What does God desire? Today I want to talk about Jesus desiring mercy, and the difference His mercy can make. Our text today is one of the hallmark’s of the Christian life. Jesus invites us to realize something critical: real worship can be shaped by music styles or even preferences, but real worship is also rooted in mercy and relationships. A classic case of the mercy Jesus was talking about took place In the 1970s and 80s. Pastor Wenceslao “Wency” Padilla was a Christian leader in the Philippines under the brutal dictatorship of Ferdinand Marcos. Because Padilla spoke out against the regime’s human rights abuses — the disappearances, the torture, the murder of political opponents — he was arrested, imprisoned, and repeatedly tortured. Fortunately, Padilla survived. After the dictatorship fell in 1986, a truth commission was formed. Victims were asked to testify against their torturers. Many did, demanding justice. Padilla was asked what he wanted done to the men who had tortured him.He said, “I want to meet them. I want to forgive them.” The commission arranged a meeting. One by one, the men who had held him down, beaten him, and waterboarded him were brought into a room. Some of them were ashamed. Some were defiant. Padilla shook each one’s hand. He looked them in the eye. He said, “What you did was evil. But I am a follower of Jesus Christ, and He commands me to forgive. So I forgive you. I release you from the debt you owe me. I will not pursue vengeance.”One of the torturers broke down and asked Padilla to pray for him. Padilla did. When a journalist later asked him how he could forgive men who had betrayed not just him but their entire nation — men who had served a dictatorship that crushed their own people — Padilla said: If I had demanded justice, I would have remained their prisoner forever. My hatred would have kept me in that cell. Forgiveness set me free. They do not deserve it. That is exactly why it is called mercy.” Let’s talk about the mercy God desires, and the difference His mercy can make.Mercy is transformative: “As Jesus went on from there, he saw a man named Matthew sitting at the tax collector’s booth. “Follow me,” he told him, and Matthew got up and followed him.”-Matthew 9:9. This story is pretty dramatic and radical when you consider the backstory. Matthew was a tax collector, but not just any tax collector. He was likely a *publican*, a Jew working for the Roman occupation, collecting taxes from his own people. In Jewish society, this was as unpatriotic and low one could get. Tax collectors were religious outcasts. They were considered ritually unclean and regularly in contact with Gentiles. They were often excommunicated from the synagogue. It was assumed that tax collectors were thieves, extorting more than what was owed to line their own pockets. They were grouped with “sinners,” prostitutes, and Gentiles. For Jesus to even speak to such a man was scandalous. Why would you invite someone so morally corupt, and a traitor to the nation to follow you? For Jesus to invite Matthew to become a *disciple*—a student who would share his life and ministry—was not something the Jewish world would have endorsed. In the Jewish culture, the typical dynamic was reversed. A student would seek out a rabbi and ask to follow them, demonstrating their own dedication and worthiness. Jesus breaks this pattern entirely. He doesn’t wait for Matthew to come to him. He doesn’t first check Matthew’s references or moral qualifications. He goes directly to the most despised person in the community and invites Matthew to give up his livelihood, identity, and past to follow Him. The text says Matthew “got up and followed him.” This is striking! There is no negotiation. No request to go home and pack. No “let me first say bye to my friends or check with my work.” This wasn’t a slow, deliberate conversion; it was a clear, trusting act of surrender. Luke’s gospel (Luke 5:28) adds the detail that Matthew “left everything,” emphasizing the total cost and freedom of the invitation from Jesus.
The mercy of God transformed my life in 2009. I have shared bits of this story, but some stories are worth sharing! Rhiannon and I were living in Jacksonville Texas. I was coming off a year of teaching in which I did not feel like I had the best year. it was also the same year we adopted Evan. Here is the kicker, my school was 40 miles away! I told Rhiannon I really wanted to be a bit closer to Evan and her, but I also wanted to pursue teaching and coaching. I know I need to be a good Father, but I also know I need to work. I could lead kids, I just needed someone to show me mercy, to give me an opportunity to build on what I had learned my second year of teaching. That was a rough summer deciding deciding between those two points. I could be close to the family, but could I continue to work and teach? Choosing between family and work was the most conflicted I have ever been. The question was: Did I deserve an opportunity to be closer to home and work nesr my family? Or was the Lord going to tell me I was stuck were I was?
In July of that summer, the Lord opened the door. Coach Kevin Anderson at Westwood in Palestine called me and said “Hey! Do you have a job yet?” He invited me to come in and interview, but also encouraged me. “John, I know you think you had a bad year, I don’t think you made anyone mad, but let’s see what you learned and what happens if you come work for us.” That moment of mercy led to a couple of teacher awards from the District, but it also led to transformation.I understood that repentance is not just telling God sorry, but also responding to His mercy with a desire to change and taking steps to do so. I set alarms for everything important now. I did more at home to help Rhiannon with dishes, folding clothes. When I began to preach part time in 2013 and dropped coaching, I took those lessons of mercy and transformation and applied it to my ministry. I had a full time teaching job, no coaching job, but two part time churches, Brooklyn was born by then, so I had two kids and a wife to love. I choose to not let responsibilities stop me from doing the small things well. If I had an assignment due for Course of Study in Ministry, I blew up my professor’s cell phone! If I had to register with the Conference, Wade Harmon almost destroyed his phone cause I was always checking with him if he had everything he needed for me to get credit for courses completed, had the new classes ready for me to pick, etc. Friends, these moments of transformation almost never happened, but because of the moment of mercy from Coach Anderson, they did. I will be always grateful that Coach Anderson showed me mercy that summer in 2009. He knew I had a bad year, and took a chance on me anyway. The mercy of Jesus, is transformative!
Mercy is also relational: “While Jesus was having dinner at Matthew’s house, many tax collectors and sinners came and ate with him and his disciples. When the Pharisees saw this, they asked his disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?” On hearing this, Jesus said, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. But go and learn what this means: ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice.’ For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”-Matthew 9:10-13. The radical nature of the invitation of Jesus is immediately underscored by what happens next. Matthew throws a feast for Jesus, and the guest list is “many tax collectors and sinners.” The religious leaders, the Pharisees, are horrified. Their question—”Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?”—reveals they their central belief: Perception, not relationships with sinners are the most important thing before God. Jesus’s response is the opposite of the Pharisees, and is the heart of His ministry: “I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.” Remember, Rabbi’s were sought by students to follow them. Jesus turns it around. He is basically saying “I have come to call people to know me!” There are over 30-40 passages Jesus spoke about a personal, direct relationship with Himself in the Gospels. Hear the the Spirit of Jesus for us! “Come to me, all you that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.”-Matthew 11:28. When people need mercy and fruit in their lives, Jesus says “I am the vine, and you are the branches, if you abide in me, and I am you, you will bear much fruit.”-John 15:4-5. If a person feels like they been rejected and just want someone to listen to them, Jesus shows mercy and says “Whoever acknowledges me before others, I will also acknowledge them before my Father in heaven.”-Matthew 10:32.
These passages make one thing clear: The mission of Jesus is us! To have a relationship with us so you and I can have abundant and resurrection life in Him. Friends, that should radically change how we live. If people are the mission of Jesus, and we are His representatives on earth, than this has several ramifications for life. You parents, worried your kids will be bored this summer, you, and your kiddos, have the same invitation the disciples did. Abide in Jesus and you will bear fruit. Far from boredom, this will be the best summer you ever had with them! For kids about to go to summer camp or college this fall. You no longer have to worry if camp or college will shake your faith, that college or camp has to worry cause the same Jesus who said “Learn of me”, will be teaching you new things this summer and fall that camp and college would never consider. They both, without even knowing it, may be used by Jesus to teach you something you need to know. Glory be to God!
What kind of mercy do you need today? Remember friends, New Testament teaching addressed needs. Someone reading Matthew’s Gospel needed to know mercy was possible, even for people who felt they didn’t deserve it. Are you in need of mercy today? Can you give mercy but have been withholding it lately? In Christ, you can have both! You can let go of the pressure to be merciful because Jesus has already done it for you on the cross, and receive His mercy for you purchased by His blood, even when the world says you don’t deserve it!
That is the heart of the Church’s Mission statement of First Methodist: “Share Christ.” Friends, I invite you, to share Jesus and His mercy to anyone who will listen this week. Call that person you haven’t called in a while. Go get that cup of coffee. Don’t always talk when you hear something you don’t like! Do something Biblical like order chips and queso and share a snack with them. Ha! In other words, don’t lean on structure and information when you meet them, lean on Jesus and transformation!! That is His mercy, and the difference He makes. In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.
