The Condition Of Mercy
Sermon
Living The Easter Faith
Sermons For The Easter Season
Let us pray: Our Father and our God, on this day we give you
thanks for all the blessings of our lives. In these moments, may
we learn something about what it is for which we need to be most
thankful. Lord, in these moments may we experience your mercy and
your grace. In Jesus' name we pray, Amen.
A social psychologist by the name of David Myers has written a
book titled The Pursuit of Happiness. The book has 59 pages of
references and a 43-page bibliography. This large number of
citations clearly demonstrates that many people have had much to
say on that elusive subject called "happiness."
The central question that Dr. Myers poses is this one: Who is
happy, and why are they happy? He then frames the question in a
more detailed way: "What traits of personality, what
circumstances of life, what states of mind correlate with well-
being -- with that joyful, and joy-spreading spirit that enables
one to sense that simply being alive is the most wonderful of
life's gifts?"1
This psychologist argues that happiness has remarkably little
to do with age, gender, race, location, education, wealth,
personal tragedies, or social standing. However, it does have a
lot to do with physical health, self-esteem, optimism, engaging
work, and supportive friends and family.
Then Dr. Myers poses the question that is important for us as
a religious community: What does faith have to offer to the state
of being happy? In the Christian context, faith expressed in the
church of Jesus Christ offers first of all a caring community.
You are well aware that in most churches there
35
is an outpouring of love and support when illness or tragedy
strikes a family.
Furthermore, faith offers us the belief that God our Creator
accepts us just the way we are, the way he made us. Faith in
Christ offers a call to unselfish living, and a perspective on
dying that enables us to face death without fear. It is our
belief in eternal life that enables us to believe that human life
has value and significance.
Therefore you might say that our faith offers something to
live for, and something to die for.
There is, I think, one more contribution which faith has to
offer us in our search for happiness in human life. It is that
condition which Jesus talked about in his parable of the "Two
Debtors." It is about what we might call "the condition of
mercy."
Jesus tells the story of a king who was settling his accounts
with his slaves. He called before him one slave who owed him
10,000 talents. Now in those days this was an enormous debt. A
rough equivalent would be $10 million in today's money.
The size of a 10,000 talent debt can be appreciated when we
realize that Herod the Great had an annual income of 900 talents.
The total annual tax for the regions of Galilee and Peraea in the
year 4 B.C. was only 200 talents.2
Who knows what this man had done to incur such a debt. It
would have to have been something comparable to the savings and
loan scandal of the 1980s. The debt was so enormous that there
was no possibility of the man ever repaying the loan to his
master.
And so the king, seeing the magnitude of the debt, ordered
that the slave, his wife, his children and all his possessions be
sold. In those days, it was not unusual for persons to be sold
into slavery to pay a debt. This would have made only token
payment, but the king would have at least recovered some of his
lost money.
However, the slave fell on his knees and begged for mercy from
the king. He promised to repay the debt, an act that was, of
course, impossible.
36
It is the response of the king that is important for us to
appreciate. What he does here is immediately respond with more
than the servant has asked. The king not only decides not to sell
the man and his family into slavery, but to forgive entirely the
enormous debt. The slave leaves the court as a free man.
We would perhaps like the parable to end here with a happy
ending. However, now we get, as Paul Harvey says, "the rest of
the story."
The one who is rescued from bondage now comes upon a fellow
slave. This slave owed him 100 denarii. This amount would be
approximately $1,000 in today's money. It was, of course, a very
trifling amount when compared to the enormous debt which the
first slaved owed to the king.
The first slave grabs his debtor by his neck, saying, "Pay
what you own me." The fellow slave falls on his knees and pleads
for patience and understanding. But the first slave refuses,
throwing his debtor into prison.
His fellow slaves, who were greatly troubled by the injustice,
then ran to the king to tell him what happened. The king called
back the first slave, and literally bawled him out for his
unmerciful behavior. Then the king has his debtor thrown into
prison.
Jesus closes his parable with these words: "So my heavenly
Father will also do to every one of you if you do not forgive
your brother or sister from the heart."
So what is Jesus saying in this teaching? What really is the
point of it all?
What this parable is about is the enormous capacity of God in
heaven to forgive us, the children whom he has created in his
very own image. It is about the unlimited nature of God's love.
The truth revealed here is that there is nothing, nothing that we
have done for which God cannot forgive us.
The fact is that our sins are lost in the sea of God's love
and forgiveness. That is the one truth that all Christians, be
they liberals or conservatives, evangelicals or moderates,
Catholics or Protestants can agree upon.
37
Yes, our sins are lost once and forever in the love of God.
All that we must do to receive the forgiveness of God is to say
that we are sorry, and then try to do better.
The greatest news of the Christian gospel is that we do have
this opportunity to start over if we are able to sincerely repent
of wrongdoing. In the midst of our moral and spiritual failures,
the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus Christ assures us that
the slate has been wiped clean, once and for all time. The
Christian hope rests in the conviction that our future lies in
still-to-be-seen future, rather than in a soiled and painful
past. In Jesus Christ, there is always the opportunity to begin
again through the simple but profound acts of our repentance and
God's forgiveness.
However, the problem for the unmerciful slave was that he did
not try to do better. He was willing to accept forgiveness as a
gracious gift from his master, but he was not willing to do the
same for somebody else.
What Jesus is saying here is that this is the kind of behavior
that God cannot and will not tolerate. This parable is one of the
most important teachings that Jesus ever shared. Because in this
story Jesus is illustrating the principle which is enshrined in
the Lord's Prayer which we say here every Sunday morning: that we
are to forgive our debtors just as we have been forgiven by God
our Father in heaven.
There is no question that it is not easy to forgive those who
have wronged us. Some may have been cheated financially. But
usually the offense is more personal. The anger we feel is rooted
in our feelings of being humiliated, or having been used or taken
advantage of in a careless and insensitive way. Often we feel
that our pride has been wounded. Perhaps the offense is having
had something that we love very dearly taken away from us.
Beulah Mae McDonald is a black woman who has earned a
reputation as "The Woman Who Beat The Ku Klux Klan." On March 21,
1981, Mrs. McDonald had a dream in which she saw a steel-gray
casket sitting in her living room. Every time she tried to move
closer to the casket, someone told her, "You don't need to see
this."
But Mrs. McDonald knew that she did have to see it. And when
she awoke from her dream, the first thing she did was to look in
the other bedroom where her youngest son Michael was supposed to
be sleeping. He was not there.
When the boy didn't come home the next morning, Mrs. McDonald
knew that something was wrong. The phone rang. The caller said,
"They had a party here, and they killed your son. You better send
somebody over." A few blocks away, in a racially mixed
neighborhood, about a mile from the Mobile, Alabama, police
station, they found Michael McDonald's body hanging from a tree.
Around his neck was a perfectly tied noose with 13 loops.
On a front porch across the street, watching police gather
evidence were members of the United Klans of America, one of the
largest and most violent of the Ku Klux Klans. Looking across the
street, Bennie Jack Hays, the 64-year-old Titan of the United
Klans, said, "A pretty sight. That's gonna look good on the news.
Gonna look good for the Klan."
The men who killed Beulah Mae McDonald's son thought they
would go free. But they were wrong. Not only did the young black
man's killer receive the death penalty, but Mrs. McDonald won a
seven-million dollar lawsuit which broke the back of this hate
group which is driven by the power of Satan.
Mrs. McDonald was a single mother who had to raise her
children alone and in poverty. She says this about raising her
children: "I wasn't able to get everything for them, but I let
them know the value of things." Her method of childrearing was
that of love and religion.
On Sunday morning, Mrs. McDonald would take her family to
church in the morning and remain there all day. "I'm a strong
believer," she explains. "I don't know about man, but I know what
God can do."
It was the power of God that enabled Beulah Mae to do that
which would have been impossible for an unbeliever. Her faith in
God enabled her to forgive even those who had murdered her son.
39
At the civil trial, one of the Klansmen implicated in the
crime named Tiger Knowles turned to Mrs. McDonald. They locked
eyes for the first time. Knowles spoke of the seven million
dollars which he and the others were going to have to pay as the
consequence of their crime.
"I can't bring your son back," he said sobbing and shaking.
"God knows if I could trade places with him, I would. I can't.
Whatever it takes -- I have nothing. But I will have to do it.
And if it takes me the rest of my life to pay for it, any comfort
it may bring, I hope it will." By this time, the jurors were
crying. The judge had tears in his eyes.
Then Beulah Mae McDonald said these words: "I do forgive you.
From the day I found out who you all was, I asked God to take
care of y'all, and he has."3
Who among us could show that kind of forgiveness? The answer
is, that none of us could ever do it without faith in God. Even
with much smaller offenses, we cannot really and truly forgive
without God's help.
One of the fundamental principles of Alcoholics Anonymous is
that a person cannot stop drinking on one's own. The first step
for the problem drinker is to acknowledge that he or she is out
of control. Secondly, the person must seek spiritual help; one
must petition the "higher power." With the help of God and
participation in a supportive community, the demon of alcoholism
can be defeated. However, the abuser cannot be delivered unless
he or she truly wants to stay sober. The personal will to change
is the critical factor.
So it is also with mercy and forgiveness. We need the touch of
a Mighty Hand to do that which is impossible for humans. We need
the strength of a higher power and the community of faith to be
merciful and pure in heart. However, there is no use in asking
God to help us unless we desire in the depths of our hearts to
really and truly forgive those who have hurt us.
But with God's help we can forgive. We can go on. We can start
over again, no matter what has happened to us. Such is the
condition of mercy, such is the condition of love which
God has granted to us in living. It is one of the conditions that
must be present for us to find happiness in living.
The resurrection of Jesus Christ on Easter Day has inaugurated
a new age, the kingdom of God on earth. In this Resurrection Age
we are called to do things that we cannot do through our own
power and strength. One of the aspects of holy living in this new
age is the ability to forgive even when we do not believe that
forgiveness is possible.
Today, on this fourth Sunday of Easter season on which we
celebrate the living Christ, I invite you as the people of God to
reflect deeply upon the love of God for you. Think about how God
can help you find peace and happiness by enabling you to do those
things which you never thought you could do.
Let us then praise and give thanks to God for his love and
mercy this day. May you continue to have a blessed and happy
Easter season!
Benediction: Gracious and eternal God, we have worshiped you
and given thanks for all that you have done. As we go from this
place, may we and those we love walk with your Spirit now and
forever.
Now may the Lord bless you and keep you, may the Lord make his
face to shine upon you and be gracious unto you, the Lord lift up
his countenance upon you, and give you peace. Amen.
1-David G. Myers, The Pursuit of Happiness, reviewed by Philip
Blackwell in The Christian Century, October 7, 1992, p. 876.
2-Neal Fisher, The Parables of Jesus: Glimpses of God's Reign
(New York: Crossroad, 1990), p. 101.
3-"The Woman Who Beat the Klan," New York Times Magazine,
November 1, 1987, pp. 26-39.
thanks for all the blessings of our lives. In these moments, may
we learn something about what it is for which we need to be most
thankful. Lord, in these moments may we experience your mercy and
your grace. In Jesus' name we pray, Amen.
A social psychologist by the name of David Myers has written a
book titled The Pursuit of Happiness. The book has 59 pages of
references and a 43-page bibliography. This large number of
citations clearly demonstrates that many people have had much to
say on that elusive subject called "happiness."
The central question that Dr. Myers poses is this one: Who is
happy, and why are they happy? He then frames the question in a
more detailed way: "What traits of personality, what
circumstances of life, what states of mind correlate with well-
being -- with that joyful, and joy-spreading spirit that enables
one to sense that simply being alive is the most wonderful of
life's gifts?"1
This psychologist argues that happiness has remarkably little
to do with age, gender, race, location, education, wealth,
personal tragedies, or social standing. However, it does have a
lot to do with physical health, self-esteem, optimism, engaging
work, and supportive friends and family.
Then Dr. Myers poses the question that is important for us as
a religious community: What does faith have to offer to the state
of being happy? In the Christian context, faith expressed in the
church of Jesus Christ offers first of all a caring community.
You are well aware that in most churches there
35
is an outpouring of love and support when illness or tragedy
strikes a family.
Furthermore, faith offers us the belief that God our Creator
accepts us just the way we are, the way he made us. Faith in
Christ offers a call to unselfish living, and a perspective on
dying that enables us to face death without fear. It is our
belief in eternal life that enables us to believe that human life
has value and significance.
Therefore you might say that our faith offers something to
live for, and something to die for.
There is, I think, one more contribution which faith has to
offer us in our search for happiness in human life. It is that
condition which Jesus talked about in his parable of the "Two
Debtors." It is about what we might call "the condition of
mercy."
Jesus tells the story of a king who was settling his accounts
with his slaves. He called before him one slave who owed him
10,000 talents. Now in those days this was an enormous debt. A
rough equivalent would be $10 million in today's money.
The size of a 10,000 talent debt can be appreciated when we
realize that Herod the Great had an annual income of 900 talents.
The total annual tax for the regions of Galilee and Peraea in the
year 4 B.C. was only 200 talents.2
Who knows what this man had done to incur such a debt. It
would have to have been something comparable to the savings and
loan scandal of the 1980s. The debt was so enormous that there
was no possibility of the man ever repaying the loan to his
master.
And so the king, seeing the magnitude of the debt, ordered
that the slave, his wife, his children and all his possessions be
sold. In those days, it was not unusual for persons to be sold
into slavery to pay a debt. This would have made only token
payment, but the king would have at least recovered some of his
lost money.
However, the slave fell on his knees and begged for mercy from
the king. He promised to repay the debt, an act that was, of
course, impossible.
36
It is the response of the king that is important for us to
appreciate. What he does here is immediately respond with more
than the servant has asked. The king not only decides not to sell
the man and his family into slavery, but to forgive entirely the
enormous debt. The slave leaves the court as a free man.
We would perhaps like the parable to end here with a happy
ending. However, now we get, as Paul Harvey says, "the rest of
the story."
The one who is rescued from bondage now comes upon a fellow
slave. This slave owed him 100 denarii. This amount would be
approximately $1,000 in today's money. It was, of course, a very
trifling amount when compared to the enormous debt which the
first slaved owed to the king.
The first slave grabs his debtor by his neck, saying, "Pay
what you own me." The fellow slave falls on his knees and pleads
for patience and understanding. But the first slave refuses,
throwing his debtor into prison.
His fellow slaves, who were greatly troubled by the injustice,
then ran to the king to tell him what happened. The king called
back the first slave, and literally bawled him out for his
unmerciful behavior. Then the king has his debtor thrown into
prison.
Jesus closes his parable with these words: "So my heavenly
Father will also do to every one of you if you do not forgive
your brother or sister from the heart."
So what is Jesus saying in this teaching? What really is the
point of it all?
What this parable is about is the enormous capacity of God in
heaven to forgive us, the children whom he has created in his
very own image. It is about the unlimited nature of God's love.
The truth revealed here is that there is nothing, nothing that we
have done for which God cannot forgive us.
The fact is that our sins are lost in the sea of God's love
and forgiveness. That is the one truth that all Christians, be
they liberals or conservatives, evangelicals or moderates,
Catholics or Protestants can agree upon.
37
Yes, our sins are lost once and forever in the love of God.
All that we must do to receive the forgiveness of God is to say
that we are sorry, and then try to do better.
The greatest news of the Christian gospel is that we do have
this opportunity to start over if we are able to sincerely repent
of wrongdoing. In the midst of our moral and spiritual failures,
the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus Christ assures us that
the slate has been wiped clean, once and for all time. The
Christian hope rests in the conviction that our future lies in
still-to-be-seen future, rather than in a soiled and painful
past. In Jesus Christ, there is always the opportunity to begin
again through the simple but profound acts of our repentance and
God's forgiveness.
However, the problem for the unmerciful slave was that he did
not try to do better. He was willing to accept forgiveness as a
gracious gift from his master, but he was not willing to do the
same for somebody else.
What Jesus is saying here is that this is the kind of behavior
that God cannot and will not tolerate. This parable is one of the
most important teachings that Jesus ever shared. Because in this
story Jesus is illustrating the principle which is enshrined in
the Lord's Prayer which we say here every Sunday morning: that we
are to forgive our debtors just as we have been forgiven by God
our Father in heaven.
There is no question that it is not easy to forgive those who
have wronged us. Some may have been cheated financially. But
usually the offense is more personal. The anger we feel is rooted
in our feelings of being humiliated, or having been used or taken
advantage of in a careless and insensitive way. Often we feel
that our pride has been wounded. Perhaps the offense is having
had something that we love very dearly taken away from us.
Beulah Mae McDonald is a black woman who has earned a
reputation as "The Woman Who Beat The Ku Klux Klan." On March 21,
1981, Mrs. McDonald had a dream in which she saw a steel-gray
casket sitting in her living room. Every time she tried to move
closer to the casket, someone told her, "You don't need to see
this."
But Mrs. McDonald knew that she did have to see it. And when
she awoke from her dream, the first thing she did was to look in
the other bedroom where her youngest son Michael was supposed to
be sleeping. He was not there.
When the boy didn't come home the next morning, Mrs. McDonald
knew that something was wrong. The phone rang. The caller said,
"They had a party here, and they killed your son. You better send
somebody over." A few blocks away, in a racially mixed
neighborhood, about a mile from the Mobile, Alabama, police
station, they found Michael McDonald's body hanging from a tree.
Around his neck was a perfectly tied noose with 13 loops.
On a front porch across the street, watching police gather
evidence were members of the United Klans of America, one of the
largest and most violent of the Ku Klux Klans. Looking across the
street, Bennie Jack Hays, the 64-year-old Titan of the United
Klans, said, "A pretty sight. That's gonna look good on the news.
Gonna look good for the Klan."
The men who killed Beulah Mae McDonald's son thought they
would go free. But they were wrong. Not only did the young black
man's killer receive the death penalty, but Mrs. McDonald won a
seven-million dollar lawsuit which broke the back of this hate
group which is driven by the power of Satan.
Mrs. McDonald was a single mother who had to raise her
children alone and in poverty. She says this about raising her
children: "I wasn't able to get everything for them, but I let
them know the value of things." Her method of childrearing was
that of love and religion.
On Sunday morning, Mrs. McDonald would take her family to
church in the morning and remain there all day. "I'm a strong
believer," she explains. "I don't know about man, but I know what
God can do."
It was the power of God that enabled Beulah Mae to do that
which would have been impossible for an unbeliever. Her faith in
God enabled her to forgive even those who had murdered her son.
39
At the civil trial, one of the Klansmen implicated in the
crime named Tiger Knowles turned to Mrs. McDonald. They locked
eyes for the first time. Knowles spoke of the seven million
dollars which he and the others were going to have to pay as the
consequence of their crime.
"I can't bring your son back," he said sobbing and shaking.
"God knows if I could trade places with him, I would. I can't.
Whatever it takes -- I have nothing. But I will have to do it.
And if it takes me the rest of my life to pay for it, any comfort
it may bring, I hope it will." By this time, the jurors were
crying. The judge had tears in his eyes.
Then Beulah Mae McDonald said these words: "I do forgive you.
From the day I found out who you all was, I asked God to take
care of y'all, and he has."3
Who among us could show that kind of forgiveness? The answer
is, that none of us could ever do it without faith in God. Even
with much smaller offenses, we cannot really and truly forgive
without God's help.
One of the fundamental principles of Alcoholics Anonymous is
that a person cannot stop drinking on one's own. The first step
for the problem drinker is to acknowledge that he or she is out
of control. Secondly, the person must seek spiritual help; one
must petition the "higher power." With the help of God and
participation in a supportive community, the demon of alcoholism
can be defeated. However, the abuser cannot be delivered unless
he or she truly wants to stay sober. The personal will to change
is the critical factor.
So it is also with mercy and forgiveness. We need the touch of
a Mighty Hand to do that which is impossible for humans. We need
the strength of a higher power and the community of faith to be
merciful and pure in heart. However, there is no use in asking
God to help us unless we desire in the depths of our hearts to
really and truly forgive those who have hurt us.
But with God's help we can forgive. We can go on. We can start
over again, no matter what has happened to us. Such is the
condition of mercy, such is the condition of love which
God has granted to us in living. It is one of the conditions that
must be present for us to find happiness in living.
The resurrection of Jesus Christ on Easter Day has inaugurated
a new age, the kingdom of God on earth. In this Resurrection Age
we are called to do things that we cannot do through our own
power and strength. One of the aspects of holy living in this new
age is the ability to forgive even when we do not believe that
forgiveness is possible.
Today, on this fourth Sunday of Easter season on which we
celebrate the living Christ, I invite you as the people of God to
reflect deeply upon the love of God for you. Think about how God
can help you find peace and happiness by enabling you to do those
things which you never thought you could do.
Let us then praise and give thanks to God for his love and
mercy this day. May you continue to have a blessed and happy
Easter season!
Benediction: Gracious and eternal God, we have worshiped you
and given thanks for all that you have done. As we go from this
place, may we and those we love walk with your Spirit now and
forever.
Now may the Lord bless you and keep you, may the Lord make his
face to shine upon you and be gracious unto you, the Lord lift up
his countenance upon you, and give you peace. Amen.
1-David G. Myers, The Pursuit of Happiness, reviewed by Philip
Blackwell in The Christian Century, October 7, 1992, p. 876.
2-Neal Fisher, The Parables of Jesus: Glimpses of God's Reign
(New York: Crossroad, 1990), p. 101.
3-"The Woman Who Beat the Klan," New York Times Magazine,
November 1, 1987, pp. 26-39.
