THE BEATITUDES
BLESSED ARE THE MERCIFUL
DR. JIM DIXON
MATTHEW 5:7, Matthew 18:21-35
OCTOBER 21, 1990
Napoleon Bonaparte applied rigid discipline to all of his troops. If any soldier in Napoleon’s army fell asleep at his post, the penalty was death. Through the years some soldiers did fall asleep at their post; and in each case, in every case, the penalty was death. But on one occasion, a mother came to Napoleon. She begged Napoleon that her son might be spared. Her son had fallen asleep at his post, and this mother had come, begging that Napoleon might remove the death penalty. Napoleon said to her, “If I do for your son what I have not done for others, it would not be just.” The mother said “Sir, I am not begging for justice. I am begging for mercy.”
The people of this world will one day stand before the throne of God at the final judgment. The people of this world will not be begging for justice. The people of this world will be begging for mercy. The Bible says that judgment will be without mercy for those who have shown no mercy (James 2:13); and “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy” (Matthew 5:7).
In the sight of our Father, mercy is critical. This morning as we discuss the subject of mercy, I have two teachings. The first is this. The merciful are the forgiving. If you would be truly merciful in the sight of the Lord, then you must be a forgiving person.
A story is told and is allegedly true about a bus ride from New Jersey to Florida many years ago. Three teenagers boarded the bus in New Jersey and were heading for vacation in Florida. As they boarded the bus, there was a man on the bus who was poorly dressed and extremely quiet. The teenagers noticed him and gave him space as the bus journeyed south. As time passed, the bus had a rest stop here and there. The teenagers tried to engage this man in friendly conversation. The man was sort of reluctant to talk. After a period of time, the man began to open up just a little bit. The teenagers said to him, “Where are you going?” He said, “I’m going all the way to Jacksonville.” The teenagers said, “Do you have family there?” The man paused for a second. He did not answer immediately. Finally he said, “I don’t know.”
The teenagers were taken back by this and said, “What do you mean you don’t know? You don’t know if you have family in Jacksonville?” The man said, “Well, I have just spent many years in federal prison. When I was convicted, I, at that time, had a wonderful wife and beautiful children. I really couldn’t bear to have my wife try to live on her own for all the years I knew I was going to be in prison and my children have no dad. I told my wife that she didn’t need to wait for me. She should divorce me and find some other loving man to be her husband and the children’s father. When I got to prison those many years ago, I told them to never give me any letter from my wife, and I have not heard from my wife in all these years nor have I written to her. I don’t even know whether she still lives in Jacksonville and whether she’s at the home where we lived. A few weeks ago I wrote her a letter. I said, ‘I’m coming home.’ I said ‘If you’re still there and you still want me, would you tie a white piece of cloth on the oak tree where we used to have a picnic under just outside of our suburb of Jacksonville. I’ll see it when I come in; and if I see that white cloth there, I’ll know that you’re waiting for me. If I don’t see the white cloth, you won’t see me again.'”
The bus approached that suburb of Jacksonville. The oak tree was right by the highway. The three teenagers and this man sat on the edge of their seat, waiting to see if there was a white cloth on the tree. When the oak tree came into view, the three teenagers began to jump up and down in celebration. The man’s eyes filled with tears, and he began to cry. Not only had his wife put a white cloth on the oak tree, but she had also put a white bedspread and white pillowslips. The whole tree was laden with white.
It is said that the song, “Tie a Yellow Ribbon Around the Ole Oak Tree,” is loosely based on that allegedly true story. It sounds like it should have been, “Tie a White Ribbon Around the Ole Oak Tree.” That song was made famous by Tony Orlando.
I do not know whether the story is true; but I do know that if you are a Christian, you have come home, confessing your sin and being welcomed like the prodigal. You have been welcomed with shoes on your feet and a ring on your finger. You are clothed in royalty. The fattened calf is prepared in celebration. You have been welcomed home and a massive debt by the mercy of God has been lifted.
As Christians, having been forgiven and having received such incredible mercy, we are now called to show mercy to others. We are now called to forgive others. Peter came to Christ and said “Lord, how many times shall my brother sin against me and I forgive him? As many as seven times?” (Matthew 18:21-22). The rabbinic law required that you forgive a person three times. Peter thought he was being magnanimous. Jesus said to him, “I do not say to you seven times but seventy times seven,” a Hebraic expression meaning there is no limit. There is no limit to the number of times you must, as a Christian, forgive. This is the message of God to us. As Christians, above all other people in the world, we are to forgive. We are to be a forgiving people, a merciful people.
The warning of God is clear. In our passage of scripture for today, in the parable of the unmerciful servant, the servant had been forgiven a massive debt of ten thousand talents, equal in today’s currency to twenty million dollars. Having been forgiven an incomprehensible amount, this man went out and found a fellow servant who owed him a few hundred dollars. He seized him by the throat and said, “Pay what you owe.” The judgment of his king fell upon him. Having received mercy, he would not show mercy to others.
The warning is clear for us as Christians. As Christians we are not destined for the throne of God in the final judgment. We are not destined for the great white throne judgment described in the book of Revelation. That is a judgment of heaven and hell. We have escaped hell as Christians. The Bible says we have passed out of death into life and our destiny is heaven (John 5:24). We have received mercy. God wants you to know that if you, as a Christian, do not show mercy, if you do not extend forgiveness, there are going to be consequences. You are going to pay a price because as Christians we all appear before the judgment seat of Christ. It is not a judgment of heaven or hell, but it is a judgment, nevertheless. It says in 1 Corinthians, chapter 3, that many of us will be saved only as through fire. There will be tragic loss of reward for some Christians. Judgment is without mercy for those who have shown no mercy. Having been forgiven, we are called to forgive. If we do not forgive, there are consequences.
James Edward Oglethorpe was a Christian. Oglethorpe was born in 1696 in London, England. He graduated from Oxford University. In 1733, Oglethorpe took 117 colonists to America and founded the colony of Georgia. Oglethorpe was a just man and a fair man, but he was not always merciful. He was not always forgiving. In 1735, John Wesley, the great revivalist and evangelist, came from England to the colony of Georgia on a missionary assignment. He was in the colony of Georgia for two years. During that two-year period, James Oglethorpe fired one of his servants for a very small transgression. A servant had unintentionally disobeyed Oglethorpe on a minor matter. Oglethorpe had not only fired him but also sent the servant with his wife and family back to England. This seemed to John Wesley unnecessarily harsh. He approached Oglethorpe and asked for an explanation. Oglethorpe said, “I never forgive any act of disobedience.” John Wesley said “Well, sir, I hope and pray you never sin.”
That is the message of God to us. If you want your sins forgiven, if you want your disobedience forgiven, you need to be a forgiving person towards others. I do not know what hostilities you harbor. I do not know the lack of forgiveness in your life. I do not know you that well. You do not know me that well; but what the Holy Spirit is saying to us today is if there’s any lack of forgiveness in our hearts, we need to be rid of it today. If you are not forgiving your parents, you need to forgive them today. Maybe one of your parents was an alcoholic, or maybe one of your parents abused you in some fashion. Maybe one of your parents died when you were young. You felt abandoned. You have resented that and have harbored that resentment in your heart. Christ wants you to forgive. Maybe you need to forgive your husband or your wife or your ex-husband or your ex-wife. Maybe you need to forgive a child or a boss at work or someone in the business world who has cheated you. Maybe it is someone down the street.
Sometimes we say, “I can’t forgive because it hurts.” Biblically, the message is the opposite. It is only when it hurts that you can forgive. If you do not hurt, there is nothing to forgive. You cannot forgive Atilla the Hun. He did not hurt you. It is only when someone has hurt you that you can truly forgive them. That is what Christ is asking you, commanding you to do today. Search your hearts and remember, “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy” (Matthew 5:7). One of the meanings of mercy is to forgive.
Secondly, and finally, we have another meaning of merciful. It is the word compassion. To be merciful is to show compassion. Blessed are the compassionate. Franklin Delano Roosevelt was elected to the presidency of the United States four times, more than any other man in U. S. history. He served as president of the United States for 11 years. It was in the summer of 1921 on Campobello Island that Roosevelt was crippled with polio. His family, his friends, historians and even Roosevelt himself testify that it was the best thing that ever happened to Franklin Roosevelt because through his polio he learned compassion. He is most remembered as a president for the compassion that he had for the needs of hurting people.
God wants you, Christ wants you to be a person of compassion. Whatever trial you are going through, whatever suffering, whatever hardship you find in your life, it is only meant to teach you compassion for others who are in a trial or a hardship.
The word for mercy in the Bible is the word éleos. This word sometimes has nothing to do with forgiveness but everything to do with compassion. The good Samaritan is called merciful. The good Samaritan showed mercy, but it was not because he forgave somebody. He showed mercy simply because he had compassion on the need of another human being. Most of us when we think of compassion, think of Mother Teresa. Mother Teresa is indeed an incredible example of the compassion of mercy. Mother Teresa turned 80 years old this year and sought retirement from her long labor. The Pope refused her retirement. It was not because the Pope did not appreciate her great service. He did. It is not because Mother Teresa did not deserve to retire. She did. But her voice is so desperately needed by a world where compassion is all too rare. It is desperately needed.
Mother Teresa grew up in a peasant family in former Yugoslavia. It was a normal family. She went to church as a child. By her own testimony, she asked Jesus Christ to be her Savior from sin and the Lord of her life when she was a teenager. She said she immediately felt a welling up of the presence of Christ as He came within her. She said she felt consumed by a desire to serve Christ and His kingdom. The only expression of Christianity she knew was the Roman Catholic Church, and she became a nun. She went as a missionary to India. She wanted to teach the truth of the gospel to people in a foreign land. She was sent to a convent in Calcutta. It was a beautiful convent. Mother Teresa was given a beautiful room. She had a beautiful view out of that room. There was a beautiful garden that she took walks in every day. She had a beautiful classroom in which to teach children about Jesus Christ.
One day she decided to take a walk for the first time through the streets of Calcutta, the city she had never seen. She began to walk through the streets of Calcutta and was utterly stunned by what she saw. Individuals were dying in the gutter, rotting in the street. She came back that night. As she wandered into her beautiful room, all she could think of was the ugliness, the tragedy of what she had just seen. It was in that moment, that night, that the Holy Spirit spoke to her. Christ spoke to her. He said “I’m calling you to the poorest of the poor. I’m calling you to minister not to the living. I’m calling you to minister to the dying.” She asked to be released from her vows.
She went out on the streets of Calcutta and prayed this prayer. “Jesus, dear Jesus, show me someone who’s dying alone.” She found an elderly woman dying in the gutter alone. She literally lifted her up and carried her to the hospital. The hospital refused this dying woman. Mother Teresa said, “If there’s a God in heaven and if there’s a Christ we love, nobody should ever have to die alone.”
She went to the Indian government and asked for some building, some public facility where she could show compassion to people who were dying. The government of India told her about an abandoned Hindu temple. Mother Teresa said, “It will be beautiful to Christ.” She took it and began to receive individuals off the streets, people from the gutters, people who were dying. It was the beginning of an incredible ministry. Today, the Sisters of Charity minister in more than 30 nations in the world. Mother Teresa received the Nobel Peace Prize. She’s called the Saint of the Gutters.
I want to say to you this morning and I know God more importantly wants to say to you this morning that all Christians share her call. All of us are called to show compassion, not just Mother Teresa. We may never receive the Nobel Peace Prize, and the world may never notice us; but we are called for Christ’s sake to a ministry of compassion.
In the Bible there are two beautiful words for compassion. There is the word splanchnic. It does not sound very beautiful, and in a sense it is not because it literally means good intestines. But in the Bible, it is translated compassion. In the Greek world, people viewed compassion as “beginning deep within you, to be moved within you, to be stirred within you.”
The other word for compassion is the word sympónia, from which we get the word sympathy. It literally means to suffer with, to feel what another person is feeling, and to be moved within by the needs of others. Éleos, the word for mercy, is a greater word because it describes compassion in action, more than feelings. To show mercy is to act on compassion. That is what Christ has called us to do.
About a year ago, Heather and I went to see the movie “Beaches” starring Bette Midler and Barbara Hershey. As Heather and I were watching the movie on a Monday afternoon, Heather and I were really moved. We saw Barbara Hershey dying of a tragic disease, leaving her little daughter behind and entrusting her to her best friend, Bette Midler. Bette Midler, who had always been selfish and preoccupied with self, was willing to take this cosmic leap and began to care for her friend’s child. It was such a tender moment. I began to cry, and Heather began to cry. We were sitting in the theater crying. We felt compassion. I was stirred inside. I was moved inwardly. I felt what it seemed to me Bette Midler and Barbara Hershey must have felt. I felt what it seemed to me the little girl must have felt. I did not do anything. I could not do anything. It was just a movie. I could not help Bette Midler. When Heather and I came out of the movie, we went to the car and drove off. We felt compassion and were moved, but we did not do anything. We could not do anything.
It seems to me for many Christians in this world life is like that. You are watching television or watching a movie. You see things. You feel moved. You might even feel what others feel, but you do not do anything about it. You might as well be watching television. You might as well be watching a movie. You get in your car, and you drive off. You go home. You forget about it. But as a Christian, you are called to compassion as an expression of mercy; and mercy is compassion in action. This is the call of Christ upon us.
Honestly, in the sight of Christ, the action is more important than the feeling. So even if you do not feel compassion, you can act with compassion; and Christ will be pleased. “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy” (Matthew 5:7). Blessed are those who forgive, and blessed are those who act with compassion. Let us close with a word of prayer.