THE SPARING MERCY OF GOD
“It is of the LORD's mercies that we are not consumed, because His compassions fail not. They are new every morning: great is thy faithfulness.” (Lamentations 3:22-23)
Mercy is compassion that forbears punishment even when justice demands it. It is an expression of who God is, and His love for us (Exodus 34: 6-7). Mercy triumphs over judgment, but refusing mercy is disastrous and this will invite judgment. God’s judgment for sin is never unjust. His judgment is always the result of mercy that was offered and refused. He wants us to repent, but those who refuse mercy will receive judgment (2 Peter 3:9). The Lord is patient and never wants us to perish.
There is a five-fold mercy of God:
1. REWARDING MERCY - This is the mercy shown towards those who have performed well in a task.
2. PARDONING MERCY – Mercy exercised towards those who have done ill, or towards their past sin.
3. PREVENTING MERCY - When he keeps us from evil, from the evil of sin, or of punishment.
4. DELIVERING MERCY – Though He let us fall into the evil of sin or punishment, yet he is pleased to help us up , and takes us out again.
5. SPARING MERCY – While we are in affliction, God deals gently with us.
Sparing mercy is the lowest degree of mercy, If God deny sparing mercy, he denies all mercy. The Angels that sinned found no mercy, no sacrifice was provided for them, God cast them down to Hell, and delivered them into chains of darkness, to be reserved unto Judgment (2 Peter 2:4). God didn’t spare the old world, but saved Noah, the eighth person, a preacher of righteousness, bringing in the Flood upon the world of the ungodly. Neither the Angels who apostatized from God, nor the old ungodly world has any share in sparing mercy.
Mercy is when He spares us from bad things we deserve. God, in his Mercies and Compassion, spares, preserves and saves Sinners from being consumed by his Wrath. In the riches of His Patience, Forbearance, and Long-suffering, he waits on them to be gracious: He reveals his saving mercies to them, he offers it; shows them the way of it, how it can be glorified to them, and then tenderly invites and beseeches them to seek after it and accept it (Romans 2:4). He calls on them by his Word, strives with them by his Spirit, sends all His Ministers to preach the message of salvation.
It is of the Lord's mercies that we are not consumed by temporal Judgments, and cut off by the blow of His Hand; and it is yet more of his mercies that our Souls are not roaring under that fire of his wrath, which burns to the lowest Hell.
It is of his Sovereignty, who has mercy on whom he will have Mercy, and has Compassion because he will have Compassion (Romans 9:15).
“But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. “(Ephesians 2:4,7)
GOD SPARES LOT AND HIS FAMILY FROM THE DESTRUCTION OF SODOM AND GOMORRAH (Genesis 19:1-29)
God’s angels arrived at the gates of Sodom and Gomorrah where they were greeted by the gatekeeper Lot. He pleaded with the angels to join him in his house so he could wash their feet and serve them a meal. The angels agreed and went to the house of Lot. Lot was a foreigner to the realm of Sodom and not succumbed to the lustful, degenerate sins rampant in the city.
One of the most prevalent sins in Sodom was the homosexuality of the men, engaging in sexual relations with the other men and boys. After the angels entered the home of Lot, the men of the city surrounded Lot’s house, in an attempt to have sex with them (Genesis 19:5).
Lot fled Sodom with his wife and two daughters. The angels first tell Lot to flee to the mountains, but Lot requests that his family go to a nearby city, named Zoar, to ensure their survival. The LORD rained down burning sulfur on Sodom and Gomorrah—from the LORD out of the heavens (Genesis 19:23-29) but His mercy spared Lot and his family. He remembered Abraham, and brought Lot out of the catastrophe that overthrew the cities where Lot had lived.
Out of disobedience, Lot’s wife looked back, and she became a pillar of salt.
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GOD SPARED THE CITY OF ZOAR FOR ONE RIGHTEOUS MAN
“See now, this city is near enough to flee to, and it is a little one; please let me escape there (is it not a little one?) and my soul shall live.” And he said to him, “See, I have favored you concerning this thing also, in that I will not overthrow this city for which you have spoken. Hurry, escape there. For I cannot do anything until you arrive there.” Therefore the name of the city was called Zoar. (Genesis 19: 20 -22)
As Lot and his family flee Sodom(Genesis 19.15-25), he falters, not believing that he can make it all the way to the mountains (where he had been commanded to flee). He asks for permission to stop and find refuge in a small city nearby (Zoar). It’s easy to miss how the angel responds to him in verse 21:
“See, I have favored you concerning this thing also, in that I will not overthrow this city for which you have spoken. .”
The angel granted Lot’s request and removed that little city from the to-be-destroyed list. God spared an entire city for the sake of one righteous man.
Abraham didn’t specifically ask for mercy for the sake of just one man, but God’s mercy to Zoar is the necessary result of Abraham’s intercession. Abraham justified his plea for mercy by appealing to God’s character:
Far be it from you to do such a thing, to put the righteous to death with the wicked, so that the righteous fare as the wicked! Far be that from you! Shall not the Judge of all the earth do what is just? (Genesis 18:25)
God always does what is just. In this situation, that means that God won’t destroy the righteous along with the wicked. Abraham doesn’t plead that God “won’t destroy more than one or two righteous with the wicked.” He stated the broad truth about God’s character and then God responded favorably to each decreasing number that Abraham suggested.
Abraham prayed for mercy for the sake of 50, 45, 40, 30, 20, and 10. God demonstrated that he’ll show mercy for the sake of one. He is, after all, the God “who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think” (Ephesians 3.20).
CLASSIFICATION OF THE SPARING MERCY OF GOD
1. NOT TO PUNISH AT ALL – God spares his own people sometimes, as a father spares his son that serves him (Malachi 3:17). Though they fail, yet he passes it by, and does not reckon with them for it. The Lord represented himself to Amos, forming grasshoppers, threatened to devour the land; this vision put the prophet upon that earnest prayer, “O Lord GOD, forgive, I pray! Oh, that Jacob may stand, For he is small!” So the LORD relented concerning this. “It shall not be,” said the LORD. “(Amos 7:1-3), this sparing mercy was repeated in Amos 7:6, 8:2
2. MODERATED JUDGEMENT. Though God punished yet he does not punish to the full. When the cloud breaks, he lets a few drops fall on us, and does not pour out showers or make an inundation to overwhelm us. It is mercy to punish less. “They felt his wrath, but God did not stir up all his wrath; they were smitten but not destroyed, Justice did not make an utter end of them. (Psalm 78:38). Same mercy was extended to the people in Jeremiah 30:11 and Jeremiah 46:28 – I will not let you go altogether unpunished (Yet I will spare you, though I punish you) I will correct you in measure, I will not make a full end of you.
“It is of the Lord’s mercy that we are not utterly consumed” (Lamentations 3:22). If we are much consumed, but not utterly consumed, this also is sparing mercy. If He takes away a man’s properties and give him a little money to buy bread, this is sparing mercy.
3. DEFERRED PUNISHMENT. It is sparing mercy, when punishment is deferred or adjourned to a further day; thus the Lord spared the old world, a 120 years. “And the LORD said, My spirit shall not always strive with man, for that he also is flesh: yet his days shall be an hundred and twenty years (Genesis 6:3)”: it did a long time, he spared them many years to draw them to repentance, and to leave them inexcusable, because they didn’t repent.
4. UNWILLING TO AFFLICT. There is a sparing mercy of God in the very act of afflicting, when he shows that he is unwilling to afflict, or discovers tenderness to them that are afflicted (Lamentation 3:12) – He doesn't willingly afflict nor grieve the children of men.
REPENT AND TURN TO GOD
It is of the Lord's Mercies that we are not consumed. This loudly and earnestly call upon us to repent of our Sins, and this should be a powerful constraint of Grace upon us.
The sparing Mercies and the consuming Judgments of God, his threatened Wrath and his Bowels of Compassion, have one Voice to us, and should have the same Effect on us.
May the Judgments of God not consume us, but refine us; purge away our dross and refine us as Silver.
“I will turn My hand against you, and thoroughly purge away your dross, and take away all your alloy. I will restore your judges as at the first, and your counselors as at the beginning. Afterward you shall be called the city of righteousness, the faithful city. Zion shall be redeemed with justice, and her penitents with righteousness. The destruction of transgressors and of sinners shall be together, and those who forsake the LORD shall be consumed.” (Isaiah 1:25-28)
Have mercy on me, O God, according to Your loving-kindness; according to the multitude of Your tender mercies, blot out my transgressions. Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin. For I acknowledge my transgressions, and my sin is always before me.(Psalm 51:1-3)
James Dina (james@mountzionblog.org)
30th August 2020
https://mountzionblog.org/the-sparing-mercy-of-god/
References
1. "An Exposition on the book of Job" by Joseph Caryl.
2. Choosing MERCY > Judgement by GREG SIMAS.
3. "God spared the city for one righteous man" by James Steinbach.
4. "It is of the Lord's mercies that we are not consumed" by Colman, Benjamin.
