Mercy for the Wretched

Learning so many things. Largely regarding my own insufficiencies and wretchedness, apart from God's grace.

I still desperately want to be able to construct flowcharts sufficient to prescribe proper action.
I still desperately want to perceive my understanding as sufficient to gauge what is right and good.
I still cling erroneously to the notion that I know what love is, per my own conceptions and experiences and interpretations of God's ways and wisdom and created order.

But He's been increasingly allowing me to see the utmost need for His guidance moment by moment in all things, such as to fail to know else except to turn to Him in prayer and seek out His Word, that by His Spirit He'll make straight the path before me. This, regarding some Everest-style circumstances, as goes interpersonal relationships. And corporate relationships. And professional relationships. And life. Daily.

I have failed for many months. A year? Utterly. At consistency and diligence. All the more to have appreciation for His mercy toward me, where comes His guidance, deliverance, and preservation. I say this somewhat tongue-in-cheek, as not meaning whatsoever what once I may have--I do not in any capacity despair of life, I am not in any capacity any longer (in the present moment, at least--this battle is still one waged regularly) despising myself...but merely say this in terms of what it is to stand before an all-powerful, all-knowing, all-loving, wholly good Creator God who sustains me, whom I have utterly been defiant of and despised per my actions again and again: I do not deserve life. Nor peace. Nor kindness. Nor mercy. Nor health. I deserve consequence adequate to the egregious wrongs I've done against Him who so love me as to know me in my mother's womb and love me, even there.

We all deserve such.

And yet His love is so much that, instead, He came in the flesh to walk amongst us and endure that righteous consequence of wrath, Himself. Satisfied my debt. Our debt. Into death. And overcame even death. Resurrected. That all who come to Him in truth will receive mercy rather than the consequence due us.

This is unfathomable. Incomprehensible.

He is trustworthy. Above all. As none else could ever be.

This God. This One God. This Only God.

He is trustworthy. For no matter how dire our circumstances, no matter how deep our despair, no matter how severe our suffering--and there are some beyond utterance--He is trustworthy, in the midst, as He endured and endures with us while yet continuing to extend the offer of mercies untold. Every day, mercies. Beyond measure.

One of the evangelists whom the Lord has been gracious to me through has discussed the difference between man's mercies and God's mercies as considering what one would face in a human court of law. Go before the judge with a few transgressions of the law having been confirmed by officers, and if it's a first offense perhaps the judge will have mercy. Yet, go again in a year with 100 of the same offenses, no matter how grieved you may be to have committed the same the judge is going to throw the book at you, so to speak: you will swiftly encounter consequence as pronounced by the judge.

But, of God? All the more treacherous and despicable are our deeds, in that higher court, as against perfect law, perfect justice, perfect good--and yet, if we come before Him knowing our guilt and embracing the truth of it openly...not rejoicing but contrite...come to Christ Jesus and He will have mercy. Having already paid the debt, Himself. Again and again. And all the more grieved are we, when this is the case--to love Him is to loathe the sin for which He sacrificed Himself to atone the consequence. And yet He forgives.

And even those who don't come, contrite, He is long-suffering toward primarily.
Rain falling upon the just and the unjust, even as the sun shines on both.

We humans aren't nearly so merciful.

All the more dire and grievous when those we love, whom He loves, wander. We must pray for one another. And speak loving words of truth to one another, prayerfully seeking reconciliation with truth. Even as, all the while, our utmost allegiance is to Christ--so, too, do we love those whom He loves.

Yet honoring God, first.

I am piecing through some things which are very grievous and trying, still, and may write openly. He will guide and guard, surely, as I continue to press on toward Christ Himself. Yet these are matters which have been wrestled with deeply and painfully for the past few years.