Relying on God’s mercy …

It doesn’t take a relentless enemy — and Satan is relentless! — to cause you or I to stumble, it just takes us.

Even as children of God, we’re not perfect … yet! As the Holy Spirit is perfecting us by transforming us over our lifetimes, we still all too often let the flesh get the better of us and we stumble.

Face down, big flop!

The Apostle Paul experienced the same wrestling with the flesh we do, and he wrote about that battle …

“I have discovered this principle of life — that when I want to do what is right, I inevitably do what is wrong. I love God’s law with all my heart. But there is another power within me that is at war with my mind. This power makes me a slave to the sin that is still within me. Oh, what a miserable person I am! Who will free me from this life that is dominated by sin and death? Thank God! The answer is in Jesus Christ our Lord. So you see how it is: In my mind I really want to obey God’s law, but because of my sinful nature I am a slave to sin,” Romans 7:21-25.

Thank God — truly! — that He is merciful with us!

Not just once, back when we first responded to the message of the Gospel, but look how merciful God is with us …

The faithful love of the Lord never ends! His mercies never cease. Great is his faithfulness; his mercies begin afresh each morning. – Lamentations 3:22-23.

Oh how we need a merciful God like that! While a primary difference in how Christians and non-Christians live is that disciples of Jesus Christ no longer practice sin, we still have our failures as the Holy Spirit works on us. We need the mercy of God to see us through so that the transforming work of the Holy Spirit can be accomplished.

Michael Scrogin highlights in his book, “Practical Guide to Christian Living,” our need for more than just a second chance in our efforts of living life:

We have Halls of Fame all over this country. There’s one in Canton, Ohio, for football; one in Springfield, Massachusetts, for basketball; there’s one in Cooperstown, New York, for baseball. We have a Halls of Fame for all sorts of sports, and we’re forever electing aging athletes to these institutions. Speeches are made in their honor as we give them awards.

If it were up to me to make the decisions, I would have a different sort of Hall of Fame. I would have a Hall of Fame of those who have given and those who have received second and third and 13th chances. This hall would be huge and it would be filled mostly with the names of those who had made it against all odds. I would have a section dedicated especially to those who had been arrested or imprisoned and who later, when they were released, straightened out their lives and didn’t go back.

I would set aside an entire wall for recovering alcoholics, who’d been up against a devastating disease, who’d hit bottom, but who’d climbed back out. I’d set aside one whole building for teenagers because every teenager needs at least 100 second chances.

All those who come to God in faith are inducted into just such a Hall of Fame. When we stand before the Bema Seat of Christ, we’ll all be handed our “awards” from the God of Second Chances!

The mercy God showed you yesterday wasn’t the last drop of mercy available to you …

“… his mercies begin afresh each morning …”

We make it through this life as disciples of Jesus Christ by relying on the mercy of God, whose mercies never end, whose mercy is new every morning!

Have you considered how you rely on the mercy of God? Have you thanked Him for being merciful to you?

Scotty