Good Morning All,
Micah 6:8; “He has told you,
O man, what is good; and what does the Lord require of
you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly
with your God?”
We
have all heard the old saying “give a man a fish and he eats for a day; teach a
man to fish and he eats for a lifetime.”
It is a way to view life and a way to live out a Christian, faithful
lifestyle. Yet it sort of misses the
point. It sounds good but it assumes
that you can actually fix the problem by yourself.
There is a difference between mercy and
justice. Mercy is what you and I do to
relieve pain and suffering. Mercy is
giving the man a fish because he is hungry and needs to eat today. Mercy is meeting the needs of now, right
now. It is one of the most important
things that we, as Christians, show one another. It should be an automatic response from each
of us. The desire to come to the aid of
someone in need should be in every Christian’s heart.
Justice is a little different thing. Justice is teaching the man to fish. Justice is about fixing some problem that
exists. Mercy is giving someone the food
they need to eat for today. Justice is
getting them better jobs or better pay so that they can afford to buy their own
food. There is a difference in that
justice usually takes a large effort by a lot of people for a long time. It can be daunting. Yet we seek justice because God tells us to. We are to do justice. We should not take advantage of anyone. We should not stand by as someone else takes
advantage either. God calls upon us to
seek and to do justice.
Yet it is a sinful world and justice can
take years to accomplish. Years to right
the wrongs of cruelty and exploitation.
It can take years to get people to recognize the problem. Yet the person needs to eat today. He needs shelter and protection now. So he needs our mercy right now. He needs justice, that is for sure, but he
needs mercy now.
This is where we as Christians need to
respond. Sometimes, we look at a
situation and see that justice is a long ways off and we are almost paralyzed
by inaction. There is no way we can aid
everyone. There is no way to continually
try and use only mercy; we need to accomplish justice. Yet for today, have mercy; have mercy for one
person. Feed one man, one fish for
today. Sometimes that is all we can
do. If that is all we can do, then we do
all we can; just that one fish to that one man.
So calls upon us to do justice; yet mercy
must flow like a river because I can be merciful and you can be merciful; one
person aiding one person, as best as we can.
We can work toward justice, we can strive for justice but we must live
in mercy. Every day we need to show
mercy to our fellow man because every day God shows you mercy.
Father of all mercy, lead us to be merciful and to
seek justice in this world. Break our
hearts as we see pain and suffering.
Move us to action for those who are in need of your holy compassion. Use us as your instruments to brig healing to
the world. In the precious name of Jesus
we pray, amen.
God’s Peace,
Pastor Bret
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