5th
Sunday of Easter
May 15, 2022
Fr. Phil Eberhart
NEW
EVERY MORNING
This
sermon may be more appropriate for Lent -
or at least it has its roots in our Lenten disciplines of coming to God
through Jesus in repentance and prayer.
I was
blessed to be given a seat at the table with some friends this past Wednesday
at the Colorado Prayer Luncheon and an old friend was the speaker, Pastor
Robert Gelinas from Colorado Community Church, Aurora. Robert and I were youth pastors at the same
time, he at 1st Pres in Golden and I at Christ Episcopal Church,
Denver. Today the work he does is large
and it richly blesses the city and the area.
He spoke,
of course, on prayer! What a novel idea
for a prayer luncheon!! He turned our
attention to a simple prayer, that we know well, from our Morning Prayer and
our Eucharistic Offices that says simply:
"Lord,
have mercy!
Christ,
have mercy!
Lord,
have mercy!"
You’ve
heard of the 8-word prayer: “O God! O
God! O God! O God!”
This is
the 9-word prayer!
He talked
about driving and praying on Colfax from east to west. Something I’ve had the occasion to do as
well, with groups and individually a few times.
He urged everyone there, and the Colorado Convention Center was full to
the brim, to pray that 9-word prayer over the streets of our city “as we go.”
Lord,
have mercy! Christ, have mercy! Lord, have mercy!
This
morning I want to explore a bit, the mercy of God. Some of our favorite
scriptures and favorite songs are about this subject. One of mine is actually both – a couple of
mine in fact! What a surprise, I know!
“ He
hath shown thee, O Man, what is good; and what doth the Lord require of
thee: But to do justly, and to love
mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God!”
“The
steadfast love of The Lord never ceases;
His mercies never come to an end; They are new every morning, new every
morning, Great is Thy faithfulness, O Lord!
Great is Thy faithfulness!”
If I
could just leave you with those two songs rolling around in your brain this
week, my job would be done here! But
wait there’s more!
The words
“mercy, mercies, or merciful” show up over 200 times in the Bible! Here is a brief survey:
The place
where God’s presence rests in the Tabernacle is called…
The MERCY Seat – it is the top of the Ark of the Covenant. It is the place where Jesus, after the
resurrection, brought the offering of His own blood to pour out for the sin of
the world! Once for all, in obedience to
the Father: on The Mercy Seat.
The Lord
God begins to reveal this to Moses on the mountain, as He passes by:
The Lord passed
before him and proclaimed, “The Lord,
the Lord, a God merciful and
gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness,
And this
self description by God is then repeated over and over and over again
throughout the Old Testament:
Nehemiah,
chapter 9; Psalms 86, 103, and 145; Joel
2; and Jonah 4.
The hymn
of Jeremiah in Lamentations 3, that we sang a moment ago:
Lamentations 3:21-23
21 But
this I call to mind,
and therefore I have hope:
22 The
steadfast love of the Lord never
ceases;[a]
his mercies never come to an end;
23 they are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness.
The
mercies of God are the motivation for our self-presentation as living sacrifices
in Romans 12:1; our awareness of God’s
mercies to us, both individually and corporately, form the basis of our
becoming “living sacrifices” – worshipping God genuinely and whole heartedly,
which Paul then calls our “reasonable service of worship.”
JB
Phillips translates those verses this way…
12 1-2 With
eyes wide open to the mercies of God, I beg you, my brothers, as an act of
intelligent worship, to give him your bodies, as a living sacrifice,
consecrated to him and acceptable by him. Don’t let the world around you
squeeze you into its own mold, but let God re-mold your minds from within, so
that you may prove in practice that the plan of God for you is good, meets all
his demands and moves towards the goal of true maturity.
Mercy is
the stuff of the prayer that Jesus pointed his disciples to as a model of
repentance from the publican (the tax collector) vs. the prayer of the
“righteous” Pharisee: We call it “The
Jesus Prayer.”
“Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner!”
And as I
pointed out in my first song, it is what I call God’s TRIFECTA:
Micah
6:8 “He
has shown you, O Man, what is good and what does the Lord require of you: But to do justly, and to love mercy and to
walk humbly with your God”
Justice /
Mercy / Humility
Does what
we do today have these three marks?
Because these marks are the marks of the People of God – they form the
stuff of the fragrance – the incense of His presence – in the world!
Paul
tells us that we are to spread the fragrance of His Victory, and this is what
it smells like! How would people in the
world respond to that fragrance, when they are used to harsh judgement and
condemnation from Christians.
a
God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in
steadfast love and faithfulness,
How can
we show people this God?
Jesus
said it, in our Gospel reading this morning:
34 A new commandment I give to you, that you love one
another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. 35 By this all people will know that
you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”
The
mercies of God are the outworking of His nature, which is Holy Love. Holiness absolute to the degree that He had
to cover Moses eyes because he would not have been able to survive seeing! Love great enough that He had to show
Himself, and eventually came to speak to Moses, face to face, as a friend of
God.
The Mercy
of God is captured in the Blessing of Aaron that we say or sing every
week. The Lord … “MAKE HIS FACE SHINE
UPON YOU, BE GRACIOUS TO YOU. THE LORD
LIFT HIS FACE TOWARD YOU, AND GIVE YOU PEACE.”
Have you
ever lifted a son or daughter above your head?
Sometimes you throw them into the air and catch them over your
head! Think about what the Lord is
saying here: The Lord LIFT HIS FACE
TOWARD YOU. Where are you in that
picture? If God’s face is lifted toward
you, He is below you. He has picked you
up and is tossing you into the air. It
is the most joyful and intimate moment that a parent can have with their child!
This is
the picture I want to leave you with this morning. God loves you radically. Mercy is His DNA! He cannot do otherwise!
If you
have a God-image that is something else – anything else – then you need to
study this message over and over and over again. Get God’s Mercy into YOUR DNA! Marinate in God’s MERCY –
a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding
in steadfast love and faithfulness,
Pray with
me:
Lord,
Have Mercy!
Christ, have mercy! Lord, have
mercy!
Look mercifully, O Father, on our infirmities; and, for the glory of your Name,
rescue us from all those evils we now endure; and grant that in all our
troubles we may put our whole trust and confidence in your mercy, serving you
in holiness and purity of life, to your honor and glory; through our only
Mediator and Advocate, Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
Sung:
Holy God,
Holy and
Mighty,
Holy
Immortal One,
Have
mercy upon us.
