That is why the Lord says,
“Turn to me now, while there is time.
Give me your hearts.
Come with fasting, weeping, and mourning.
Don’t tear your clothing in your grief,
but tear your hearts instead.”
Return to the Lord your God,
for he is merciful and compassionate,
slow to get angry and filled with unfailing love. Joel 2:12-13 NLT
What a merciful and gracious God we have. One who loves us so much He gave His Son to sacrifice His life so that we could be free from sin once and for all. No amount of pleading, working and groveling can remiss (forgive and remove the power of) sin only the blood of Jesus. When we accept what Jesus did for us on the cross, we receive God’s mercy, not getting what we do deserve and grace, getting what we don’t deserve.
Although most Believers would say they agree whole heartedly to that, they find it difficult to show that same compassion on others. Instead we become judgmental of those who don’t agree with us. Just think about the denominational divides over issues of perspective. We see the world as our enemy instead of something we need to reach with the message of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Perhaps the reason this is so difficult is that we don’t continually experience God and all He truly is. We know it in our heads, but not in our hearts. We find ourselves living “for” Christ instead of living “with” Him. We’ve turned our relationship with Him into doing instead of being. And it leaves us disconnected and cold from Him. When we no longer experience His mercy, grace, forgiveness, love and compassion, it’s difficult to then pass it on to someone else.
We live in a nation and world that desperately needs to experience the love, mercy, grace and compassion of God. Many are totally oblivious to this need, but those who have been reconciled back to our heavenly Father know the depth of that need. We need to pray for those who are still separated from Him and that He would give us opportunity to show Jesus to them; so that they would receive Jesus and enter into a relationship with Him by accepting His love, mercy, grace and forgiveness. We know God’s will is that all should come to repentance, so no one will perish (2 Peter 3:9). Perhaps one of our prayers should be Lord, break my heart for what breaks Yours and help me see people through Your eyes.
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