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What is mercy?  How is mercy different from grace?  Grace is love shown where it is undeserved.  Mercy is love shown as a response to helplessness of another.  Grace responds to the undeserving and mercy answers to the helpless.  The parable of the Good Samaritan (Lk. 10:30-37) illustrates the meaning of mercy well.  Jesus poses the question to the lawyer: “Which of the three (the priest, the Levite and the Samaritan) was a neighbour to the helpless man?”  The lawyer replied, “The one who had mercy on him”.  Three lessons can be learned about what it means to “show mercy to others”.

1. Mercy provides relief

Mercy provides relief from the consequences of sin in the lives of people.  Mercy is the practical and real outworking of love.  Its aim is to relieve suffering and show care and concern.  It is not primarily concerned with retribution in that the Samaritan did not seek to hunt down the robbers who caused the man’s injuries.  Mercy involves getting down on one’s knees and working with one’s hands to restore dignity and provide relief to someone whose life has been broken by sin.

2. Mercy is costly

Mercy is a costly and necessary manifestation of true Christian living.  Why did the Levite and priest behave in such a merciless manner?  One reason is that they simply did not want to be inconvenienced.  Another possible reason was to prevent ritual defilement.  But we know from Luke’s Gospel that Jesus would have ignored it! (Lk. 7:14 and 8:53-54)  Better to be ritually unclean that to fail to show mercy!  Hosea reminds us – “I desire mercy, not sacrifice, and acknowledgment of God rather than burnt offerings” (Hos. 6:6).

3.  Wrong not to show mercy

We deny the reality and necessity of God’s mercy in our lives and our salvation when we refuse to show mercy to others.  The Christian believer is called to forgive others because Christ has forgiven him.  The person who refuses to show mercy to others is inevitably one who is so unaware of his own state of guilt and wretchedness and bondage to sin that he thinks he needs no mercy himself.  By contrast, the person who lives a life that reflects the calling of the beatitudes shows mercy to the wretched because he recognizes himself to be wretched.  In being merciful, he too is shown mercy from God.  Let us love mercy and seek out ways to show mercy to others.