The Mercy of God
Psalm 103:8-18

INTRO:

Good morning. We're continuing our series of sermons from Psalms. I invite you to take out your Bible and turn over to Psalm 103. This Psalm is certainly well known and often quoted. It is about praising God for all His mercies.

Our text for this morning will be Psalm 103:8-18 in the main, and I want us to look at some things about the mercy of God.
Lets begin reading at verse 8; “8. The Lord is merciful and gracious, Slow to anger, and abounding in mercy. 9. He will not always strive with us, Nor will He keep His anger forever. 10. He has not dealt with us according to our sins, Nor punished us according to our iniquities. 11. For as the heavens are high above the earth, So great is His mercy toward those who fear Him; 12. As far as the east is from the west, So far has He removed our transgressions from us. 13. As a father pities his children, So the Lord pities those who fear Him. 14. For He knows our frame; He remembers that we are dust. 15. As for man, his days are like grass; As a flower of the field, so he flourishes. 16. For the wind passes over it, and it is gone, And its place remembers it no more. 17. But the mercy of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting On those who fear Him, And His righteousness to children's children, 18. To such as keep His covenant, And to those who remember His commandments to do them.”.

This text here begins by telling us something important about God. God is merciful and
God is gracious. As you go further in verse 10 pertaining to mercy it says He has not dealt with us according to our sins, Nor punished us according to our iniquities.

The fact of the matter is we have all sinned. We have all fallen short of the glory of God. Even after obeying the gospel led us to being children of God, we still sin at times. When we sin, if we have any conscience at all, we feel Godly sorrow, we feel ashamed.
We start fearing judgment, and we begin to realize and understand “I don’t deserve to go to heaven; I deserve to be separated from God”.

The beauty of our God, who created us, is that when we sin our God is merciful. He is willing to forgive us and not deal with us according to our sins. Even though we have sinned He is not going to deal with us according to what we have committed—if we repent. He will refrain from visiting on us the punishment that we deserve according to the iniquities that we have done. That's what we're talking about in the sermon this morning.

Daniel says in Daniel 9:9 - “To the Lord our God belong mercy and forgiveness, though we (talking about us) have rebelled against Him.” We have all sinned which is rebellion against God, yet the Lord is merciful, He's willing to forgive.

In Micah 7:18-19 – “18. Who is a God like You, pardoning iniquity and passing over the transgression of the remnant of Your heritage? You do not retain Your anger forever, because You delight in mercy. 19. You will again have compassion on us, and will subdue our iniquities. You will cast all our sins into the depths of the sea.”[para] Whenever we read about the mercy of God in the Old and New Testament we will see over and over and over again that what is driving God’s mercy to us is His love for us. Because of His love God is willing to forgive us, even though we have absolutely blown it and rebelled against him.

In the sermon this morning is a study of how God shows mercy to us.

I. To understand the very heart of the mercy of God and how it is shown to us we have to understand about the crucifixion of Christ. God’s full mercy of forgiveness could not be shown to mankind without Christ’s sacrifice.
A. Paul puts it this way in Romans 5:8-10 – “8. But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. 9. Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from wrath through Him. 10. For if when we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life.”
1. As I said and I want us understand what is driving the mercy of God, the grace of God, and that is God's great love for us. We were sinners and while we were sinners God showed His love to us. What He did was He gave His son, Jesus Christ, to die for us.
2. The next verse says; much more than having been justified by his blood we shall be saved from wrath through him. The wrath we're talking about is what we deserve on Judgment day... hell. We are going to be saved from the wrath of God, we will not receive what we do deserve which is eternal separation from God. We are saved from that wrath by the blood of Christ that was shed when He was crucified.
3. Going further in verse 10 it says; for him when if when you were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of his son. Much more having been reconciled. We shall be saved by his life. It is through His death and the shedding of His blood we can have the remission of our sins. Because He lives... we shall be saved by His life. He rose from the dead.
i. We have an intercessor, a mediator between our self and God and He is pleading our case. Pleading on our behalf. The one who understands us completely. All the mercy God is going to be showing to us is through Christ.
ii. Without coming to God through Christ we cannot access the Mercy of God.
B. Now over in Ephesians it says basically for the same thing in Ephesians 2:4-5 – “4. But God, who is rich in mercy, (Why?) because of His great love with which He loved us, 5. even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved),” Here again it talks about where we were. We were dead in sin separated from God.
1. Why did God do what he did? Because of His great love. Again, because of that love He gave His son to die for us.
2. It is through that death that we can access the mercy of God, by which we are forgiven of the sin that is separating us from God. If we were punished for our sin as we deserve, the wrath of God would come upon us.
C. Look at Titus 3:5 and notice the beginning of the verse. “not by works of righteousness which we have done,” Let's stop right there. Have any of us ever thought; I don't see me going to heaven. I don't see how I'm going to make it happen. I'm just not good enough. Guess what? You're right. You're not good enough. You're not going to go to heaven because you are so awesome that you deserve to be in heaven.
1. All of us have blown it already. There are moments in the future where we will mess it up again. We should never think we're going to go to heaven because of our awesome work that we do to the point where God says- Oh you deserve it.
2. That's not how we’re going to be saved. The verse says “but according to His mercy He saved us,” How we will be saved is according to His mercy, He saves us. We do not save ourselves. The only way anybody will be saved is by the mercy of God. Everybody who is going to be saved is going to be saved only because God shows them mercy and forgives them.
3. What is the rest of the verse? How is this mercy shown to us? “through the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit,” What is that talking about?
4. In the beginning of John chapter 3 Jesus speaks to Nicodemus and tells him that a man must be born of the water and the spirit to enter into the kingdom of heaven. To be born of water and the spirit is the washing of regeneration. That is baptism. The renewing of the Holy Spirit is being born of the Spirit.
5. God adds us to His family, makes us children of God and plants a seed in our heart. We are born again not of corruptible seed as Peter said, but of incorruptible, through the Word of God which lives and abides forever. 1 Peter 1:23. The Holy Spirit works through the word, the Gospel, that is planted in the hearts of the good and honest people, who love God, to produce faith.
D. The way in which God shows His mercy to us is through Christ crucified and then from us obeying the Gospel, our having faith that Jesus actually is the Christ, the son of the Living God. Understanding that Christ died on Calvary for our sins, was buried and rose again the third day and is in heaven right now at the right hand of God.
1. When we come to this faith we confess it, and driven by faith we repent of our sins then we are baptized (get this phrase now) for the remission sin.
2. God shows mercy to us when we obey the gospel of God.
II. Continuing in First Peter 1:3-5 says; “3. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His abundant mercy has begotten us again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, 4. to an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled and that does not fade away, reserved in heaven for you, 5. who are kept by the power of God through faith for salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.”
A. This text is looking to the future, to the Judgment Day. I wonder how each of us feels about the Judgment? Are we kinda scared? Are we very scared? Very apprehensive? Thinking it’s not going to be good? Does our conscience hurt us?
1. I’d say it’s good if our conscience hurts us. It’s good if we fear judgment because that is something that's going to be driving us to repent. It will be driving us to come to understand the love of God shown toward us and the mercy of God.
2. Then we will see we have a living hope. A real hope of our resurrection and our being with God in heaven.
3. The last part of verse 3 says to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, Remember the last part of that verse, it is because He lives we have the hope of the resurrection of eternal life. Our mediator understands us.
4. Let's go further with the rest of this verse...verse 4. “4. to an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled and that does not fade away, reserved in heaven for you, 5. who are kept by the power of God through faith for salvation ready to be revealed (when is this?) in the last time.”
5. This is talking about our hope of heaven. Our hope of being with God. We can make it. We can make it to heaven even though we’ve sinned, even though we don’t deserve to be with Him. We can make it because Christ lives and Christ died. When the Lord comes we can be with God.
B. In Second Timothy 1:16-18 – we read about someone who helped Paul “16. The Lord grant mercy to the household of Onesiphorus [O-ne-siph-orus] for he often refreshed me, and was not ashamed of my chain; 17. but when he arrived in Rome, he sought me out very diligently and found me. 18. The Lord grant to him that he may find mercy from the Lord in that Day and you know very well how many ways he ministered to me at Ephesus.” I draw your attention to verse 18 ... that he may find mercy from the Lord in that Day ... What day is he talking about? Judgment Day. Its coming isn’t it?
1. It is a holy day. The one who’s judging is holy. How can I stand before one who is holy? How can I have any hope of being with one who is holy when I’ve sinned?
2. Psalms says in Psalm 25:7 – “Do not remember the sins of my youth, nor my transgressions; According to Your mercy remember me,” When it comes judgment day we don’t want God looking at us and remembering what we did when we were young. Actually remembering what we did when we were middle aged or even what we did when we are old isn’t good either. We don't want God remembering us on judgment day according to our sins and our transgressions.
3. The text says; “According to Your mercy remember me, For Your goodness' sake, O Lord.” The only way we can stand before God with any hope of being with God who is holy, is to be forgiven. For God to show mercy to us, not because we are so awesome, but God loves us. It is only by the mercy of God that we can be seen by God as being holy. It is only by the mercy of God that we can be seen as blameless.
III. Now let’s go back to Psalm 103. I want us to notice the predominate phrase in the chapter. Verse 11 – “For as the heavens are high above the earth, So great is His mercy toward those who fear Him;”. Then in verse 12 – “As far as the east is from the west, So far has He removed our transgressions from us.” Who's he talking about here? Those who fear Him.
A. Go on in verse 13 – “As a father pities his children, So the Lord pities those who fear Him”. There it is the second time.
1. Verse 14 – “For He knows our frame; He remembers that we are dust.” God understands us. He understands what we are, we're human beings, we're flesh and blood. We’re dust. He understands how weak we are and our limitations.
2. Going to verse 17 – “But the mercy of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting On those who fear Him,” On those who fear him. We need to ask ourselves, do I fear God? Do I fear judgment? Fear of God and fear of judgment is a manifestation of faith where we believe in something we haven't seen. We believe in God and that Judgment Day is really coming and we understand we don't deserve to be with God. The one who fears God—keeps His commandments.
3. Sounds familiar? It should Ecclesiastes 12:13 – “Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God and keep His commandments, for this is the whole duty of man.”
4. Psalm 103:18 ends with – “And to those who remember His commandments to do them.”
B. Driven by our faith and our fear of God we are those who strive to keep His commandments by our faith. That's the person God will show mercy to. The person who is living by faith, walking by faith, trying to keep the commandments by faith, in their lives.
1. Unfortunately there are some who call themselves Christians that do not take this seriously. They have a nonchalant attitude toward God and the Judgment and just sluff it off. After all a loving God will not cause anyone to be lost. They believe such things as unconditional election, irresistible grace or once saved always saved.
2. The only people God's going to show mercy to are the ones that fear him. They are driven by their fear of God and their faith and they keep His commandments.
3. Those that are keeping His commandments by faith, those that are living and walking by faith, are the people that God will be willing to show mercy to and forgive. When you are baptized the blood of Christ will wash away your sins you were committing before you obeyed the gospel.
4. After you obeyed the gospel when you sin again, and you will, the blood of Christ will still be there to cleanse you of those sins; if you repent because you are keeping His commandments by faith, because you are striving to walk in the light, by faith.
IV. Psalm 86:5 – “For You, Lord, are good, and ready to forgive, And abundant in mercy to all those who call upon You.” Here we see another important stipulation to obtain mercy; we've got to take it to God in prayer. We need to call upon God. We need to go to God and seek forgiveness of the sin from the One we've sinned against.
A. Psalm 86:6 says; “Give ear, O Lord, to my prayer; And attend to the voice of my supplications.” When we have messed up and we know it, it is sometimes hard to take it right to God. No matter how bad it was or how bad we feel, that's when we need to go to him and pray to Him, seeking mercy in prayer.
1. As the Hebrews writer says in Hebrews 4:15-16 – “15. For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin. 16. Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need.”
2. Our high priest understands us, our God understands us. He understands about hormones, how it can drive us to the lust of the flesh. He understands about the lust of the eyes. How we human beings can be diverted by looking at something pretty. Oh look at that! We get caught up in things and materialism.
3. He understands about human fear. He understands about human anger and emotions. God understands us. He is willing to show mercy to us. And we have high a high priest who ever lives to make intercession for us, who did rise from the dead, who is at the right hand of God; for us.
4. Verse 16 tells us; Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace. Coming to God who is holy even though we've sinned, then the text says that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need.
B. I am sure most of us recall in Luke 18 we have in the account two individuals’ prayers. One is a Pharisee, the other a publican. Remember the prayer of the Pharisee. It was basically an arrogant prayer, God I thank you that I'm not like other men. I fast, I tithe, I'm not like this person over there.
1. Then there was the prayer of the publican. What was his prayer? God be merciful to me a sinner. Pretty direct isn’t it? Pretty simple and straightforward, hits the nail on the head as they say. He wouldn't even lift up his eyes to heaven. How do you think the publican felt? Did he feel godly sorrow? Did he feel shame? Did he feel fear? From the few simple things we are told I believe the answer is yes to all that.
2. He wouldn’t even look up to heaven. The old King James says he smote upon his breast. See the godly sorrow? See the shame? What is his cry to God? God be merciful to me...a sinner. That's what I am, that's what you are, that’s what we are and we need to recognize that. We're coming to God who is holy and we’ve messed up, we have sinned. The only thing we can do is cry out mercy.
3. This man went down to his house justified. He was forgiven because he approached the throne of God with humility. He approached the throne of God with shame and godly sorrow and with understanding what it was and where he was and what he needed—was mercy.
C. In Psalm 41:4 it says; “Lord, be merciful to me; Heal my soul, for I have sinned against You.” How similar to what we find in Luke. Here though we find something additional, Lord, Heal my soul.
1. It speaks of the realization that in going our own way, rebelling against God, sinning, we sustain damage. The scars, the wounds, the damage we've done to our own soul. How do we do it? We have sinned against you Lord.
2. When we sin we damage our soul, we wound our own soul. Our soul needs to be healed. The only way it can be healed is for us to be forgiven by God showing mercy to us.
V. Let us consider Psalm 51. The Psalm starts “Have mercy upon me, O God.” David has been confronted by Nathan the Prophet and David has been shown what he has done. In Psalm 51 David is dealing with his sin, the sin of adultery, and the sin of murder. King David was definitely not one of the habitually wicked who refuses to repent. The saint is the sinner who repents; the wicked man is the sinner who refuses either to acknowledge his sins or to cast himself upon the mercy of God in prayers for pardon.
A. That is how the Psalm begins; Have mercy upon me O God. Right to the point isn’t it? “Mercy according to your loving kindness according to the multitude of your tender mercies.”
1. What is driving the mercy of God? Remember the first part of the lesson, God's great love. That's why He gave His son. That’s why Christ died.
2. God will show mercy to us according to His loving kindness. How is he going to show His mercy to us? By blotting out our transgressions. By washing us thoroughly. By healing our souls.
3. That's why our souls cry out wash me, cleanse me, heal me, and forgive me, please. I know I’ve sinned against you. I don’t deserve your mercy. Yet we are to seek mercy from God in prayer, humble prayer.
B. Psalm 51 continues; “Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, And cleanse me from my sin. 3. For I acknowledge my transgressions, And my sin is ever before me. 4. Against You, You only, have I sinned, And done this evil in Your sight That You may be found just when You speak, And blameless when You judge.” Godly sorrow cries out for one simple thing...His mercifulness.
VI. Proverbs 28:13 – “He who covers his sins will not prosper, but whoever confesses and forsakes them will have mercy.” King David understood that. If we are going to seek mercy we’ve got to recognize and confess the sin that we’ve done. Scriptures teach the need of taking heed to ourselves. We need to test our selves and examine our selves. See our selves as we really are and face up to it.
A. John tells us this in First John 1:10 – “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.” David accepted personal responsibility for what he had done
1. He speaks of "my" transgression (Psalms 51:1), "my" sin and "my" iniquity (Psalms 51:2), "my" transgression and "my" sin (Psalms 51:3), declares that, "I sinned" (Psalms 51:4), again mentions "my" sin in Psalms 51:9. Seven times he takes all the blame and guilt upon himself.
2. David did not attempt to shift the blame as Adam did; he offered no excuse, he pleaded no extenuating circumstances, but simply accepted full responsibility for his deeds. Someone today would have said “Bathsheba had no business stripping naked for a bath in full view of the palace; she's to blame"; or, perhaps, "All the other kings do as they please in matters like this; why shouldn't I be as privileged as they?"
3. We need to face up to the sin that really is in our life and when we've sinned, feel the remorse. Let the sting of godly sorrow hit us square in the heart and go to God in prayer confessing our sin.
4. The text says if we confess our sins He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
5. God doesn't want us to hide our own eyes from our sins. He wants us facing up to them and seeing them confess them to Him and plead for mercy, driven by Faith, driven by godly sorrow, driven by fear, driven by love, wanting to be right with God.
B. It is because of David’s confession, his repentance, and his prayers that he is justly entitled to the accolade "A Man After God's Own Heart".

CONCLUSION:
Our Lord, our God is merciful and aren’t we glad for that. He is merciful and He is gracious, always willing to forgive.

There may be moments when you look at yourself and think I’m not going to make it. I know I’m not good enough and I’ll just mess up again. Though that is all true, God Most High knows you. Our High Priest understands and He sympathizes with us. He understands our temptations, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, the pride of life, fear and anger. He understands our weaknesses. We have been provided with a way out, an escape from the fate we deserve and that is to go to God and ask for forgiveness.

The only hope any of us have for heaven is to go to God. We come to understand the way God shows mercy is through Christ crucified and what drove God to give His son to die for us was His love for us. The reason Christ went through everything that He went through, was for us, because He loves us.

The strongest level of faith is love. Driven by our faith, driven by our living hope because of the resurrection of Christ, driven by our love for God, driven by our fear the Lord, we will strive to forsake the sin, to repent of the sin, to put it off, turn from it, and live a life more pleasing to our God in the future than we have in the past.

The Bible teaches this is the only way for us to be able to make it to heaven. We must be forgiven and come to God through Christ.

If you believe in Jesus Christ is Son of God, and understand that He died and rose again the third day you need to confess that. Motivated by your faith, repent and start following the teachings of God in Christ keeping His commandments in your life.
If you want to confess your faith and repent of your sins we would be glad to assist you baptize you into Christ the remission of your sins.

If you're a child of God already you need to test yourself, you need to examine yourself.
If you have sin in your life, deal with it. Take your sins to the mercy of God.

If you're subject to the gospel call in any way let us know while we stand and sing.

Invitation song: ???

Reference sermon by: Wayne Fancher