"Forgive Us Our Debts"

Well this morning we continue on in Matthew 6 as we work our way now toward the fifth petition here in Matthew 6 verse 12 and. We considered that the daily bread that this shift away from focusing on God and the first three petition.

God's glory God's kingdom his reign and that God's will would be done on earth as it's done in heaven. And then last week with the fourth petition. We saw this shift now to the disciple and particularly the the needs of the disciple.

The daily bread that the disciple receives from the Lord's hand the way the Lord nurtures us in both body and soul. The way that we are entirely dependent upon him as our creator as we saw from Psalm 104 as if all of creation itself has its mouth open waiting to receive from the Lord.

The Lord turns his face away all of creation shudders in trouble. But when the Lord breathes upon he renews the face of the earth and so he considered what it means to pray for. The daily bread and here Jesus presses into another need a need that we have between God and man this need.

To forgive others even as we seek God to forgive us. And so that's what we're looking at in the fifth petition. Let me begin from verse 7 when you pray. Do not use vain repetitions as the heathen do for they think that they will be heard for their many words.

Therefore do not be like them. For your father knows the things you need need of even before you ask him in this manner. Therefore pray our Father in heaven. Hallowed be your name your kingdom come your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

Give us this day our daily bread. Forgive us our debts as We forgive our debtors. Well as we begin this morning, let me ask the question do you pray that God would give and Forget to ask that God would forgive.

It tends to be that we we readily come to God for our daily bread for our immediate needs we don't as willingly as freely and as fully come to God that we might be forgiven and. Certainly that doesn't then saturate the way we think about others as we bear them over in prayer and yet Jesus reveals that this is a deep need.

And as deeply we ought to be concerned for our daily bread. So also deeply we ought to be concerned about God's forgiveness and our forgiveness for others. So that we're not just attentive to what we need to be given but also what we need to be forgiven by God.

That's where Jesus goes in this petition. Forgive us our debts. Now, what are the debts? It's an interesting word. The parallel to the Lord's Prayer in Luke uses a different term. This is most likely commentators or of course always have disagreements.

But most likely this is coming from a sort of Semitic background this idea of death.

Of course.

There's many ways that scripture speaks of sin sin being a missing of the mark sin being a Transgression a crossing of a boundary sin being a debt. This is one way to think about sin, but even before we think about sin We can speak of debt meaningfully just in terms of our relationship to God.

Remember, this is where Jesus has been. We think of the God who is our creator who provides our daily bread and and even there There is just a certain debt of being that belongs to God. Debt in the widest frame of reference is that which we owe to God as our creator.

Simply by the fact that he made us and we did not make ourselves. There is a responsibility that comes with that. Every one of us in the Romans one sense was made to glorify God. Simply by virtue of being made by him and yet as Paul goes on to argue in the beginning of Romans Rather than glorifying the Creator We rather turned and glorified the things that he created we glorified ourselves.

We we made idols out of wooden stone out of ambitions and pride and envy and so we we gave thanks to things that didn't deserve thanks and Denied the one to whom all things are due and so there's this debt that is owed to God.

This is why God turned us over. As a result of the fall turned us over to our own sinfulness our own darkened minds that we could not Understand him nor desire after him. And so again, there's a debt that is owed to God simply by virtue of him having created us.

Every one of us must give account to God. This is plainly stated in Scripture. This is not something you can opt out of. You can't say well if I become a Christian then I have to give an account to God.

No God created you. Everyone must give an account to God. Everyone has a certain debt that is owed to God a due. By virtue of the fact that they were made by him and having been made by him. They were made for him.

No one is of themselves but God. Therefore being entirely dependent upon him by virtue of the fact that he made us by virtue of the fact that he sustains us. By virtue of the fact that we must give an account to him.

There is a debt that is owed. We could speak of this as a natural debt the debt of nature the debt of being made in his image. But rather than glorifying him we turned against him and sin. Infected and corrupted every aspect of our being every faculty every fiber every ability every power sin infected all of that so that.

Now it's impossible for us to rightly regard God in the way that he created us to be regarded. There's no way that we can actually pay this natural debt in a way that Adam by virtue of being made in his image would have spontaneously inherently related to God out of glory.

You don't need to Command that people glorify something glorious. That's just what you do as a response. This is how Adam was when he was communing with God by virtue of creation. Everything he did brought glory to God everything he saw from the Creator's hand.

His desire was pure and facing toward the Lord and sin impacted all of that. When someone hears an incredible Song or sees a beautiful piece of artwork. Or lays their eyes on something glorious. You go to a place the kind of place where people pull out their cell phones and they try to take ten thousand Photos, but they can never capture what they're responding to.

What are they doing? They're glorifying that it's an impulsive reaction. No one's putting them up to it. They're not saying well, I guess I should try to glorify this. It's it's spontaneous. They're compelled to do it.

That's what we're like toward God. But what sin does is it severs that ability to respond to God. For the glory that is due his name and now we are in his debt. It's the debt of nature. We do not pay what we owe.

We do not respond as we ought. This at the minimum is what we're praying when we recognize we need forgiveness for our debt. Lord I have not seen you as you are. I Have not thought of you as I should I have not regarded you as glorious praiseworthy.

I haven't loved you in the way that your law says I ought to love you with all of my mind and all of my.

Heart and all of my strength.

This is seems so far out of reach Lord. That's how far fallen. I am as an image-bearer. Adam loved God with all of his mind with all of his heart with all of his strength with all of his soul. He could not do otherwise until the fall.

This is the debt of nature a debt that we cannot pay that's the minimum. But then we think about the maximum the debt of sin. That's clearly where Jesus is going clearly. That is the parallel here. It's what he means by Debt, he's talking about sin.

Forgive us our debts as we forgive those who debt against us our debtors those who sin against us. So clearly that's where Jesus is going in. What sense is sin the worst debt? Well, it's the worst because we have nothing to pay.

If.

We could pay the debt. We wouldn't need to pray for forgiveness as Jesus teaches us to pray. But Thomas Watson points us out. He says we're not like the man in the parable who says have patience with me I'll pay all that I owe.

That's not an option. After the fall as we know Adam made us all bankrupt. So there's a debt that is owed to God and it's a debt that cannot be paid. We can't muster enough up to earn Satisfaction. There's no way that we can actually carry that balance.

We're ruined Unless God forgives. So Jesus positions and he uses his term debt to position us toward God as our creditor. And we as creatures being debtors debtors to his grace debtors to his mercy if God does not forgive we perish.

That's the framework here in the fifth petition. And so the whole posture of his disciples then is to be humble. Jesus says even as you seek for daily bread and you have this this hunger that compels you and moves you and motivates you.

So also you ought to be compelled and motivated by the need for mercy that it would drive you toward a certain humility and Recognition of just how patient and long-suffering God is to you of how his mercy is renewed every morning.

How he never gets fed up and says that's enough. I'm done dealing with you. In fact when we were his enemies he sought us when we were wandering away from him straying against him.

He sought us.

All of this is contained in the fifth petition when we pray for forgiveness. So I want to look at this in three points this morning now. You'll know just from where we end off in verses 14 and 15 that this is going to come back in about three weeks time.

So I want to lay sort of a foundation this morning and then get into some of the practical application in three weeks. So I want these three points to sort of be a very broad simple foundation for thinking about this fifth petition and.

Then in three weeks time we get to verses 14 and 15. Jesus is gonna turn right back to this point. And so you see how important it is for him. You see how important it is for us as his disciples the fact that he didn't just let it be here in verse 12.

He came back to it. He emphasized it. He put the the yellow highlighter on it to say it's really Important that you understand this. So here's the first point we pray for forgiveness. It's the most obvious thing about this fifth petition, isn't it?

Forgive us our debts. What are we doing? We are praying for forgiveness. What is the act of praying for forgiveness? What does it actually look like when you pray for forgiveness? Well, it looks like you're confessing your debt acknowledging owning admitting.

Explaining not justifying. But clarifying your debt what we're talking about. In other words is confession. That's what it looks like to pray for forgiveness. It looks like Confession confessing our sins to God.

Confession remember coming across this some years ago. Thomas Manton had this wonderful little image for us this morning. I hope we're distant enough from lunch that I don't feel too bad bringing it up.

If we were at the very end of the sermon, I wouldn't bring it up. But he says confession is the vomit of the soul. Isn't that a beautiful image? Confession is the vomit of the soul and I mean 17th century cuisine.

I think that was something they were accustomed to. British cuisine hasn't really moved on that much in the 300 years. But if you've ever eaten something that immediately did not sit right with you you understand what he's getting in.

You immediately go something is wrong. I am NOT comfortable you get sweat in places. You shouldn't have sweat like under your eyelids. My body is going into red alert and it's not right until you get it out of your system.

Right, you don't you don't find relief. In fact, it gets worse and it gets worse and it gets worse until you finally clear it. Whatever way God sees fit for you to clear it and then you find that relief.

And finally that the pain that sense of everything that was upsetting and disturbing. It's finally put to rest now. You have some sense of relief and peace and you can move forward in strength and that's the idea of confession.

Something's not right. I've done something wrong. I've had wrong acts. I've thought wrongly. What am I doing? It's not sitting right? It's soul sweat now. Something's not right. I Can't freely now turn to my father.

I I can't actually dwell in that joy and that communion with him now I feel estranged from him. I feel that where there ought to be a sort of light and peace. There's now a darkness and a hiddenness and now it's really troubling to me.

My conscience is very burdened. I just want out. I want to get rid of this. I want to have peace and relief again. That's what it's like to confess sin. We're tossing and turning in our soul until through confession.

We pray for forgiveness and only there can we find relief peace reconciliation the beginnings of joy. And Jesus is highlighting this. Why does he circle back to this he knows that this is normative for his followers.

His followers must walk in the forgiveness that God alone can provide and having received that forgiveness. They're enabled to forgive others and that's why Jesus can say even as you're praying for forgiveness.

You're cognizant of the fact if I am praying for forgiveness if I realize my debts. How dare I go scolding and chasing after other debtors? I'm saved by grace. How could I not be gracious. I'm spared by God's mercy.

How could I not be merciful. God has been long suffering toward me again and again and again. Why would I not forgive my brother. 77 times 7 of course Jesus emphasizes this in part because he desires for us to walk in.

Peace.

He desires for us to have his joy. That's his high priestly prayer and John 17 that my joy would be in you and that joy would be complete. The problem as George Muller I mentioned last week. One of the things that George Muller says is in our natural state.

We don't like dealing with God, right? After the fall Adams running and hiding Adam and Eve are putting on a ghillie suit and trying to you know Be statues in the bushes hoping they can hide from God.

They don't want to deal with God. All that They responded to in this glorious compulsion now has become a terror to them. He's so glorious. So holy so majestic and powerful. I can't bear to be in that presence not in this state not with this sin.

Not with this guilt and so in our natural fallen state. We don't like to deal with God. Me in fact we shrink away from him. We shrink away from thinking about eternal realities. You see people shrink away from thinking about death.

People don't like thinking through the the deeper more difficult aspects of life. They shrink away from the spiritual realities that older generations clung to in our generation seems like they'll do anything to escape.

And this is what George Muller says we we shrink from him. We dislike dealing with God alone and this clings to us more or less even after we're born again. That's very insightful. Even after we are saved even after we are following the Lord we may still not like dealing with him.

We may still shrink away from the idea that I'm dirty. I'm guilty. I have no right I need to clean myself up and then I can come to God. I can create Conditions by which I can be happy and at peace. I just got to work really hard and clean myself up and and and only when I'm worthy of forgiveness.

Well, then I go and ask for forgiveness. But what is Jesus doing here in the fifth petition? He's teaching us. Remember what he just said give us our daily bread. He's saying this is going to be a daily life of the Christian.

Not just seeking your needs day by day, but seeking God's forgiveness day by day. And if you're seeking God's forgiveness day by day, you don't have enough time to clean yourself up. I remember My parents one of their wedding presents they had and at my house.

It's like a museum growing up our house. Like they had the same. You know dinner set that they got when they were married, you know, 30 years later still going strong. We've gone through like eight half the time that we've been married somehow everything was Maintained immaculate and they had these three little porcelain musician figures.

And.

I was roughhousing with some friends after school one day and I I knocked them off the cabinet behind and Two of them shattered and so I threw them away. Out of sight out of mind and as the villains from Scooby-Doo would say I almost got away with it, too until One of the heads that I missed was found in the cabinet.

And it's like I remember these. Where did they go? And why is there a broken head?

Ross I.

Thought I can just hide it and then it's dealt with. All right. But a Christian recognizes that meant that mentality of I'm just gonna hide and then it'll be okay. It's like saying I'm just gonna keep eating this poisoned food and even though I'm drenching sweat.

And I'm turning all shades of green. It'll be okay. As long as I don't deal with it and Jesus is saying no. As soon as something's broken as soon as you've done something wrong you come to your father for forgiveness.

Daily you come to him his mercy renews every day. This is a promise that's held out to the Christian. So Martin Luther when he gets to this point Martin Luther says the entire Lord's Prayer is nothing else but a confession.

Isn't that beautiful the entire Lord's Prayer everything we've been looking at for weeks now. What is it at root? It's just a confession. Lord, you're holy Lord. You're glorious Lord. I have needs Lord.

I've done wrong Lord. Help me. It's essentially the Lord's Prayer and and he says this what are our petitions other than a confession that we haven't done what we should Have done and it's a plea for grace a plea that we would have a cheerful conscience.

Confession of this kind must continue without letup as long as we live because the Christian life Essentially consists in this that we acknowledge ourselves to be sinners and are always praying for grace.

That's Martin Luther. He knew he knew that in an extreme way when he didn't know it at all. If you had said to Luther Prior to his great discovery in Galatians and in Romans of the truth of God's gospel He would have said well, all I do is acknowledge that I'm a sinner.

I Confess more than anyone. I'm in this monastic order of Augustinians. It's a revolving door for me. They hate me because I'm five minutes away and I come running back because I sinned in that five minute spin.

I'm basically torturing myself to have a clean conscience and find peace with God. So Pre Reformation Luther would have said the Christian life consists in acknowledging ourselves to be sinners and praying for grace.

And then the post-reformation Luther is able to write this Same words. Completely different understandings. And my fear is that for many of us we're a lot closer to pre-reformation Luther Than we are to Luther after he read through Romans and Galatians and discovered the gospel of the grace of God in Christ Jesus acknowledging ourselves to be sinners as not torturing ourselves toward absolution and Praying for a grace that we never receive that's Luther before the Reformation.

It's rather acknowledging. I cannot clean up my own act I cannot even cleanse my own conscience and I certainly cannot have peace with God unless he gives me peace. Because he's the one that's forgiving me.

He gives me grace. Therefore. I'm reconciled. It's the discovery of psalm 130 where the psalmist says Lord if you mark iniquities who can stand. If you mark iniquities who can stand the psalmist like Luther was struggling with a guilty conscience.

He speaks earlier in that psalm about being in the depths. What are the depths? Is this some physical trial you begin to realize even if it began that way it is now a spiritual trial. It is an ordeal.

This man is feeling completely lost. And as he's struggling with his guilt in a sense of alienation from God, he's recognizing God has shown mercy. And he recognizes that mercy is nothing that he's earned.

It's simply washes away his guilt. Lord if you marked it if you held me to my sins who could stand. No one can stand before you. No one can talk back to the judge. So what it means is that God is no longer marking the iniquities of his people.

What the psalmist is getting at is God is not pressing the full weight of our sin against us. Jesus doesn't even say. When you pray this daily prayer your list better be exhaustive and detailed and if you miss anything It'll come back to haunt you.

That's not what Jesus said. That's what Luther thought when it spent hours Torturing himself examining himself for every iota of what could be displeasing to God. Then he was freed from that bondage when he recognized a merciful God not a vengeful God.

But a God who delights to show mercy who says even when you're not seeking my daily forgiveness. I'm renewing my daily forgiveness. That's just who I am as your father in heaven. And so for the believer who's put their faith in Jesus Christ.

We recognize our conscience can have peace our walk can have joy because God does not mark iniquities against us. In other words, he never presses the full weight of our sin. And that's the whole point if you were charging our sins to us, no one could stand.

I Couldn't sleep. I couldn't eat. I couldn't function if I had a weight of my sinfulness against God ever hanging around my neck. So this ongoing life of asking for God for forgiveness. It does two things it brings the believer to to a better frame of humility before God.

I'm still asking for forgiveness after all these years. I'm still finding more that needs to be forgiven after all of this light. I still find stains that run deeper. Guilt that is so neatly hidden. Then on the other hand, it's also enlarging the mercy of God.

The more I'm humbled and aware of all the little sins. Not just the big obvious sins. But even the little straying sins the foxes in the vineyard so that humbles me makes me realize I'm not what I ought to be.

Though God has been working in my life all these decades I'm still so so far from what I ought to be in Christ and that humbles me. It makes me sympathetic and merciful to others at the same time. It magnifies the mercy of God who is patient like a God.

Who is abundant in his mercy like a God? And that humbles me more as it glorifies God. So these two things are always happening as we pray this as our daily prayer if God should mark iniquities. None of us could stand.

Utterly lost ruined by the fall lost without hope. So this is where the psalmist goes from verse 3 to verse 4. You have this adversative conjunction. It's the most beautiful part of the psalm if you should mark iniquities who could stand.

But. There is forgiveness with you. That's the discovery that takes him out of the depths. There's forgiveness with you. He didn't clean his act up. He didn't say Lord. Let's barter. I promise. I'll do this.

I promise. I'll work harder. I Discovered this joyful reality. But God is not going to press him with the full weight of his sin because with God there is forgiveness. Jesus is saying the same thing in this petition.

Forgive us our debts. Why. Because you are the God who forgives with you. There is forgiveness. So instead of crushing our souls with all the staining misery of sin we find in God forgiveness for our sins.

Psalm 86 we we use this as our responsive reading this morning Psalm 86 you Lord are good ready to forgive. Did you notice that? He's more ready than you are. He's more ready to forgive than you are to ask for forgiveness.

That's who God is ready to forgive. We finally. When we're at that heightened state of theological nausea. We finally drag ourselves as it were to the confessional and God's they're already going. What took you so long.

Did you think I wouldn't be here. Have you known me to be cruel and vengeful and spiteful. Did you forget that I am good and ready to forgive. You Lord are good ready to forgive. Abundant in mercy to all who call upon you.

And Jesus is telling his disciples every day call upon him. Every day he's ready to forgive you. Every day he's furthering his calling in your life fulfilling his purpose. He's the one that began the work.

That was the whole argument of Galatians. It was it was like a lightning bolt. Luther had a couple occasions with lightning bolts. The first lightning bolt. He he had this view of God as this judge that was against him.

And the lightning bolt was. I'll work it off. I'll become a monk. Just spare me. The second lightning bolt was reading Galatians where Paul says you began this by grace and now you're gonna finish it by works.

What did you do to save yourself? God has done the work. So if it began by grace, how are you gonna complete it by works?

There's a lightning bolt for Luther.

You Lord are good ready to forgive abundant in mercy to all who call upon you. It was it was in that Augustinian order that Luther actually understood what Augustine was getting at. Augustine was a theologian of the grace of God.

Augustine himself said when a man cloaks his sin God strips it bare, but when a man uncovers his sin God covers it.

Beautiful.

When we try to camouflage our sins and get by and we're nauseous and we're weakened and our strength is draining God actually just lays it open. God just strips it bare. But when we confess our sin in other words when we uncover our sin and just say Lord here it is he covers it.

This is what it looks like to pray for forgiveness. It's laying bare all those things for which we need forgiveness and being motivated by the fact that he's a God ready to forgive. So that's the first point we pray for forgiveness.

Second point we pray as those forgiven. We pray as those forgiven. So we don't just pray for forgiveness, but we pray as those who are forgiven. And this whole sermon, of course, I'm speaking of believers in Christ Jesus of those who have faith.

I'm not speaking generically of all people speaking of those who have put their faith in Christ for salvation. For those who pray for God to forgive. They're also praying as those who are forgiven. Very important point Jerry Bridges pointed us out and forget what book it was.

But I saved it as a note and I've turned back on it year after year. Jerry Bridges says we tend to drag our old sins along with us and live under a vague sense of guilt. We're not nearly as vigorous in appropriating God's forgiveness as he is in extending it and Therefore instead of living in light of God's forgiveness through Christ.

We tend to live under an overcast sky of guilt most of the time. This is what I'm getting at with. We tend to be more like pre-reformation Luther than post-reformation Luther. Living with some vague sense of guilt.

Not the recognition of my debts are forgiven and I ought to be humbled. But somehow I still have debts that need to be covered and I better be humble as I try to work them off. That's the difference that we're talking about a vague sense of guilt.

Well, why do you feel this way? I don't really know. I just know that this is how I feel a vague sense of guilt not the light of God. But an overcast sky you look outside. It's mid-april. Why is there four inches of snow on the ground?

Why is the sky gray? Are you like me? You're waiting for blue jays and chickadees and daisies. It's like I wanted to take some strolls around the park. Why am I shoveling? Why am I deicing? That's what it's like.

We live under this overcast sky. We live in this it's supposed to be warm and rich and lively and glorious. But instead it's cold. It's frozen. This vague guilt. Jesus doesn't want his disciples to function in this way.

Pray for your father to forgive you. That's what he says. He doesn't want you to walk in some vague guilt. How dishonoring is that to his sacrifice. Lord you mostly Made the way for my forgiveness. I'll make up what is lacking and is dishonoring to the gospel.

Lord you forgave most of what you could and I'll just find a way to work off the rest of the debt. That is blasphemous to the gospel. Jesus does not intend for his followers to walk in this sense of vague guilt to mope around like a spiritual Eeyore.

Jesus knows what Nehemiah knows. The joy of the Lord is your strength and The joy of the Lord is your strength. Because without the joy of the Lord you are weak. And where does the joy of the Lord come from?

What does it consist in. It consists in Psalm 130 with you? There's forgiveness. That's that's the that's the heartbeat of joy in the Christians life.

My debts are canceled.

My shame is lifted my burden is released. I'm forgiven. I'm free. I'm cleansed. I'm counted worthy. I'm counted pure. I'm blessed. I'm adopted. I belong. I'm an heir not for my sake but for Christ's sake not because of what I've done Or what I've failed to do but simply because of what Christ has done on my behalf.

That's the joy that becomes a strength of the Christian. We operate under a sense of vague guilt again. No wonder there's no strength. There's no joy. No wonder there's no power in the Christian life.

There's no sense of forgiveness. No sense of mercy. You can be motivated to certain duty. You can be motivated to discipline under a sense of crushing guilt, but not for long people will come to church under a crushing sense of guilt and That only lasts what a handful of weeks because there's no joy in that.

It's just guilt and guilt only drives people so far. And so in their weakness because guilt has not been absolved by the forgiveness offered freely in the gospel. They have no strength. And though they're trying so hard to enter that narrow way that few fine.

They're too weak to do it. And so they perish on the way. Those who are strong Might might not look very strong. They might look very humble. They might not look very mighty and bold. They might look very meek.

They might be described as full of mercy. And these are the strongest Christians you'll ever meet. They have the joy of the Lord. It's cleansed them and absolved them of all of their guilt. They've learned what Jesus teaches his followers to pray forgive my debts.

Even as I forgive others their debts against me. Blessed is this one who understands these things. Psalm 32, which Paul takes up in Romans 4 blessed is the man whose transgression is.

Forgiven.

It's a blessed man. That's a strong man. That's a mighty Christian. Listen to the logic here. It's all about forgiveness and and I want you to see the the effects the consequences the fruit of God's forgiveness in Psalm 32.

Here's the banner statement. Here's the picture. Blessed is the man whose sins are forgiven. That is a blessed man. What does it look like on the on the one hand. What does it look like to be a man without your sins forgiven?

Without a conscious awareness that you come to a God who is good and ready to forgive and you receive that forgiveness freely. What does that look like when you don't have that and what does it look like when you receive it?

Those are the two things at the beginning of Psalm 32 that David brings across. So here blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven whose sin is covered. Blessed is the man to whom the Lord does not impute iniquity.

In other words hold to account. We're using accounting language. Pin the debt in. Whose spirit there is no deceit? There's a debt something's been wrong, but he's not adding sin to sin. He's not lying about it.

He's not deceiving himself. He's not deluding himself and hiding it from others. Here it is Lord. Here's what I've done. Here's how I've been in my shame Lord. Here's who I am right now. Well, what's the consequence of not being forgiven?

When I kept silent David writes my bones grew old through my groaning all day long. Here's that theological Eeyore moping around every joint hurts. He has a spiritual fatigue that hangs around him like a dark cloud.

I kept silent. My bones grew old. He's a young vigorous man. He's a young mighty ruler and he's like inside. I'm 95 years old. I'm withering away in the inner man. I'm groaning all day long. Why night and day your hand is heavy upon me.

He's trying to hide. He's trying to delude or distract himself from the sense of guilt and the separation of God feels like this a heavy hand on him. Well, there's a mercy in that he must belong to the Lord.