#7 in series on the Sermon on the Mount
Preached April 14, 2002
Parkview Church of the Nazarene,
Mobile, AL
J. Richard Lord, Jr.
The Mercy Investment
Matthew 3:7
Intro
Ever since this latest recession has struck, a lot of people have been glued to CNN, Fox News and other such news, listening to reports on the latest rise and fall of businesses and the ups and downs in the stock market.
Most of us who have any kind of retirement program have some ties to the stock market and as a result, ties to the business of Wall Street, whether we realize it or not.
So it is of prime concern to us of how well business is in America. Add to the news about the Enron scandal and how thousands of people have had their retirements wiped out can understandably cause some worry.
Some of us have put a lifetime of savings into these retirement plans believing we will have a nice little nest egg to carry us through our golden years. And now, uncertainty has landed at our door.
We have expected, because we have put this money out, that we will receive it, multiplied many times over, back when we need it.
So everybody is jittery. The stock market continues to plunge up and down. We bite our nails. We watch our retirement portfolios take a beating. We have learned firsthand that in this life there is no sure investment.
Except for one thing.
The investment in Mercy.
There is classic commercial about an investment firm called E. F. Hutton. In this commercial, you see a room full of people sitting around, chatting. In one corner, there is a conversation going on and someone says, “My broker is E. F. Hutton and he says. . .” At that point, the whole room becomes quiet and everybody leans forward and strains to hear what E. F. Hutton said.
As we look at this scripture, everyone sitting around is straining to hear what Jesus is saying. And as we listen, we hear Jesus gives the best investment advice in the world. He is telling us to invest in Mercy.
If you are a good investor, you have learned that before you invest in something, you must learn everything you can about it, so you can invest with realistic knowledge and expectations of what kind of return you will get.
So what is Mercy? Mercy is:
I. FORBEARANCE
The New International Dictionary describes mercy as: “Forbearance from inflicting punishment on an adversary or a lawbreaker.” Forbearance is a legal term meaning: “Refraining from enforcement of a debt, right or obligation that is due.”
When a court grants forbearance, it means that there is a recognition that a debt or obligation is owed, but that it will refrain from collecting on that debt.
If you commit a crime, the court can, if it so chooses, grant you forbearance of the punishment of that crime. Of course, this is usually done under extreme mitigating circumstances and very rarely.
When we come to Jesus, he grants us forbearance of the penalty of our sins. We are guilty, we owe the debt, but Jesus grants us permanent forbearance.
Having received forbearance, Jesus expects us to do the same with our fellow men. In the Lord’s Prayer, he instructs us how to pray, “Forgive us our debts (or trespasses) as we forgive our debtors. (or those who trespass against us)” (Matthew 6:12)
When we ask Jesus for forgiveness for our sins, there must be a willingness to forgive others, or there can be no salvation. Jesus was very definite on this point.
"Therefore, the kingdom of heaven is like a king who wanted to settle accounts with his servants. As he began the settlement, a man who owed him ten thousand talents was brought to him. Since he was not able to pay, the master ordered that he and his wife and his children and all that he had be sold to repay the debt.
"The servant fell on his knees before him. `Be patient with me,’ he begged, `and I will pay back everything.’ The servant’s master took pity on him, canceled the debt and let him go.
"But when that servant went out, he found one of his fellow servants who owed him a hundred denarii. He grabbed him and began to choke him. `Pay back what you owe me!’ he demanded.
"His fellow servant fell to his knees and begged him, `Be patient with me, and I will pay you back.’
"But he refused. Instead, he went off and had the man thrown into prison until he could pay the debt. When the other servants saw what had happened, they were greatly distressed and went and told their master everything that had happened.
"Then the master called the servant in. `You wicked servant,’ he said, `I canceled all that debt of yours because you begged me to. Shouldn’t you have had mercy on your fellow servant just as I had on you?’ In anger his master turned him over to the jailers to be tortured, until he should pay back all he owed.
"This is how my heavenly Father will treat each of you unless you forgive your brother from your heart." (Matthew 18:23-32)
So part of the investment in mercy we make is forbearance.
When the first missionaries came to Alberta, Canada, they were savagely opposed by a young chief of the Cree Indians named Maskepetoon. But he responded to the gospel and accepted Christ. Shortly afterward, a member of the Blackfoot tribe killed his father. Maskepetoon rode into the village where the murderer lived and demanded that he be brought before him. Confronting the guilty man, he said, "You have killed my father, so now you must be my father. You shall ride my best horse and wear my best clothes." In utter amazement and remorse his enemy exclaimed, "My son, now you have killed me!" He meant, of course, that the hate in his own heart had been completely erased by the forgiveness and kindness of the Indian chief.
If we invest forbearance in the lives others, when they say or do things that hurt us; if we adopt a lifestyle of forbearance, by projecting forbearance automatically on everyone we come in contact with, we will discover that forbearance will come our way every time we need it.
This is the return of our investment. It’s a dividend. We give forbearance, and we get it back, multiplied many times over.
II. COMPASSION
The second part of the definition of mercy is: “The compassion that causes one to help the weak, the sick, or the poor--a cardinal virtue of a true Christian.”
When we are saved, there is something that happens to us. There is a pull, that comes from the throne of grace, that starts us to thinking more outwardly than inwardly. We tend to not define the world as how it effects us and begin to see what we can do to effect the world. Simply stated, “We love because he first loved us.” (I John 4:19)
We begin to understand what was meant when Paul, in Acts 20:35, quoted Jesus in saying, “It is more blessed to give than to receive.” We are now in a condition of contentment and fulfillment. Our hearts are overflowing. We discover the thrill and blessing of giving to others. Not just our money, but our time and efforts.
There is a deep satisfaction that we can get no where else when we invest our lives in helping others.
We also discover something else. When we invest our lives in the lives of others, we find that our own problems seem to either go away or are more easily handled. Our own problems don’t seem as important.
This is part of God‘s design. It is a dividend of our investment. When we invest in others, we are blessed in return.
It is hard to describe, but easy to feel. We who are Christians have received the benefit of mercy by the blood of Jesus. When we invest compassion on others, that benefit is increased. We receive even more compassion, not only from God, but also from others.
Ecclesiastes 11:1 says, “Cast your bread upon the waters, for after many days you will find it again.”
There were once two young men working their way through Leland Stanford University. Their funds got desperately low, and the idea came to one of them to engage Paderewski for a piano recital and devote the profits to their board and tuition. The great pianist’s manager asked for a guarantee of two thousand dollars. The students, undaunted, proceeded to stage the concert. They worked hard, only to find that the concert had raised only sixteen hundred dollars.
After the concert, the students sought the great artist and told him of their efforts and results. They gave him the entire sixteen hundred dollars, and accompanied it with a promissory note for four hundred dollars, explaining that they would earn the amount at the earliest possible moment and send the money to him. "No," replied Paderewski, "that won’t do." Then tearing the note to shreds, he returned the money and said to them: "Now, take out of this sixteen hundred dollars all of your expenses, and keep for each of you 10 percent of the balance for your work, and let me have the rest."
The years rolled by--years of fortune and destiny. Paderewski had become premier of Poland. The devastating war came, and Paderewski was striving with might and main to feed the starving thousands of his beloved Poland. There was only one man in the world who could help Paderewski and his people. Thousands of tons of food began to come into Poland for distribution by the Polish premier.
After the starving people were fed, Paderewski journeyed to Paris to thank Herbert Hoover for the relief sent him. "That’s all right, Mr. Paderewski," was Mr. Hoover’s reply. "Besides, you don’t remember it, but you helped me once when I was a student at
college and I was in a hole."
Compassion is an investment that brings great returns!
III. SACRIFICE
One of the principles of sound investing is that you should not invest any more that you can afford to lose. Many a person has lost their financial security because they gambled on an investment and lost.
But sometimes the world’s concepts of investing and Jesus’ concept do not agree.
When we invest in mercy, we cannot invest cautiously. We cannot approach this in the same manner we might approach the stock market, for the only way we can get a return on our investment in mercy is that we must invest it all. We must give everything we have or it will be for nothing.
This is no less that what Jesus did. He didn’t just give out of His abundance, He gave himself even to death on the cross!
This is what we must do as well. We cannot invest only what we can afford to lose. We must invest everything we are and everything we have.
“Jesus sat down opposite the place where the offerings were put and watched the crowd putting their money into the temple treasury. Many rich people threw in large amounts. But a poor widow came and put in two very small copper coins, worth only a fraction of a penny.
Calling his disciples to him, Jesus said, ‘I tell you the truth, this poor widow has put more into the treasury than all the others. They all gave out of their wealth; but she, out of her poverty, put in everything--all she had to live on.’” (Matthew 12:41-44)
The measure of our investment comes not by the total of our giving, whether it is money, or time, but the percentage of our resources. And Jesus wants one hundred percent! It will take no less than a one hundred percent investment to get a return.
And what a return that will be. “What a day that will be, when my Jesus I shall see. When I look upon His face, the one who saved me by His grace. When He takes me by the hand, and leads me to the promised land, what a day, glorious day that will be!”
CONCLUSION
Jesus has taught us a principle of life that Christians must understand. A person who has adopted a merciful lifestyle, that is, a lifestyle that is marked with forbearance, compassion and sacrifice, is a person who is receiving the great riches of life that
Jesus had promised us.
If we decide today that the only truly sound investment is mercy, we will discover that its dividends far outweigh any other investment returns we could ever have
