Marvelous Mercy

Alright. Try unplugging it and plugging it back in, right? Amen.

I'm grateful for you this evening. This morning, we talked about what you do flows out of who you are.

And so tonight, we'll pick up on that thought as we continue in the Beatitudes. And the question

I want you to ask yourself is, am I a recipient of mercy?

If what you do flows out of who you are, then the question tonight is, are you a recipient of mercy?

Matthew 5. Matthew 5. Because if you're a recipient of mercy, if that's who you are,

I am a recipient of mercy. And if what I do flows out of who

I am, then if I am a recipient of mercy, then

I will be what? Merciful. And this is what

Jesus teaches us in the Sermon on the Mount. Matthew chapter 5.

Let's consider these Beatitudes together. Let's stand and let's read in verse 2.

Our text is verse 7, but I'm going to read verse 2 through 10.

And He opened His mouth and taught them, saying, Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted. Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied. Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy.

Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God.

Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Let's pray. Father, we want to be a merciful church. We want to be a merciful people.

And we pray that tonight You would help us to reflect upon Your great mercy. You are merciful.

It's an attribute of Your very being. It's just as though You are love and holy and just and gracious and good.

So too, God, are You merciful. And help us to understand what it looks like to be a merciful people.

We pray Your blessing over the preaching of the Word. We pray it in Jesus' name. Amen. You may be seated.

The Beatitudes, as we've talked about, they are pronouncements of blessing. We've said that the word,

I believe it's like maybe the Christian standard or home and Christian standard translates the word blessed as happy.

Now, the word for blessed and happy I don't think are one to one correlation, but there is certainly an element of happy in the word.

But we're examining here in this series, this first part of the

Sermon on the Mount, the recipients of the kingdom of heaven. What I want you to think about tonight is what do the citizens of the kingdom of heaven look like?

And Jesus answers that for us here in the Beatitudes. So you need to remember something. The Beatitudes are not commands.

Be careful how I say this, because in one sense we are commanded to be merciful, but in the Beatitude itself, look at verse seven.

I mean, just look at it. You're not commanded in verse seven. Verse seven is not an imperative for you to be merciful, right?

So Jesus could command you to be merciful in verse seven, but that's not what he does. He simply gives it as a statement of fact.

This is an indicative. He says who the merciful are, right? Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy.

Now I want you to consider, I was helped this week in some study of this text, but I want you to consider how verses seven, eight, and nine really flow out of verse six.

So if you're satisfied, if you're hungry and thirsting for righteousness, and you're satisfied, well, here's some things that will change about your life.

Blessed are the merciful, verse eight. Blessed are the pure in heart, verse nine. Blessed are the peacemakers.

Daniel Doriani says, to hunger and thirst for righteousness is to long for God. If we seek first the kingdom, then we also seek the king.

We long for his rule and his presence. So if we hunger and thirst for righteousness, then these other things are going to be evident in our life.

We are merciful. We are pure in heart. We are peacemakers. Why? Because we want the king.

We desire him and his rule. Doriani also does something in his commentary,

I think it's very helpful, I hadn't really noticed before, but he takes the first three beatitudes and he calls them beatitudes of need.

So go back to verse three. Blessed are the poor in spirit. Blessed are those who mourn.

Blessed are the meek. Okay, that is, think about this for just a moment. Think about the masterful way that Jesus is teaching.

So we see our sinfulness in these beatitudes. We realize our need, we realize our poverty of spirit, then we, into verse four, we mourn our sin, then we are meek because we see ourselves rightly in light of who we are and who

God is, and then because of this, the spirit's working in our life. Visualize it this way.

In one sense, this is like a behind the curtains, like if you ever wanted to know what does regeneration look like, this is kind of like God removing the curtain and letting us look at what's going on into a heart that is being born again and has been born again.

We see these realities, and so now we hunger and thirst for righteousness, and we long to be right in the sight of God, we understand that's only in Christ, by faith in Christ we're justified before a holy

God because of His righteous life, His death in our place, His resurrection. We repent and believe the gospel, but we also hunger for righteousness in our daily life, and flowing out of desiring righteousness, we're merciful, pure in heart, and peacemakers.

So, I'm trying to say, it's helpful to think through the beatitudes here as a whole.

Jesus is showing us what the recipients of the kingdom of heaven look like.

So, tonight then, we talk about verse 7. Who are the merciful?

The merciful are those who have been shown mercy, and those, the text says, who will be shown mercy.

Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy. And their mercifulness flows out of a transformed heart that hungers and thirsts for righteousness.

Let me say it this way, and then let's get into the outline. How do you know tonight if you really hunger and thirst for righteousness?

Say, preacher, I think I hunger and thirst for righteousness. How do I really know? Well, are you merciful?

Right? Because those who are hungering and thirsting for righteousness are merciful people.

So, let's examine that tonight. So, first, I want to consider, number one, mercy received.

Mercy received. Now, Jesus doesn't touch on this, but I want to give you a behind -the -scenes look.

Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy. The merciful are merciful out of a heart that has already received mercy.

Mercy, friends, I'm telling you, is the way that you entered the Christian faith.

Mercy is not getting what you deserve. And consider for a moment God's mercy upon your life prior to your conversion.

Just everyone in here think about it for just a moment. Think about where you were. There's a moment in your life, right, that you can point to.

Sometimes people can point to the exact hour, the exact minute, the exact day. Okay?

Some of you can point to, this was the time in my life that this happened. Okay, but think back to the time when you were converted.

And think now, before that time. And I want to remind you of God's mercy to you.

I have a few Old Testament texts to consider. You can write these down, I'll read them.

First, I want to consider Exodus 34 .6. Exodus 34 .6, we see that God's mercy is one of His glorious attributes.

So God says this in Exodus 34 .6, Yahweh passed before Him and proclaimed,

Yahweh, Yahweh, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness.

Now just think about this for just a second. God reveals Himself to Moses. And when He reveals Himself to Moses, He declares some of His attributes.

And one of the attributes that God declares to Moses is

He says, He's merciful. Now this word for merciful,

I don't want to over read this, but I think it's helpful. This word for merciful comes from a

Hebrew root word that is the word for womb. This mercy of God reflects

His compassion. There's not a place, in a sense, there's not a place that is to be safer and more full of compassion and care in this world today than the womb.

Which, by the way, we should mention, makes abortion all the more wicked, right?

Makes it all the more doubly offensive. This place that is supposed to be a place of compassion and care and comfort and protection is a place of open season in our culture today.

Where children are murdered. It's a very indictment, not just upon the murdering of unborn children, but even an indictment in one sense on our

Creator. But I don't want to over read the word, I'm just trying to illustrate tonight the rich and abundant and compassionate mercy that is found in God.

The very attribute of God. God is merciful. Period.

John Gill says this, God is merciful in the most tender and affectionate manner. He is rich and plenteous in mercy, freely giving it, delights in bestowing it, constantly shows it to His people.

It is manifested and displayed in Christ, the mercy seat. And it lays a foundation for faith and hope and is the spring of all good things in time and to eternity.

Oh friends, how glorious a reality it is tonight that we serve a merciful

God. It is because of His mercy that we even made it to the point of our conversion.

In Psalm 78, 38, it says, Yet He, that is God, being compassionate, that word for compassionate is the same word for mercy from Exodus 34, 6.

So, yet He being compassionate, He being merciful, atoned for their iniquity, and did not destroy them,

He restrained His anger often and did not stir up all His wrath. Think again about the moment prior to your conversion.

Not just the moment, the moments, the months, the years, the time you spent in rebellion to God.

It was His mercy, as it were, that tempered His wrath. Now, I know that's a human way of saying it.

The attributes of God are not conflicting. Don't think of it that way.

But the point is, in His mercy, the Lord did not deliver

His wrath upon your wretched and miserable soul. You, who deserved

His wrath, He stayed His wrath by His mercy.

If God were to have shown you justice, would you have ever made it to Christ?

The answer, of course, is no. All those months and years that you spent in idolatry, all those times you disregarded

His commandments, all those times you ignored His ways, all those times you loved darkness rather than light.

God could have struck you down. He could have cast you in the pit of hell. He could have erased you from the memory of all persons.

You could have been unknown and forgotten by all subsequent generations. And yet God stayed

His hand of wrath and showed you mercy. Mercy in the sense that He didn't wipe you off the face of the earth.

But even beyond that, consider Jonah. Jonah 4, verse 2 says this.

Jonah complains about God's mercy. It says, And he prayed to the Lord and said,

O Lord, is not this what I said when I was yet in my country? That is why

I made haste to flee to Tarshish. For I knew that You are a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and relenting from disaster.

So here's Jonah's complaint. Jonah knew Exodus 34, 6.

He knew that God is merciful and he knew the very reason that God sent him to Nineveh is because he is a merciful

God. That is, not only is God merciful in His nature and not only does

God's mercy stay His wrath and His judgment against your sins, but there is also the reality that there was a point in your life that out of His mercy,

God sent you a gospel preacher. Marvelous mercy!

Somebody at some point in your life handed you a tract, taught you in Sunday school, preached the gospel to you, pulled you aside and said,

Hey, do you understand your position with a holy and righteous God? And they gave the gospel to you.

They said, above your head is the wrath of God and it's coming upon you. And if you don't repent and believe the gospel, you will suffer

His wrath forever in hell. And God in His mercy sent you a gospel preacher.

It is out of God's mercy that men manifest the

Messiah's message. This is the mercy of God. How overwhelming is the mercy of our great and holy triune

God. But as you know, it didn't stop there. Not only is God's mercy His very nature, not only does

God's mercy stay His wrath in your unconverted day, not only did God's mercy send you a gospel preacher, but I want you to see this.

Turn to 1 Peter with me. 1 Peter. We looked at 1 Peter this morning, didn't we?

Let's start in chapter 2. 1 Peter 2. 1

Peter 2, verse 10. 1

Peter 2, verse 10. Once you were not a people, but now you are

God's people. Once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.

What I'm saying to you is if you are a Christian in here tonight, you are a recipient of sovereign mercy.

If you're not a Christian in here tonight, I appeal to you on the mercy of God.

Be reconciled to God in Christ. Now dear Christian, turn back to 1

Peter chapter 1 and consider this. In 1 Peter chapter 1, verse 3.

So here's what I want to tell you. Not only is mercy a part of God's nature, not only did mercy stay

His hand of wrath upon your pre -converted day, not only did mercy send you a gospel preacher, but also consider 1

Peter chapter 1, verse 3. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, according to His, what's it say?

Great mercy. He has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.

That's such a great text. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, according to His great mercy.

He has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the gospel, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.

In other words, the mercy of God is, let's see it on Calvary. It's displayed on Calvary for all to see.

Is God merciful? Yes. How do I know? Look to the cross. You see there the mercy of God extended wide,

His hand stretched out, displaying that God is a merciful God.

That though we have sinned against Him, though that we have turned our back against Him, though we have broken His commandments and gone of our own way, the cross displays the mercy of God for all who will partake of it.

For all who will repent and believe the gospel, God is ready and willing to be merciful.

But then Peter says that this mercy of God presses even further in that it is out of His mercy that God actually causes us to be born again.

Think about the greatness of that text. According to His great mercy,

He has caused us to be born again.

Which by the way, just a side theological note, you didn't cause yourself to be born again.

You didn't partner with God in order to be born again. Rather, out of God's great and sovereign mercy,

He brought about your regeneration, here's a fun word, monergistically, meaning by Himself.

Streams of mercy never ceasing call for songs of the loudest praise.

Friends, I present to you tonight a merciful God. And I plead with us tonight in this room to reflect upon and consider the great mercy of God that we have been shown.

And it's with this foundation and this background that we now enter into our text. Jesus says,

Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy. So the second point tonight, mercy received, secondly, mercy rendered.

The followers of Jesus are merciful. Why? Because of all that, however long that part of the sermon was that we just heard.

We're merciful because we've been showered with the mercy of God. You want to know what real repentance looks like?

What does it look like to repent of your sins? It's not merely to say sorry, or to cry, or to show emotion.

That may be part of it, but one way that true repentance manifests itself is that we now show ourselves to be merciful.

You can't truly be repentant and simultaneously unmerciful.

What type of Christian are you? Oh, I'm one of those unmerciful Christians. What? That doesn't make sense.

How could someone who stood before, like imagine standing for this great dam of blessing.

Right? And the dam just bursts forth and then all this water of blessing just pours out on you.

And you want to try to say, oh, I'm not wet. That's like you saying you're not merciful because you didn't experience the mercy of God.

Like what? No. We're merciful. We're compassionate. We feel sympathy with the misery of another.

These are just some standard definitions. Let me mention three ways our mercy manifests itself to others.

First, your mercy ought to manifest itself to others. It ought to be shown to others in your manner.

Number one, in your manner. In your attitude, if you will. Since we have received such abundant and undeserved mercy from God, our manner towards others is merciful.

That is, we view people in a merciful way. Mercy is now a reflex in the

Christian life. It's not, of course you're in that situation because you're such a wicked person.

Rather, because we know if not for the grace of God, there go I. You see the person in Perryville and I see them every day, probably every day, maybe multiple times a day.

You see the people walking down the street and you know that they have abused some sort of substance.

You see that. You see that right here in our town. And you have an option. You can think, well, of course they look that way.

What do you think's going to happen if you use drugs? What do you think's going to happen if you drink alcohol? Of course you're like that.

You deserve to be in such a situation. And I'm reminding you, if not for the grace of God, that's you.

Or worse. And so we see people. Mercifully.

We view people as God views them. Mercy guillotines our pride.

Cuts the head right off. And tempers our demeanor.

This isn't condoning sin. God doesn't condone sin.

But His mercy, as it did with you, shows itself in not destroying sinners, but displaying

His patience with them. You need to ask yourself this question tonight. Do you think that there are people in this area and in your life, do you think there are people out there who deserve hell more than you once did?

We categorize that, don't we? Well, I know that I was bad, but I mean that person, they really deserve hell.

I wonder how you see your sinfulness apart from Christ before a holy God. To be impatient with sinners.

To be ready to cast them off into hell this very moment. To not care about their situation or the things that they're dealing with or the things that they're going through.

This is unmerciful and it's unlike our God who is merciful. And it is a forgetfulness of the great mercy that you and I have been shown.

Look back to Calvary. Look to the cross. See abundant mercy flowing freely from Calvary, from the wounds of Jesus into your wretched and undeserving soul.

And let that mercy flow from you to others.

We also must be merciful in our manner towards our brothers and sisters in their sanctification.

Be patient with believers as they grow. Don't be ready to pounce on them. Again, this is not dismissing sin.

We're seeking to uphold mercy. Are you ready to forgive others their wrongs against you?

Or when they repent, are you ready to just hold it over their head? Secondly, we're merciful in our means.

We're merciful in our manner. Secondly, we're merciful in our means. Maybe I could say it this way.

We're merciful in our attitude and we're merciful in our actions. That would have alliterated just as well, huh?

So to just simply say, man, I hurt for that person, or I really feel bad for that situation, is not mercy.

Christians will be the ones who grab someone by the hand who no one else will grab.

And they will say, let me help you. Do you understand the foundation for education in society?

This is the terrible thing. This is what has happened. You know, education in our society today has just completely been turned over to the government.

And you tell me the trajectory. You tell me the trajectory. Is it good or bad?

Adoption, foster care, we've turned it over to the government. Feeding the hungry, clothing the poor.

We've turned these things over to the government. You tell me tonight if the government has stepped in and made the situation better.

Friends, God has not instituted the government to be merciful. Right? That's not the government's role.

The government is to uphold justice, to reward the good, to punish the evildoer, to defend its citizens.

But it doesn't really have a category for mercy. But the church does.

Friends, we've abdicated ministries of mercy, and now we just say, well, that's taken out of my taxes.

Government can deal with it. This is not Jesus' design for the church. We're merciful in heart, and friends, we're merciful in action.

There's generosity that flows out of our mercy towards those in need, whether that is the sick, the downtrodden, or the poor.

In the plagues, one of my favorite stories about John Calvin in Geneva, in the plagues, the city officials, they're like, look, dude.

They didn't say, look, dude, but I'm just telling you in my mind how I see it. Look, you've got to stop.

The plague's here. You've got to stop visiting the sick. And he was like, no. And he still went and did it.

Why? Because he has a pastoral heart. We seek to defend the defenseless.

It's an act of mercy to stand up for the unborn. Even at our own cost, we defend those who can't defend themselves.

We help the helpless. We are instruments of mercy. We are instruments of God's mercy in the church.

We are merciful to our brothers and sisters in Christ in heart and in action. Our confession even teaches, when it talks about the

Christian Sabbath, it even teaches that we must do acts of mercy on the

Lord's day. In other words, if you're driving to church, and you're like, look, I'm running a little bit late to church, and Jacob's going to be outside with a scowl on his face.

I've got to get there. And you see a young lady pulled over, and you see kids in the car.

She's got a flat tire. Looks like she doesn't really understand how to change. You roll down the window, and you throw out a gospel tract.

Say, I'll be praying for you. That's not merciful, right? I've got to get to church.

I'm sorry. No, no, we should be a merciful people.

We're merciful in our means, meaning we're merciful with our time, with our talents, with our treasure, the gifts we've been given to extend

God's mercy to others. I told, I told so and so.

I told him not to do it that way, and he went and did it that way, and now he got himself in trouble.

I ain't going over there. He don't deserve my help. He probably don't deserve your help.

But you understand, if he deserved your help, it's not mercy. Right? If he deserved your help, it's you giving him what he deserves.

Mercy is not giving him what he deserves. Let mercy flow from your lips, and uplift your brothers and sisters to the

Lord in prayer. Let it drip from your hands as you help those in need. Let it direct your feet as you walk into places that other people aren't going to walk into to extend the mercy of God to poor, wretched sinners.

Thirdly, may God's mercy control our manner and our means. Thirdly, let us be merciful in our message.

Verse 7, blessed are the merciful. Now, I'm not so much talking about your everyday words here, but as I was studying this week, this thought overwhelmed me, and I just want to share it with you.

How can we be merciful to such a vile and corrupt age? How can we be merciful to the godless society that we live in today if we withhold from them the gospel of mercy?

Meaning, if we see those who are destitute of food and clothing, and we help them, but we withhold from them the gospel of mercy, how is it that we're actually being merciful to them?

God, in His mercy, sent Jonah to a wicked and godless city, Nineveh.

God, in His mercy, sent Jonah, and God, in His mercy, has established an outpost, if you will, a fortress, if you will, right here in Perryville.

An outpost for sinners. A refuge of mercy. It's the church, the local church.

Jonah knew God's mercy, and that's why he didn't want to go to Nineveh. But supposedly, churches today know the mercy of God, and yet they sit on their hands when we have the gospel of mercy.

So, we can steward this mercy here at Providence Baptist Church. We can steward it like others sometimes try to do, and we can say, okay, well, here's how we're going to be merciful.

We'll just, when we can, we'll invite people to this place and to come into these walls and to hear about mercy, and maybe we'll try to have an event in these walls and we'll try to get people to come and hear about mercy.

And listen, there is, I believe, a time and place for that. There is sometimes where that is appropriate, and I'm not going to fight against that.

But if that is the fullness of our strategy, if that is even the focus and the primary aspect of our strategy, are we showing ourselves merciful to central

Arkansas? Does not the mercy of God compel us not to go out and drag unwilling sinners into some place they don't want to be, but rather to take willing servants of the gospel and to take them into the streets, to take them into the areas.

There is sinfulness and lost people going to hell in our city and in our country and right here in this area, and we have the message of mercy.

For the love of God, let it compel us to the streets to take the message of hope to the sinners in our city.

They need the mercy of God, and we have that message.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not telling you, I can't invite anybody to church, the preacher will get mad.

No, I won't, like, we won't get mad. You brought a lost person to church, shame on you.

No, like, invite lost people to praise God, like, do that, that's great. However, the mainstay of our mercy, the focal point of our mercy, is not sitting around planning events while the world is perishing.

It is unsheathing the sword of the gospel and wielding it in the streets.

Let us be merciful in our message. Let us take the full, unadulterated gospel of mercy to those in this area.

I want you to think tonight about the state of our country. And I want you to think about how the church should respond.

So we see these events, now listen, we want to be careful, prudent, we want to think through these things. But there are these events sometimes that happen, like drag queen story hour, or like certain parades, certain events.

And I'm not saying that we want to be unduly antagonistic. There are people who are unduly antagonistic, and I think they're wrong.

But I want to ask you a question tonight. How do you think the church should respond to the wretchedness of our culture?

Well, there's a couple of ways that we could respond. We could just say, hey, that's gross. You're wicked.

You should not vote Democrat. And we could, by the way,

I think all those things I just said are true things. But that's not enough.

You know in Ephesians 6, you have the armor of God. Do you know that there's one place on your body that there is no armor?

We read this Wednesday night with the children. In the armor of God, there's a place on your body that there's no armor.

I'll let you interact. Where is it? It's your back.

The church does not look at the godlessness of our society and turn around and run away and say, hey, let's go into our little holy huddle and let's get in here and let's get away from the ickiness.

Rather, we see, again, I'm not saying unduly antagonistic, but we see these events, we see the godlessness of these events, we see these things happening, and say, you know what

I'm going to do? I'm going to go and I'm going to take the gospel to those people. I'm going to go and I'm going to pass out tracts.

I'm going to go and I'm going to preach, so be it if they laugh at me, so be it if they scorn me.

But I believe in a sovereign God and I believe that as I preach the gospel, that God will use the gospel to his glory.

He will plant seeds. He will actually draw people to himself through the proclamation of the gospel.

And I sure know this more than anything else. You sow nothing, you reap nothing. You go out in your garden this year and you plant a bunch of tomato seeds, maybe only a few of them come out.

But I'll tell you how many will come out if you plant none. Zero. So the church takes a message of mercy to a corrupt and wicked generation.

Then let me say there's application here in our message for Christians interacting with other

Christians. Friends, let me ask you something. Do you preach the gospel to one another?

Are we instruments in the Redeemer's hands, as it were, in one another's lives in conquering sin?

Like, we said it this morning, like the church needs to be a place where it's okay that we confess our sins.

Like if someone comes up to you and says, I've sinned. And your response is, get that out of here,

I don't want to hear that. You're not an instrument of mercy. Rather, we should be able to talk about our sins and confess our sins to one another and offer the hope of the gospel and encourage one another in repentance and be willing to confront one another when there's not repentance.

All these are instruments of mercy. Church discipline is an instrument of mercy. If I'm walking by a gunner's house and his house,

Lord forbid, is on fire, and I say, well, yeah, but if I were to wake up gunner, he'd be upset. I'm not going to tell him anything.

That's not merciful. Friends, we're to be instruments of mercy in our message. So that's mercy received and mercy rendered.

And then thirdly, just a quick point, mercy rewarded. So Jesus says, Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy.

This is a promise. Blessed are the merciful, for they shall, not might, shall receive mercy.

God rewards the merciful with what? Mercy. Of course, in one sense, it's not really a reward at all, since God's mercy is what it is that is working in our life to produce this mercy.

Isn't God so kind? Like our weak, meager, insufficient attempts at mercy,

God rewards with His own mercy. But the text clearly shows us that there's only one type of person that receives mercy.

It is the merciful. Not because it's a bargaining chip, but because those born again by grace are actually merciful.

Who you are dictates what you do. What you do flows out of who you are.

And it's only those born again who are truly merciful and endure to the end in their mercy.

So much more I could say about that, but we'll just sort of end by asking are you merciful?

Are you merciful? In your manner? In your means?

In your message? These beatitudes that we read and looked at, do they describe your character?

This isn't a buffet, right? This isn't like you walk by and you say, okay,

I kind of like that, I kind of like that. No, Jesus is speaking of a reality here. I'm not asking tonight if you can grow in mercy.

Of course you can. Answer, can you grow in mercy? Answer, yes. Can I grow in mercy? And Pastor Jacob, grow in mercy?

Answer, yes. Of course we can. And we should all pray about that. But for a moment I'm asking has the

Holy Spirit tonight visited your heart in such a way as to transform you into what

Jesus is describing here in these beatitudes? Poor in spirit. Mourning sin.

Meek and humble before God. Hungry and thirsting for righteousness. Merciful. Pure in heart.

A peacemaker. Persecuted for righteousness sake. Is this you?

And if it's not you, I preach to you tonight the mercy of God.

There is mercy for you if you will run to the

Lord. Today is a day of mercy. Repent and believe the

Gospel. How foolish and wicked would we be tonight?

Children, I speak to you. I know some of you are unconverted. Others, I'm not sure your state before the

Lord, but I will tell you how wicked and foolish are we tonight to hear about this great and merciful

God and to harden our hearts and to walk out of here and refuse His mercy. Run to Jesus.

Jesus is mercy. And then, dear

Christian, do you hear this message and remember tonight that you're in need of fresh mercy?

Boy, I am. Lamentations 3 .23 says His mercies.

The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases. His mercies are new every morning. And I don't think

I'm doing injustice to the text by saying not only are God's mercies new every morning, but they're new every evening too.

They're new for you tonight. Why will you partake of such fresh mercy tonight?

It's in the cross. Go to Christ.

Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy. Father, we thank You for this text.

And we thank You that it was recorded for us under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. We pray that You would work it in our hearts tonight and we respond rightly in faith.