Offering Compassion

‘There will be no mercy for those who have not shown mercy to others but if you have been merciful, God will be merciful when he judges you’ James 2:13.

Unfortunately, some people think that the mercy of God is a license for sin. The truth is when you truly experience the mercy of God you would not want to touch sin again. God said to Moses, ‘if you are to describe me then say I am the Lord compassionate, merciful, slow to anger, plenteous in mercy, I will not always chide neither will I keep my anger for ever’. God wants to be known as merciful. The problem with us is if God that has every right to judge everybody has chosen to be merciful, what about you and I? Sadly, for many of us mercy is far from our dictionary. As children of God when people see us they should see our Father’s trait – mercy in us. As a parent do your children call you gracious, merciful, full of compassion, slow to anger or will they give a completely different report about you? Unfortunately, some parents that have no clue about parenting think parenting is bullying. Husbands who have no clue about leading their homes and their wives think leading means bullying. The day you have to declare that you are the man of the house then you are not really the man of that house. When you truly are the man of the house, you do not need to announce it because everything just works when you are around. Ten years now in marriage, I have never even had any compulsion to say to my wife ‘I am the head’. Why would I say that? Isn’t it obvious? You have to announce something that is not obvious. God wants us to be compassionate and full of mercy. God wants us to be merciful and not merciless. Unfortunately some believers have shut their bowels of mercy. You have two tubers of yam, you see your brother who is hungry and you say ‘be blessed’. Will ‘be blessed’ fill his stomach; after you have pronounced blessings on him them give him one tuber of yam to eat [James 2:14-17]. If you have been merciless God says you will reap what you sow. Many of us need to decide today and commit to changing our ways totally; for it is only the merciful that will obtain mercy.

Prayer: Father, restore my bowels of mercy so that I will be rich in showing others Your mercy that I have also freely received, in Jesus Name.