BECAUSE OF MERCY



Your relationship with God is based solely upon mercy, and always will be. And it will never be based on anything else. “He saved us, not because of the righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy” (Titus 3:5). You are saved by grace and you live by grace — grace is synonymous with mercy.

You will never get to the point where you don’t need God’s grace and you don’t need God’s mercy. If you are a Christian who doesn’t rely exclusively on God’s grace to sustain you then you are a Christian that doesn’t really take sin seriously. You may take some sins seriously—the big sins, the visible sins, the sins that other people commit—but you often lapse into a pattern in which you don’t take seriously your own sin, because you have determined that your sin is rather small in comparison and you think you can deal with your sin all on your own. You eventually get to the place where you believe you are living at a high enough spiritual level that begging for mercy is no longer necessary. I’ve got news for you. It will never happen. Your relationship with God is always about mercy. You will never get beyond the need for God’s grace.

When you begin to despair over your sin, to take it seriously, you’re on your way to victory. When you learn to despair over your sin only then will you have the power to defeat your sin. Someone reading this is thinking, “If I’m already forgiven for all my sins past present and future, what’s to stop me from sinning all I want and cashing in my forgiveness ticket?” My reply would be, sin knows how to do only one thing, and it can accomplish only one thing. It knows only how to destroy, it doesn’t know when to let up, and it never ends well for you. No one ever says, “When I began to betray my marriage and neglect my family and live only for myself, my spouse and I were suddenly happier than we’ve ever been before.” That’s not how it works.

When you begin saying, “Because of God’s grace I sin more than I want.” You are on the road victory. If you want to create lasting change in your life you do it one day at a time. God’s word to you is that He will give you a huge head start every day of your life. He will love you forever. He will never stop loving you. You can count on His love every day. He will shower you with mercy and grace and forgiveness ever day of your life. You can begin every day right with Him. You can count on His mercy and His faithfulness forever. “The faithful love of the Lord never ends! His mercies never cease. Great is his faithfulness; his mercies begin afresh every morning.” (Lamentations 3:22-23)

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