ declaration of the Kingdom way of life was even more a contradiction to the religious and social paradigm of the day. How desperately the world was in need of mercy’s relief! How ironic that Jesus Himself would be caught in the perfect storm of the lack of religious and political mercy.
It was Shakespeare who wrote, “The quality of mercy is not strained. It droppeth as the gentle rain fron heaven upon the place beneath. It is twice blest: it blesseth him that gives and him that takes.” (The Merchant of Venice, Act IV, Scene 1) James is a bit sterner when issuing his warning and promise, “Judgment is without mercy for the one who shows no mercy, but mercy triumphs over judgment.” (James 2:13) Those who give grace are those who never forget that they are products of God’s grace. They simply extend to others, in some small measure, the mercy that they themselves have received from the loving Hand of God. Those to whom Jesus refers do not extend such mercy only on certain occasions, but they are mercy-full. They, like Jesus Himself, are full of mercy. Compassion and kindness are not occasional responses but the pervasive quality of their lives. It is not mercy without backbone or accountability, but if it errs, it errs to the side of grace.