Church of the Holy City

The Mighty Force of Mercy

The Mighty Force of Mercy
Rev. Dr. David J. Fekete
May 17, 2009

1 Kings 8:31-40 Matthew 18:21-35

We work so hard to achieve what we have in life; and we can, at times, struggle so painfully against some of our defects, that we can be tempted to think we deserve the good things we get. Or, still, we may pride ourselves on the fact that we have attained our achievements by our own hands. There is a common phrase about being a “self-made man.” And along these lines we don’t want to be beholden to anyone, but stand on our own two feet.
We don’t want a hand out. We want to earn our keep. We want no one’s pity. But these are all sad myths. And they are the kind of myth that will drag us down into even more misery. In spiritual things, this mindset is dangerous.
The fact is, everything we have is given to us. It is a gift of God, and a gift we haven’t earned. The good things we enjoy are given by God out of pure mercy. The illusion is that we are the agents of our own destiny. The illusion is that we are the sources of our happiness. The illusion is that the very life we have is our own. And when we’re feeling good, when we’re pleased with some kind of spiritual advancement we’ve made, we may not want to thank God for it. We may want to enjoy ourselves without realizing that God gave us the happiness we have. The God gives us the very life we have.
And that idea—the idea that we do it all ourselves—the idea that we have attained the good things we have by our own hand—that idea will be the very thing that drags us down into more misery. That idea of self needs to be broken. We need to know and acknowledge from the heart that we have no power to lift ourselves out of the mire of selfishness and greed. We have no power to give ourselves the happy things of mutual love. All the things that make us truly happy, all the joys of love, all heavenly happiness that we feel here on earth, are pure, unmerited gifts. And when we don’t acknowledge that, we lead ourselves into temptation.
In all temptation there is a state of doubt concerning the presence and mercy of the Lord, and concerning salvation, and such things; for those who are in temptation are in interior anxiety, even to despair; in which they are for the most part kept, to the end that they may be at length confirmed in this, that all things are of the Lord’s mercy, that they are saved by Him alone, and that with themselves there is nothing but evil; respecting which they are confirmed through combats in which they overcome (AC 2334).
Now this is a hard teaching to hear. It is hard because no one likes to hear about their own evil. No one likes to hear about our natural tendencies to the lusts of ego and greed. And no one wants to admit that it is God alone who lifts us out of the hell we would make for ourselves without His help.
But it is through temptations that our ego is deflated. When we find ourselves in a state of misery brought on by our own evil desires—and there is none of us who doesn’t have them—we fall to our knees and ask for God’s help and mercy. It is not that God wants us to feel misery—that is our own doing. But without God, we would be left with the anxieties of our selfishness and greed and the frustrations we feel when the world doesn’t go according to the way we want it.
All right. I’ve said the bad part. Now comes the good part. There is no sunrise without the darkness of night. The fact is, God is all love, all mercy, and all forgiveness. God wants us to be happy. God wants to give us happiness as a gift. Like all lovers, God wants to give us all He has—and God is infinite love and infinite wisdom and to the extent that we are open, we have no bounds as to the depth of joy we can receive from God.
Jehovah, or the Lord’s internal, was the very Celestial of Love, that is, Love itself, to which no other attributes are fitting than those of pure Love, thus of pure Mercy toward the whole human race; which is such that it wishes to save all and make them happy for ever, and to bestow on them all that it has; thus out of pure mercy to draw all who are willing to follow, to heaven, that is, to itself, by the strong force of love (AC 1735).
Let me emphasize those last phrases. God wants to make us all happy for ever; to bestow all that He has on us, and to draw us all into heaven. I really like the last line—by the strong force of love. Swedenborg makes another reference to how powerful God’s love is when he says, “From the mercy of the Lord [we are] withheld from evil, and kept in good; and this with a mighty force” (AC 7206).
All we have to do is to let this happen. And in order to let this happen, we need to realize that this is God’s mighty force, not our own. And when we are feeling good and happy, we need only give God thanks for it.
Yet when we are most in need of God, we most think we can save ourselves unaided. I once knew a man in Florida. As was common for me, I found myself in a religious conversation in the cigar parlor I used to hang out at. I said that everyone, everywhere, could be saved if they are doing the best they know. That remark really set off this guy. He was drunk, and I try to get away from drunks, especially when religion is brought up. But he demanded over and over, “Why do I need to be saved?” This man was very successful and rich, and was driven around in a limousine because his driving privileges were revoked. I got to know him in a little while. One night, when I was riding around in his limo, he was in a fit of desperation, “I’m done. If you can’t tell me why, I won’t be alive tomorrow.” Then he recanted. He said, “No, that’s not fair to you.” This is the man who asked me why he needed to be saved. I’m happy to say that he later joined AA, and even accepted the spirituality of the program.
But it takes such states of grief and despair to break that illusion that we do it all ourselves. And the real kicker here, is that we do indeed have a responsibility in this process. God gives us heavenly joy out of pure love and mercy, but we have to respond to God’s call and live a Godly life.
Divine mercy is pure mercy toward the whole human race to save it, and it is likewise with every person, and never recedes from any one; so that whoever can be saved, is saved. And yet no one can be saved but by Divine means, which are revealed by the Lord in the Word. Divine means are what are called Divine truths; these teach in what manner man is to live in order that he may be saved; . . . So far therefore as a person abstains from evil, so far the Lord out of pure mercy leads him by His Divine means, and this from infancy to the end of his life in the world, and afterward to eternity (HH 522).
Our part is to clean the inside of the cup, as Jesus tells us in Matthew 23:25-26,
“Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You clean the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. Blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and dish, and then the outside also will be clean.”
This process is called reformation in Swedenborg and as we heard just above, it begins in infancy and proceeds to the end of our life in this world, and then, he goes on to say, afterward to eternity. Not only does this reformation process go on into eternity, it can happen in the next life if it hasn’t happened here. I found a really interesting quote in Swedenborg as I was preparing for this talk. It is in a passage about the despair a person goes through in temptation. It goes as follows:
That they who are being reformed are reduced into ignorance of truth or into desolation, even to grief and despair, and that they then first have comfort . . . They who are such that they can be reformed, if not in the life of the body, yet in the other life are led into this state of reformation . . . and are at length taken away into heaven, where they are instructed among angels as it were anew in the goods and truths of faith (AC 2694).
So reformation can happen in the next life even if it hasn’t happened here. This makes me think of those unfortunates I see who it looks like they haven’t gotten a fair break. They come from abusive parents, or drug abusers, and they follow the circle of dysfunction in their own life. They don’t seem to have been given a fair start in life, and seem to have no one to fall back on. I think of these cases in relation to this passage from Swedenborg. Perhaps these are the ones who are reformed in the next life, taken up into heaven, and instructed anew by angels.
How much misery and grief we go through ultimately depends on how tough a case we are. How much is it going to take to break that ego that tells us we made ourself in our own image? What is it going to take to realize that every good thing we have is a gift, from a God who loves us immeasurably. How much will it take us to be genuinely thankful at heart, and humble. I think the blues musician Roy Buchanan has some fitting words to conclude this talk,
Thank you God, saw your sun rise today
Bless you God, got to see my little children play
It may not be the right way to pray
But I want to thank you anyway
Thank you God