The Beatitude for the Merciful

“Ask God to give thee skill In comforts art; That thou mayest consecrated be And set apart Unto a life of sympathy.”

Mercy is a shining quality. Yet, like all the qualities in this cluster of beatitudes, its brightness is heavenly, not earthly. Mercifulness is not a fruit of nature; it is not found nor even remotely suggested among the ““works ‘ot the flesh.” 3 1tis.a fruit of (the Spirit. It 1s born from above.

Mercifulness manifests itself in two ways — first, in patience and forbearance toward those who do wrong, leniency toward those who fail; and secondly, in ministrations of kindness and love to those who are in need.

The first of these manifestations is negative. The merciful are not exacting. They do not insist on claiming all that is due to them. They do not deal harshly with those who injure or offend them. The word mercy has in it always the thought of grace. It is kindness to the undeserving. The merciful are those who look with pity upon the unworthy, and who are forgiving and long-suffering. In this view, mercy is akin to meekness.

The other phase of the quality is active and positive. The merciful are not only disposed to be forbearing and patient; they are ready to show their love in ministries of kindness, not to the good and worthy only, but to the unworthy and undeserving as well. They have a heart of gentleness which prompts them to acts of mercy.

It is easy to find the lesson of mercifulness written out for us in the Book in which all our life’s lessons are set down. We find it first in God Himself. What if God were not merciful? Where then would be our hope? The first favor we must ask and receive of Him is mercy. Until we are forgiven we cannot stand in His presence. Mercy is the first word of blessing we hear as we look up into the divine face with penitence in our heart. The cross of Christ is the most wonderful point in all history, and the cross is the divine mercy giving itself, the Lamb of God bearing the sin of the world.

Everywhere God’s mercy shines. We live under a canopy of love.

‘*Why seek ye for Jehovah

Mid Sinai’s awful smoke P

The burning bush now shelters A sparrow’s humble folk,

The curve of God’s sweet heaven Is the curve of the leaf of oak;

The Voice that stilled the tempest To the little children spoke, —

The bread of life eternal Is the bread He blessed and broke.”

When we turn to the narrative of God’s dealing with men, it is one long story of mercy, divine forbearance, pity, compassion. In every line of the record of Christ’s life we find the same marvellous quality. We see it in His infinite patience with sin, injustice and wrong. We see it also in His life of love, in His ministry of kindness, in His unceasing work of compassion.

One of the old legends says that as our Lord walked away from the grave, on the morning of His resurrection, lovely flowers grew in the path where His foot- - falls pressed. It is only a legend, but there is a sense in which sweetest flowers did indeed grow in every path which those holy feet pressed. He went about doing good. We can count up a certain number of miracles which are recorded in the Gospels, but the miracles were the smallest part of His acts of love. His days were filled with unrecorded mercies. No one evet came into His presence in receptive mood and went away without a blessing. His life was full of merciful deeds.

When we turn to the teachings of Christ we find the lesson set for us in shining lines on every page. He called it love — He said His followers should love not God alone, but their fellow men as well. He was careful, too, to break down every fence, so that not one man or woman should be left out from the company of those whom we are to love.

He was particular to say that we are to love our enemies. Any one can love a friend. Any one can be kind to one who is kind to him. But we are to go beyond what common human nature would do — we are to bless them that curse us, do good to them that hate us, and pray for them that despitefully use us and persecute us.

Then in that wonderful story of the Good Samaritan, Jesus made it most clear that the love which His followers are to exhibit must not be a mere gentle sentiment, like so much of what people call religion, but must be a love that ministers and stops at no cost in its ministering. The priest and the Levite were types of good men — we need not say harsh things about them, for the great majority of modern religionists do the same thing every day — but they lacked the mercifulness which the need before them demanded. Then came the Good Samaritan, a man who made no profession whatever of love for the Jews. The wounded man by the wayside hated him, but this did not hinder the flow of the Samaritan’s compassion in immediate, costly and most helpful ministry. That is our Lord’s thought of what mercifulness should be ready ever to do.

In His representation of the judgment, our Lord shows in a wonderful way the place which mercifulness has in the divine thought of a good and true Christian life. Those who are called to the right hand of the King are not the great theologians, the brilliant scholars, the distinguished patrons of Christianity, but those who have fed the hunery, given drink to the thirsty, shown hospitality to the stranger, clothed the naked and visited the sick and the prisoner — that is, the merciful, who with gentle heart and thoughtful sympathy have ministered to the needy ones of earth.

These are mere fragments of the teaching of our Lord inculcating the duty of mercifulness. His whole gospel pulsates with tenderness. There never beat in this world such another heart of gentleness as the heart of Jesus, and His followers are to be what He was — repeating the pity, the compassion, the patience, the comfort, the sympathy of His life, wherever they go. Everything that is harsh or unmerciful is denounced as unworthy a disciple. The servant of God must not strive, but be gentle, said St. Paul. Very rarely did Jesus utter a severe word, yet He spoke with burning: condemnation of those who professed to be the religious teachers of the people and yet were lacking in the spirit and practice of love: ‘‘Ye devour widows’ houses and for a pretence make long prayers.” ‘“Ye pay tithe of mint and anise and cummin, and have omitted the weightier matters of the law, judgment, mercy and faith.” The holy indignation of that great heart of love burned in hot flame against all injustice and unkindness, against all unmercifulness; (Ino it he ssamewjudament scene in which such honor is put upon common kindnesses, the most withering anathema is uttered against the mere neglect of mercifulness — not feeding the hungry, not giving drink to the thirsty, not showing hospitality to the stranger, not ministering 108 to the sick. It is not enough to refrain from rudeness, harshness and unkindness; the lack of mercifulness is sin against the law of love.

As we study closely the New Testament definitions of religion we learn how inadequate are those conceptions of a Christian life which leave out the practice of the law of mercy and love. ‘‘He that loveth not, knoweth note Gody for God: iis stove.” ‘*Whoso hath this world’s goods, and beholdeth his brother in need, and shutteth up his compassion from him, how doth the love of God abide in him P”

The blessedness pronounced on the merciful is: ‘‘ They shall obtain mercy.” Thus mercy is indeed ‘‘twice blessed. It blesses him who gives and him who takes.”’

Nothing is made more clear in the Scriptures than that the reception of the divine goodness depends upon the spirit of those to whom it is offered. God’s love is for all; His affection goes out toward every life. Yet not every one receives that love. Some hearts are shut against it. Men live in castles of their own, and so inviolable is personality that no one, not even God, can force the ‘door, or ctfoss the threshold, until the master inside rises and opens. Only when there is love within to respond can the love that stands without and knocks be admitted. There must be, in some faint measure at least, a corresponding spirit in us to receive any gift or blessing from God. We find in God an echo of our own heart-beats. This is taught in a remarkable passage in one of the psalms:

With the merciful thou wilt shew thyself merciful;

With the perfect man thou wilt shew thyself perfect;

With the pure thou wilt shew thyself pure;

And with the perverse thou wilt shew thyself froward.

For thou wilt save the afflicted people;

But the haughty eyes thou wilt bring down.

It is true, therefore, in relation to God, that the merciful shall obtain mercy, and the unmerciful shall find no mercy.. This is taught in the petition, ‘‘ Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors.”’ Thus divine mercy and human mercifulness are linked together. If we will not forgive we cannot be forgiven. But if we forgive we shall find forgive-~

IIIness. So important is this truth that our Lord repeated the teaching over and over, speaking one of His great parables to enforce the lesson that the unmerciful cannot obtain mercy from God. But the same is true in our relations with our fellow men — the merciful obtain mercy and the unmerciful find no pity. Those who judge others shall be judged by others. With the measure that we mete it shall be measured to us. We receive what we give. We find in the world what we are prepared in ourselves “to find. “The lover of beauty finds beauty everywhere, even in a desert, while he who has no eye for loveliness finds dreariness even ina garden. He who has songs in his heart hears 112 songs in every place, while the man with no music in his soul would hear only harsh discords if even angels were singing. The selfish man tells you everybody is selfish, while he who has a generous heart finds generous spirits in every company. The unmerciful find only coldness and ungentleness, while the merciful obtain mercy.

Then there is the law of spiritual harvest — whatsoever a man soweth that shall he also reap. Those who deal unjustly shall gather injustice into their own bosom, sooner or later, and those who scatter merciful deeds shall harvest mercy.

We give a scanty draught to one Who faints beside the way: There flows a fountain for our thirst Some weary, woesome day.

““We give a little flower of love To light a darkened room; And lo! our gardens overflow

With beauty and with bloom.”’

Sometimes, however, this beatitude my seem to fail in this world, and those who sow love in the fields of need may appear to get no return, or may suffer neglect or ingratitude in the days of their own need. But this world does not see the end. Ofttimes there is only the sowing here, the harvest coming in the life beyond. We may be sure at least that in the end there will be no failure of fitting return. We have our Master’s word that not even the giving of a cup of cold water shall miss its reward. No ministry of kindness will be forgotten or will fail to bring its blessing.

“The look of sympathy, the gentle word, Spoken so low that only angels heard; The secret act of pure self-sacrifice, Unseen by men, but marked by angels’ eyes — These are not lost.

‘The kindly plan devised for other’s good, So seldom guessed, so little understood, The quiet, steadfast love that strove to win Some wanderer from the ways of sin —

These are not lost.

“Not lost, O Lord! for in Thy city bright Our eyes shall see the past by clearer light, And things long hidden from our gaze below Thou wilt reveal; and we shall surely know

These are not lost.”

Two things this old world needs — tenderness and cheer. All about us are hearts hungry for sympathy, for kindness. Then everywhere are weary and discouraged ones, needing the uplift. of hope to make them brave and strong enough to go forward to .meet the future. We could do nothing better with

115 f ee ee our life than to consecrate it to a

ministry of tenderness and en- sv)

- couragement. is one of )Aa| —

This

heaven’s paths to happiness, for the merciful shall obtain mercy.

ah
id
Al Be 17;
Nt
Ky
fa)