Forgiveness, Mercy, and Grace

Lately twitter has been the reason for many things to be in the forefront of my thoughts. There’s this thing about twitter that let’s us openly (term used lightly) eavesdrop on those we follow or maybe even snoop through the @replies to find the context of a tweet. All this is public as long as the tweeter has his tweets publicly viewable.

So today I see a string of tweets about forgiveness and one persons struggle with it. Then not so much later I see one asking for another word for mercy. The replies given for this request were plentiful. I’ll share a few of the ones I saw.

Mercy

From one who turned to Merriam-Webster.com:
humanitarianism, philanthropy; empathy, pity, sympathy, understanding; commiseration, favor, grace, benevolence, care, compassion, gentleness, goodness, goodwill, kindliness, kindness, meekness, mildness, niceness, softness, charity, clemency, lenience
Another replied with:
compassion, grace
And a third:
charity, generosity, leniency
Another split reply:
Depends on how you’re using it. Maybe compassion, benevolence, humanity, tolerance, grace, softheartedness, forbearance, clemency, gentleness, lenience

I offered: kindness, forbearance.

Grace

The problem is there really is no substitute for the word mercy. And while mercy and grace often go together, they are two different things entirely. A majority of the words listed above are better substitutions for grace, not mercy. See, mercy is not getting what we deserve and grace is getting what we do not deserve. Without mercy, there can be no grace. Mercy can exist on its own. Grace, on the other hand, can not exist without mercy. Grace is given in place of what mercy prevented.

For example: If my child throws a rock through your window and breaks it then he deserves some form of punishment. But what if you took my child out to eat at his favorite restaurant instead? That would be grace. Taking my child out to his favorite restaurant is not grace; that is a gift. Taking my son out to his favorite restaurant in place of him getting a punishment for breaking the window is grace. Showing a kindness when wrath is deserved is grace. Got it? Good.

Forgiveness

Now, how does this fit in with forgiveness? Let’s take a look at forgiveness before we put it all together.

One day a few years ago RevMrKnowTea came to me and apologized for not “getting it.” He was preparing for a sermon and it finally clicked with him what I had been trying to say and we talked about it.

God forgives proactively, not waiting around for us to be sorry first:

While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Romans 5:8

But the thing he had missed for so long was “in Christ.” Jesus forgave proactively. As He was being nailed to the cross He said “Father, forgive them” (Luke 23:34). He accomplished forgiveness by being nailed to the Cross (shown no mercy). It’s not just “forgive as God forgave you,” but “forgive as God in Christ forgave you.” And the way our forgiveness was accomplished in Christ was by His accepting the pain upon himself.

He was wounded for our transgressions. Isaiah 53:5

And after he rose, he showed them the scars. John 21:27

He had been hurt. And the scars were/are the proof that he has forgiven us. He accepted the hurt upon himself.

So forgiveness does not make the hurt go away. Especially, not all at once. There is hurt. Hurt exists now. The hurt has must go somewhere. Someone is going to hurt. Forgiveness is the deciding factor over who is going to hurt. Will you accept the hurt and forgive or will you reject it, holding a grudge and seek revenge heaping the hurt upon the offender? The hurt may be flung back on the offender in revenge, or in forgiveness it is accepted onto the forgiver. That is how forgiveness works. We do heal, but some wounds take more time than others to heal.

Christ was wounded for us. He took our sins, our punishment, on himself. His wounds healed, but he still bears the scars of those wounds in eternity (Revelation 5:6). God could have healed those scars, made them go away. Those scars are reminders to us of what it cost Him to forgive us. For those that doubt, they are the proof that He forgave us. Spurgeon calls them “trophies of His love,” declaring what he was willing to go through for us, causing us to love him even more.

He who is forgiven much, loves much. Luke 7:47

Putting it all together

Well, see God forgave me. I was forgiven and shown every bit of mercy greater than I will ever know or understand. I deserve every bit of punishment that is coming to me. Then Christ stepped in and said, “Nope. You are not going to be punished. I will not allow it.” But because there has to be a punishment for me and all my badness, he said, “I’ll do it. I’ll be your whipping boy.” And He took my punishment for me. He was crucified on the cross. He died. He was buried. He rose form the dead. He defeated death and hell. BUT he was left with the scars of taking my punishment.

But more than mercy, He has shown me grace. He has said, you are my child; I died for you. Because you are my child, then you do not have to suffer the punishment of hell. You will come to be with me in heaven. He took that which I deserve (hell) away from me and gave me that which I do not deserve (heaven) in place of hell. He has shown me grace.

Christ was shown no mercy. Without that, there is no grace. God has forgiven me and shown me mercy and given me grace.

Grace does not exist outside of mercy and mercy can not be shown without forgiveness being given.

Ephesians 4:31-32
Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice. Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.

Reconciliation: next post.