WWUTT 1927 Blessed are the Merciful (Matthew 5:7)

Jesus said, Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy.

That seems pretty straightforward. If you have mercy on others, God will have mercy on you. But there's something deeper to it than that, when we understand the text.

This is When We Understand The Text, a daily Bible study in the word of Christ, that men and women of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.

Tell your friends about our ministry at www .utt .com. Here's your teacher,

Pastor Gabe. Thank you, Becky. We're back to our study in the Gospel of Matthew, in the Beatitudes of Matthew chapter 5.

So let me read through those eight Beatitudes once again, in Matthew 5, 3 through 10, out of the

Legacy Standard Bible. Hear the word of the Lord. 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 lowly, 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 have been persecuted, for the sake of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

So, picking up where we left off yesterday, we're at verse 7. Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy.

Now, that seems pretty straightforward, but as we've been going through these Beatitudes, you've probably picked up on a theme here, that there's something deeper going on than just simply saying, if you show mercy to others, then

God will show mercy to you. That can't merely be all of it. There are plenty of unbelievers out there, those who do not know

God, who do not worship or follow Christ, who can be merciful to others, but do they receive the mercy of God?

So, this has to be mercy on God's terms and under His conditions.

First of all, let's understand what mercy is. What do you believe that mercy is? How do you often hear mercy described to you?

Often, you'll hear mercy side -by -side with grace, right? Mercy and grace.

So, what's the difference between the two? Well, mercy is not giving someone what they deserve, or giving someone what they don't deserve.

Yeah, something like that. So, if a person deserves judgment, but a judge doesn't judge them, and just lets them go, that's showing mercy, right?

That may be the way that you've heard it defined. Grace, on the other hand, is what? Rather than giving a person judgment, it's even sparing them that judgment, but giving them more of what they do not deserve.

So, not only does the criminal get pardoned, but then he also gets rewarded.

You also get all of this. That would be grace. And we often define grace as unmerited favor.

So, mercy is just letting a person off, whereas grace would even come with reward, or benefit, or receiving something.

But that is a lacking definition of mercy. It's really a lacking definition of grace as well.

Mercy is significantly more than that. There's compassion with mercy, especially in this particular context, where you hear in the

Beatitudes, blessed are those who are merciful. They're compassionate toward others.

They show pity. And they're actually moved in heart, not just to sympathize with a person in their weakness, but so moved to want to help them, to even give of themselves and their own resources to benefit somebody else.

Think of the parable of the Good Samaritan in Luke 10. There's a teacher that stands up, and he wants to challenge

Jesus. And he says, Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life? And Jesus said to him,

What is written in the law? How do you read it? And the lawyer answered,

You shall love the Lord with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength, and with all your mind, and you will love your neighbor as yourself.

And he's probably proud of himself, answering the question in that way. Jesus says to him, You have answered correctly.

Do this, and you will live. But then the lawyer responds to him. This is verse 29.

Wishing to justify himself, he said to Jesus, And who is my neighbor?

As though to say, You know, that person doesn't qualify as my neighbor. That person is my neighbor. So that this man can do, you know, show love to those who are easy to show love to and be able to justify himself, not show love to these other people so that I don't have to bother myself with those people that I don't like.

That's what this lawyer is thinking, attempting to justify himself. Jesus replied and said,

A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho and fell among robbers, and they stripped him and beat him and went away leaving him half dead.

And a priest happened to be going down on that road, and when he saw him, he passed by on the other side.

Likewise, a Levite also, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side.

But a Samaritan, who was on a journey, came upon him, and when he saw him, he felt compassion.

And he came to him and bandaged up his wounds, pouring oil and wine on them, and he put him on his own animal and brought him to an inn and took care of him.

And on the next day he took out two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper and said,

Take care of him, and whatever more you spend, when I return, I will repay you.

Which of these three do you think proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell into the robbers' hands?

That's an interesting way for Jesus to put that, because what was the lawyer's question, attempting to justify himself? And who is my neighbor?

Jesus doesn't say, Everyone's your neighbor, which would be the correct answer for that question. That's really what that means.

But rather he gives this illustration and puts the question to the lawyer, Which of these three do you think proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell into the robbers' hands?

And the lawyer was put on the spot. He had to answer, The one who showed mercy toward him.

And Jesus says, Go and do the same. And so we see in this parable that compassion and mercy are synonymous.

Verse 33, A Samaritan who was on a journey came upon him, and when he saw him, felt compassion, and actually showed that compassion by bandaging up the man and helping him.

And then the lawyer has to say that the one who proved to be a neighbor is the one who showed mercy.

He felt compassion. He showed mercy. There's your definition of mercy. That's what

Jesus means when he says, Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy.

So once again, it's not just being forgiving of other people, like not repaying people with vengeance.

We might think of mercy in that way, like I'm abstaining from lashing out at this person.

See, look at how merciful I am. Well, mercy is not the absence of something. It's rather the presence of something.

It is compassion and sympathy toward others to the extent that you would even be willing to give of your own resources in order to help that other person.

So it is showing mercy as God defines mercy, as it accords with his truth, which expresses his mercy on his terms.

We are doing mercy as God defines mercy. Blessed are the merciful.

As God has been merciful to us, so we are to be merciful to one another.

The merciful shall receive mercy. We shall receive compassion from God.

We shall receive help from him. And not that we do something to earn it, okay?

That's not what's being laid out here in this particular beatitude.

Hey, if you show mercy, then finally God will be mercy to you. That's not it. Because, again, what we read in the beatitudes is a description of those who are followers of Jesus.

So if we're showing mercy, it's because we have received mercy. God has been merciful to us, and that so motivates us to be compassionate toward others because we know the compassion of God that has been given to us.

Why wouldn't we want to show that same compassion to other people as a picture of the

God who loves us? It would be in worship, in honor of God who has mercy, that we also would have mercy.

Consider what Matthew Poole said about this particular beatitude. The men of the world bless themselves if they can take care of themselves.

Let others do what they will and as well as they can. But I tell you that those alone are the blessed men who are touched with a true sense and feeling of the wants and miseries of others, and that not out of a mere goodness and tenderness of nature, but out of a true obedience to the will of God and a sense of His love to them and faith in His promises.

And moved from these principles, do not only pity and compassionate them and wish them well, but extend their helping hand to them, suitably to their miseries.

For these men shall obtain mercy, and that not only from men, if they come into straits and distress, but from the hand of God.

In Psalm 37, 26, and in 1, 12, 5, and 6, he does not say that they shall merit mercy at God's hand, but they shall be mercified.

They shall obtain mercy. So let me go to those two psalms and read that to you.

This is Psalm 37, verse 26. Well, I'll start in verse 25.

I was young and now I am old, yet I have not seen the righteous forsaken or his seed begging bread.

All day long he is gracious and lends, and his seed is a blessing.

So because God has been gracious to him, so he's been gracious to others, and he continues to receive blessing from God as a result.

Let's read Psalm 112. I'm going to go ahead and read the whole psalm, because it's just 10 verses.

Praise YAH. How blessed is the man who fears YHWH, who greatly delights in His commandments.

His seed will be mighty on earth. The generation of the upright will be blessed.

Wealth and riches are in His house, and His righteousness stands forever. Light arises in the darkness for the upright.

He is gracious and compassionate and righteous. It is well with the man who is gracious and lends, who sustains his work with justice, for he will never be shaken.

The righteous will be remembered forever. He will not fear an evil report.

His heart is set, trusting in YHWH. His heart is upheld.

He will not fear until he looks in triumph on his adversaries. He has given freely to the needy.

His righteousness stands forever. His horn will be raised in glory. The wicked will see it and be vexed.

He will gnash his teeth and melt away. The desire of the wicked will perish.

So you heard there in both of those psalms, in Psalm 37 and in Psalm 112, that it is the one who trusts in YHWH.

His heart is set on trusting in YHWH. His heart is upheld.

He will not fear. He has given freely to the needy, because he trusts in God.

He knows that God has provided for him and will take care of him, and so he shows compassion to those who are in need, and God will have compassion on him.

God will show mercy to him. So blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy.

We've already received mercy in Christ, but we continue to receive that blessing, the mercy of God, when we show mercy to others.

And remember that there's activity behind that. When we're talking about being merciful here, it's not merely abstaining from something.

My neighbor was a jerk to me, but I'm not being a jerk back to him. See how merciful I am, all right? That's not really what we're talking about, but we're having compassion for other people.

We're going out of our way to help them, giving of our resources for someone else's benefit, for God gave of his richness and glory to us for our benefit, sending his own son to die on the cross for our sins so that whoever believes in him, our sins will be forgiven.

Doing nothing is not being merciful. Doing nothing is actually wicked. Go back to the parable of the good

Samaritan. What did the priest and the Levite do? Nothing, right?

They did nothing. And these are the ones that even the lawyer would have to admit were being pretty terrible to the man who had been beaten and laying in the road.

They were just as bad as the robbers who beat him because they would do nothing to help him.

The priest is walking along, sees the beaten man, passes by on the other side. The Levite comes down the road, sees the beaten man, passes by on the other side.

But it's a Samaritan who is on a journey. This man isn't even his kinsman.

And he stops on his journey to help the man and even pays for his care out of the money that he was using for his journey.

Giving of himself, really sacrificing of himself for someone else's benefit.

So that even the lawyer had to admit this is the man who showed mercy. The priest and the

Levite did nothing. That wasn't showing mercy. It was the man who actually had compassion on him and did for him and cared for him.

That's the mercy that we're looking for. That's what it is that we should be doing for others.

Consider these words in James 2. I'm going to read, well, like half the chapter here. So this is

James 2. I'm going to start in verse 1. My brothers, do not hold your faith in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ with an attitude of personal favoritism.

For if a man comes into your assembly with a gold ring and dressed in bright clothes, and there also comes in a poor man in dirty clothes, and you pay special attention to the one who is wearing the bright clothes and say, you sit here in a good place, and you say to the poor man, you stay over there or sit down by my footstool.

Have you not made distinctions among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts?

Listen, my beloved brothers, did not God choose the poor of this world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom which he promised to those who love him?

We've read that somewhere, haven't we? Yeah, right at the beginning of the Beatitudes. Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

So James goes on, verse 6. But you have dishonored the poor man. Is it not the rich who oppress you and they themselves drag you into court?

Do they not blaspheme the good name by which you have been called? If, however, you are fulfilling the royal law according to the scripture, you shall love your neighbor as yourself, you are doing well.

That sounds familiar, too. That was exactly from the parable we just read in Luke 10. James goes on.

But if you show partiality, you are committing sin, being convicted by the law as transgressors.

For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles in one point has become guilty of all.

For he who said, do not commit adultery also said, do not murder. Now, if you do not commit adultery, but you murder, you have become a transgressor of the law.

So speak and so act as those who are to be judged by the law of freedom.

For judgment will be merciless to one who has shown no mercy.

Mercy triumphs over judgment. So there you go, how we are to be actively merciful and compassionate to those who are in need.

And if we are not merciful, then judgment is what we will receive. But mercy triumphs over judgment.

Now, who is it that I am supposed to help who is in need? Well, anybody.

As the opportunity arises, show charity, be willing to show charity to everyone.

But I would put before you, brothers and sisters, that we have an obligation, especially to show mercy to members of the household of faith.

We cannot go out and help every poor person in the world. That's impossible to accomplish. Nor are we even called to do so.

But we are commanded that we must help those in need who are part of the body of Christ.

So consider Galatians 6, verse 10, which says, So then, while we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, and especially to those who are of the household of faith.

So we show charity to all, but we show a special priority to our brothers and sisters in the

Lord, whom we are worshipers with in the church that we belong to.

Just like when you make a paycheck, you're going to pay your own bills and care for your own family first before you take that money and help anybody else.

So it is within the church. We're going to help our own and make sure our own brothers and sisters in the

Lord are taken care of before we then also may go outside the church and show compassion and mercy to others.

This is not a difficult concept. You know what it means to love your own family and that they take priority over everybody else.

Sorry, folks, but my wife and my children get my time before anybody else does.

And that's not a controversial take. So it should also be in the church.

We're caring for our own. But then as we also have that opportunity to show charity to others, let us do so.

The most merciful and most charitable thing that we can do for people who are in the world, who are worldly, who are unbelievers, you know this, the most charitable thing we can do is to share the gospel with them.

And by sharing the gospel, I don't mean do good acts for them. I mean, you are telling them the good news about Jesus, that they would be convicted of heart, that they would repent of their sin, that they would put faith in the

Lord Jesus Christ and so receive his forgiveness and his mercy and so be saved.

Because God has shown this mercy to us. We must be merciful to one another, filled with compassion for those who are lost, who are headed to hell if they do not repent.

The most compassionate action we can take is to share the gospel of Jesus Christ with this wicked generation.

Heavenly Father, we thank you for the mercy that you have shown to us and teach us to be merciful to one another.

For as it says in Romans 5 -8, God has demonstrated his love for us in this way, that while we were yet sinners,

Christ died for us. So that same message of the gospel that came to us, may we take that message to a lost and dying world.

And as you have shown mercy to us, teach us to show mercy to others, especially the household of faith and as we have opportunity to show charity to others as well.

We ask for this guidance and this help in Jesus' name. Amen. Pastor Gabe is the author of several books and Bible studies.

Available in paperback or for your e -reader. For titles and more information, visit our website at www .utt

.com. Join us again tomorrow as we grow together in God's Word, when we understand the text.