The Mercy Spiller
Once in a while a sentence of Scripture stabs your heart and wakes you up to realities you hadn’t quite felt before.
This morning I sat on my porch reading and praying through a few psalms. Eventually I came to a sentence, Psalm 40:11. I’m sure I’ve read this sentence many times. This time the sentence read me.
As for you, O Lord, you will not restrain
your mercy from me;
Seriously?
I restrain mercy. I hold back mercy, grace, and love from other people, even the people I say I love the most. My mercy-giving has a limit.
And, other people restrain mercy. Other people have restrained mercy from me. Instead of receiving mercy, I’ve received judgment, punishment, and shunning. My mercy-receiving also has a limit.
But a relationship with the Lord has an entirely different operating system.
His mercy-giving has no limit. He doesn’t restrain his mercy from his children. He never runs out of mercy! There’s an eternal supply! He doesn’t hold back and conserve his mercy, the Lord spills his mercy all over me.
This means my mercy-receiving has no limit. Because the Father spilled all his wrath on Jesus, he can spill mercy all over me every single day of my life, even on my days of greatest failure. So far, today has been a big day of failure for me.
Guess what? News Flash. This just in: At approximately 9am this morning in the San Francisco Bay Area, there was an oil spill of God’s mercy, poured out all over Justin. You should see the spill. It’s beautiful.
God isn’t in the mercy-restraining business, he’s in the mercy-spilling business.
This is so, so hard for me to believe. I’m so used to a life of limiting the mercy I give to others and rationing the mercy others give to me. I’ve been so afraid of running out of mercy. I’ve been a Mercy Miser.
I don’t want to be a Mercy Miser.
Miser
Function: noun. Etymology: Latin miser miserable
a mean grasping person; especially : one who is extremely stingy
I want to be a Mercy Spiller.
The Mercy Spiller – http://tinyurl.com/28v5apv #fb
Amen brother
Thanks for that one today
The Mercy Spiller:
Once in a while a sentence of Scripture stabs your heart and wakes you up to realities you had… http://bit.ly/ciUQ36
Thanks for this post and your comments on the verse from Psalm 40. I recently have been thinking some about this subject. A passage that I ran across was Titus 3:1-8. God’s mercy should lead us to show mercy. This takes the form of good works and unconditional love as we remember the mercy that God has shown us we are drawn to have compassion on all men and women who were born of the same weak frame. “Remind them to be submissive to rulers and authorities, to be obedient, to be ready for every good work, 2 to speak evil of no one, to avoid quarreling, to be gentle, and to show perfect courtesy toward all people. 3 For we ourselves were once foolish, disobedient, led astray, slaves to various passions and pleasures, passing our days in malice and envy, hated by others and hating one another. 4 But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, 5 he saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit, 6 whom he poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, 7 so that being justified by his grace we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life. 8 The saying is trustworthy, and I want you to insist on these things, so that those who have believed in God may be careful to devote themselves to good works. These things are excellent and profitable for people.” Titus 3:1-8
