Titus 3:3-7; Exodus 34:5-7

We were in sin (v3).  And we make no contribution to our predicament (v5).  But we are saved by mercy.  What does this say about God?

·        He did not treat us as our sins deserve!  Ezra used these very words after Israel returned from captivity in Babylon, only to return to the same sins that led to the captivity in the first place (Ezra 9:13).  David, after his various sins associated with the Bathsheba incident, pled for mercy (Ps. 51:1).  He didn’t have the attitude that God should at least partly look the other way because, after all, we humans are prone to sin.  The only way God cannot remember our former iniquities is on the basis of mercy (Ps. 79:8).  Jeremiah (Lam. 3:32), Daniel (Dan. 9:9,18) and Hosea (Hosea 1:6-7; 2:23) all counted on God’s mercy in Israel’s return from captivity.  But here’s what is amazing …

·        He treated us according to His character.  God is fundamentally merciful.  Mercy is not a change of character for God; it is who and what He is.  Paul told Titus that we were saved by God’s mercy when the kindness and the love of God our Savior toward man appeared.  Just like the similar thought in Titus 2:11, this refers to the Incarnation.  God’s love and kindness appeared when God appeared, the Word who became flesh!  O give thanks to the Lord for He is good!  For His mercy endures forever.  

The most frequently quotes verse in the Bible is Exodus 34:6-7 when God announces His Name to Moses.  How does it read, in part? The Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious … keeping mercy for thousands.  David remembered the “Moses event” and quoted the Name in Ps. 103:7-10: The Lord is merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in mercy.  And again, in Ps. 145:8-9: The Lord is gracious and full of compassion, slow to anger and great in mercy … His tender mercies are over all His works.  The great intercessors used the Name of God, men like Daniel (Dan. 9:4), Nehemiah (Neh, . 9:17,32-33) and Moses (Num. 14:18; Psa. 106:23).

But there is no greater Intercessor than our Lord, Jesus Christ.  And He pled the Name of God when He said to His Father, I have manifested Your Name to the men You have given me out of this world (John 17:6).  He spoke these words when the work of His earthly live had concluded and when He was ready to face the cross and the bearing of our pitiable sinfulness.  The kindness and love of God appeared in the Incarnation; but it climaxed at the cross.

Mercy announces that God has not treated us as our sins deserve.  And mercy announces that God is being true to Himself.  Don’t come to God making excuses as if you weren’t that dependent on Him for mercy.  Come in the truth.  Confess your sin.  Let your cry be heard: Lord, be merciful to me, a sinner!