I want you to turn in your Bibles
this morning to the book of Exodus. I know the book of Exodus, as
well as all the Old Testament books, are regarded by some as little
more than just history, just good stories such as that. But when the Apostle Paul speaks
of this very people and what happened to them, he says, Now,
all these things happened unto them for examples, and they are written, they were recorded for our admonition
upon whom the ends of the world are come. They're written for
our instruction. And I want you to look with me
here in Exodus 34, and I'll begin reading in verse 1. And the Lord said unto Moses,
Hew thee two tables of stone like unto the first. If you remember,
the first were broken by Moses. He hurled them at the golden
calf. And I will write upon these tables
the words that were in the first tables, which thou breakest. And be ready in the morning,
and come up in the morning unto Mount Sinai, and present thyself
there to me in the top of the and no man shall come up with
thee, neither let any man be seen throughout all the mount,
neither let the flocks nor herds feed before that mount." and
he hewed two tables of stone like unto the first. And Moses
rose up early in the morning, and went up into Mount Sinai,
as the Lord had commanded him, and took in his hand the two
tables of stone. And the Lord descended in the
cloud, and stood with him there, and proclaimed the name of the
Lord. and the Lord passed by before
him, and proclaimed, The Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious,
long-suffering and abundant in goodness and truth, keeping mercy
for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, and
that will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity
of the fathers upon the children and upon the children's children
unto the third and to the fourth generation. And Moses made haste
and bowed his head toward the earth and worshipped. And he
said, If now I have found grace in thy sight, O Lord, let my
Lord, I pray thee, go among us, for it is a stiff-necked people,
and pardon our iniquity and our sin, and take us for thine inheritance. I have a question for all of
us this morning, for everyone that in the Lord's
providence He has brought here to hear this this morning, and for all who might hear it
wherever and by whatever means. And the question is simply this. Do you need God's mercy? Do you need God's mercy? This text, as well as this book,
has a lot to say about mercy. And there are two things in this
text that I begin by reminding you of, and the first is this. These Israelites had just been
guilty of violating the newly given law of God. And in this we surely have to
see that The law was not given by God as a means of obedience
to be accepted and blessed by God. You see, the truth is, as
He was giving it, they were breaking it. And Moses had just broken
the stones on the idol that they had raised up as God gave the
law on those tables of stone. And the second thing that I would
point out also is that Moses had just asked God to show him
His glory. So many people think they would
like to see and to know the glory of God. But when they hear about
it as it is manifested in the gospel, they have no interest
in it. If you look back in chapter 33
and verse 18, Moses had just said to God, I beseech Thee,
show me Thy glory. Every time I read that, I can't
help but think about what Moses had already seen. He'd seen one miracle after the
other. He'd seen the Red Sea parted. He'd seen all kinds of divine
manifestations and miracles. And yet he is still asking God
to show him, to make known to him his chief glory. And then God gives him these
instructions in chapter 34. And verse 5, if you look back,
it says, And the Lord descended in the cloud, and stood with
him there and proclaimed the name of the Lord. He came there possibly in what
is called the Shekinah glory, or maybe and most likely in some
visible form which may well have been the pre-incarnate Christ. because he stood with Moses and
proclaimed the name of the Lord. He proclaimed the name by which
he would have himself known. He is the Lord. He is that I Am that is I Am the all-sufficient and self-sufficient
God. And so, the name has to do with
the renown of God. What He would have Himself known
for, what He would be shown among men to be famous for, and now
He makes Himself known in His glory and in His mercy. How could it ever be that God,
in response to what Moses had just asked, and in light of what
this people had just done and were then doing, would He make
Himself known as the Lord the God that is, and the God that
shows mercy. And he gives these words as a
preface for his giving of this second set of stone. And he makes known that he pardons
merely out of his own good pleasure not for their merit's sake, but
because of his own inclination to show mercy to whom he will. And this also, that his mercy
is not to Israel alone, but he extends it to a multitude of
such sinners. He says, I am a God of mercy. And He is as merciful so as to
keep mercy for thousands. That was the highest known expression
of numbers in that day. He keeps mercy for thousands. As a matter of fact, Time and
time again in this book, we read that His mercy endures forever. It says that He is plenteous
in mercy. It speaks of His tender mercy. Let me read you just a few verses,
especially in the psalm. He says, the Lord is merciful
and gracious, slow to anger and plenteous in mercy. And when I think about it, when
you seek to preach the gospel, In our day, men and women view
the gospel that we preach as being just exactly the opposite. It is to them a very unmerciful,
ungracious view of God. But the Bible says that the Lord
is merciful and gracious. It says, for as the heaven is
high above the earth, so great is His mercy toward them that
fear Him. The psalmist says, the Lord is
gracious, full of compassion, slow to anger, and of great mercy. But mercy is not what we think
mercy is. Mercy is what God not only says
that it is, but mercy is how God demonstrates it. Because to the Lord, our God,
belong mercies and forgiveness, though we have rebelled against
Him." Now, there are a few things that
I want us to consider this morning. And the first one is simply this. What is mercy? How many times have we read it?
How many times have we spoken it? How many times have we so
lightly and irreverently said things such as we hear every
day, Lord, have mercy on me. But do we really need the mercy
of God? What is mercy? Well, the word
itself means something like this. to have compassion on. And maybe it causes a little
bit of rub in another definition of it. It also means to have
pity on and to pity. And I know how proud that we
are by nature. We are so quick to express such
things that we don't want anybody's pity. But do we want the Lord's
mercy? In Deuteronomy it says, and when
the Lord thy God shall deliver them, that is the Canaanites
is who he was talking about, when he shall deliver them, the
Canaanites, before thee, thou shalt smite them and utterly
destroy them, thou shalt make no covenant with them, nor show
mercy unto them." That's what God commanded. It means to actively engage in
this compassion. It has to do with the kind treatment
of an enemy, or at least one who shows himself to be an enemy. Somebody said a long time ago,
and it's worthy of our being reminded, that mercy is for the
miserable. Mercy is God not giving us what
we deserve for our sins. Mercy takes away misery and love
confers salvation, somebody said. You see, mercy, as we are shown
here in this text, mercy is for lawbreakers. It's for those who show themselves
as rebels. It's for those who don't deserve
it in any way. It's to the unworthy. So if you
and I are found feeling ourselves in need of the mercy of God,
you see, it puts us in a certain place and in a certain standing
that we, by nature, we don't want to be in. But if God Almighty ever shows
us what we are, and the only way He can do that is by showing
us who He is, because it's in His light that we see light. And we cannot, in His light,
see ourselves in need of anything but God's mercy. Mercy cannot be bought in any
way. Mercy cannot be worked for in
any way. Mercy cannot be attained because
of something in us. Mercy cannot even be gotten because
we need it. It has to be freely given. And this is what Paul said of
his very self. Hold your place there and turn
to 1 Timothy. 1 Timothy in the first chapter,
and listen to what the Apostle Paul has to say. 1 Timothy chapter 1, and look down
at verse 13. He says concerning his own self. And he reveals to us that as
a moral man, as a religious man, as a well-respected man, as a
very highly taught and learned man, he still needed God's mercy. What did he say? Verse 13, he
said, I was before a blasphemer. and a persecutor and injurious,
but I obtained mercy. But I obtained mercy because
I did it ignorantly in unbelief, and the grace of our Lord was
exceeding abundant with faith and love which is in Christ Jesus,
this is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that
Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners of whom I am
chief. Howbeit for this cause I obtained
mercy." that in me first Jesus Christ
might show forth all longsuffering for a pattern to them which should
hereafter believe on him to life everlasting." How is it that
this man, who quite the contrary from the blatantly ungodly, immoral,
and very wicked people that we associate with needing mercy,
how was it that God was gracious to him and saved him? He says it two times there. He
said, I obtained mercy. I obtained mercy. And mercy is, as I said, it's
to have compassion on. God was compassionate on him,
and He's so compassionate on everyone He saves, He pities
everyone. As a matter of fact, He says
like a father pities his children. So the Lord pities us, and He
remembers. He knows our frame, and He remembers
that we're nothing but dust. All right? Here's the second
thing this morning. And that is, what is it, in light
of what Moses asked, what is it that is glorious about God's
mercy? I'll tell you this, it isn't
what most people think. You see, the glory of God's mercy
is the fact that it is sovereign mercy. Sovereign mercy. Now, I realize
that in our day, nobody wants to take any time to find out
about what anything means. As a matter of fact, people are
quite willing to let a bunch of hucksters and charlatans and
religious idiots stand up and define for them what precious
things of God really mean. Why is the glory of God sovereign
mercy? It is simply because it comes
from God as He wills to show it. You see, free will were a
reality, then mercy would have no glory at all. Turn back over
in Exodus 33 and look at that 19th verse that Moses records
for us as the answer to his question. Verse 18, he said, I beseech
thee, show me thy glory. And he said, I will make all
my goodness pass before thee, and I will proclaim the name
of the Lord before thee, and will be gracious to whom I will
be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy." Now, you think about that. This is given by God in response
to this question and request by Moses. But if it were written
for our admonition, those of us upon whom the ends of the
world shall come, it has to be that we might know something
about the mercy of God. And the glory of it is this.
He doesn't have to be merciful to anybody. He doesn't have to be merciful
to me. He doesn't have to be merciful
to my children. He doesn't have to be merciful
to any son or any daughter of Adam anywhere on this earth at
any time in themselves. He doesn't have to be merciful. But not only that. His glory
is that He says that He will. Do you see that? When somebody reads such a verse
as this, or when you try to show them that the mercy of God is
sovereign mercy, that He gives it to whom He will, He shows
it whenever He will. When you try to show that to
somebody, they view it as such a negative thing. You mean when
I can't get it by my free will, you mean that I can't do something
to merit? You mean that God is God and
He can just give it to me if He wants to or withhold it from
me? Oh, I don't want any part in
such of a message. That's the blindness of a sinner.
That's the ignorance. That's the stupidity of even
such a man as Saul of Tarsus. When the glory of it is, he said,
I will. He didn't say, I won't, but he
could. He can when he doesn't want to,
but he said, I will. I'll be gracious to whom I'll
be gracious. I'll have mercy on whom I'll
have mercy. And not only is it glorious in
its sovereignty like that, but it's also this, there isn't a
devil in hell, there isn't a person on this earth who can stand in
the face of God and say of you or say of me or anybody else,
he can't have mercy on them. He said, I'll have mercy on whom
I'll have mercy. Well, the devil comes like he
did to Job, and Job, he says, Job just, he just serves you
for what he can get out of you. Look at him. You just do a few
things to him and he'll curse you to your face and reject you
outright. You can't bless Job. You can't
bless Abraham who lied about Sarah, his wife, said to that
king that she was his sister. You can't bless a man like Saul
of Tarsus. You can't bless a man like Isaac
who lied, a man like Noah who got drunk. You can't bless somebody
like Jacob, a conniver. He said, I'll have mercy. on
whom I'll have mercy." And if we ever know anything
about God's mercy, we certainly have to learn this, that He's
not obligated to show mercy to anyone. And the fact that He
does is what makes His glorious mercy so glorious. And there
is no reason for Him to do so in us, but He acts. like God. You know, that's one of the great
things I love about God. He acts like God. He rules like God. He's not this effeminate, gray-headed,
long-bearded, quiet, individual who sits somewhere in a rocking
chair in heaven and doesn't interrupt or interfere in the affairs of
men. He acts like God. He says, I'll have mercy on that
sinner. There isn't anybody anything
in heaven or earth or under the earth that can stop him. And
it is not a wonder that he does not show mercy to all. It's a
wonder that he shows mercy to anybody. It's sovereign mercy. And all
that means is just exactly this. He is an absolute sovereign himself. And that simply means he's the
one who can do whatever he wants to whomever he wants, whenever
he wants, however he wants, and nobody can stop him. And the
mercy of God is such that he shows mercy to whom he
will. And not only that, it's glorious
in this, he says, it's a covenant mercy. He goes on to describe it in
chapter 34. He describes it as keeping mercy. In other words, mercy that was
purposed to those who were in the covenant head, the Lord Jesus
Christ. And you better find this out.
There is no mercy from God outside of Christ. There is no mercy from God. This covenant mercy cannot be
from God apart from the covenant head, Jesus Christ. In Isaiah 55, he says, Incline
your ears. And come near unto me, and hear,
and your soul shall live. And I will make an everlasting
covenant with you, even the sure mercies of David." What does that mean, the sure
mercies of David? Well, in light of what this book
says, there are two that this name David stands for. Number one, the one who's called
the son of David. David's son and David's Lord. That's the Lord Jesus Christ.
And before the world began, the mercies of God that were in him
given to the people of God, to the elect of God in Christ Jesus,
before the world began, he made them sure right then. But then David is also used in
the man David. who's a type of every sinner
also that God shows mercy to, his failures, his weakness, his
ignorance, his lapses of unbelief. And yet, he said, God has made with me,
He has made with me this everlasting covenant, and it's ordered in
all things, and sure, And it's all my salvation. It's all in the Lord Jesus Christ. And he goes on in that same book. He says, "...for the mountains
shall depart and the hills be removed, but my kindness shall
not depart from thee, neither shall the covenant of my peace
be removed, saith the Lord that hath mercy on thee." Somebody says, well, you don't
ever know what will come up. No, I don't. But I'm thankful
God does. As a matter of fact, I'm thankful
that God did. It's hard to imagine that sometimes,
that in my own wickedness, I can surprise myself. But I won't ever surprise God. Because this covenant of mercy
that he gave in the Lord Jesus Christ and demonstrated his absolute
sovereignty and in his own prerogative purpose to show mercy to whom
he willed and to show it in Christ. Look over in Luke's Gospel, chapter
1. Luke chapter 1, and listen to
what the Spirit of God moved Zacharias to say concerning Christ. Verse 68, Bless be the Lord God
of Israel. For he hath visited and redeemed
his people, and hath raised up an horn of salvation for us in
the house of his servant David, as he spake by the mouth of his
holy prophets, which have been since the world began, that we
should be saved from our enemies, and from the hand of all that
hate us, to perform the mercy promised to our fathers and to
remember his holy covenant. Now, what's he talking about
there? He's talking about that child that was to be born. The oath which he swore to our
father Abraham that he would grant unto us that we, being
delivered out of the hand of our enemies, might serve him
without fear in holiness and righteousness before him all
the days of our life. And thou, child, shalt be called
the prophet of the highest, for thou shalt go before the face
of the Lord to prepare his ways, to give knowledge of salvation
unto his people by the remission of their sins, through the tender
mercy of our God, whereby the day-spring from on high hath
visited us." What's the day-spring from on
high? What's the day-spring? That's the sun. But this one is the Son of Righteousness,
who the prophet says rises with healing in His wings. All right, here's the next thing.
Why is God's mercy only in Christ? You say, well, I just want God's
mercy. It's in Christ. But why is it
in Christ? Well, if you remember the occasion
on this in our text, God had given, and even after their failure,
gave them his law, just a reminder of who he is and what he requires,
and the fact that he remains so. Sinai and that law represent
the holiness of God, the justice of God, the righteousness of
God, all these things. But He showed by their obedience
to that law, they could never be saved. Verse 7 of Exodus 34 reminds
us that mercy never forgets this. What is that? That God will by
no means clear the guilty. Mercy will not be God just looking
at Christ even and saying, well, just because He's my Son, I'm
going to deal mercifully with all His people. It says He'll by no means clear
the guilty. And you see, we everyone are,
just like they were, guilty before God. We're guilty of sin against
Him. We're guilty of transgressing
His commandments. We're guilty of not loving Him
with all our heart. As a matter of fact, everything
we do of ourselves renders us guilty. And just like he says here, visiting
the iniquity of the fathers upon the children simply means that
it doesn't matter when or who they are, in every generation
he deals with them on the same strict principle. He will by no means clear the
guilty. The soul that sinneth shall surely
die. So the question is, how can God show mercy to us? And at the same time, deal with
us as guilty sinners in the only way he can, in strict,
inflexible justice. Somebody said, God's a God of
mercy. Amen and hallelujah. But it says God is a just God
as well as a Savior. Now, I won't say by any stretch
of the imagination that our just simply knowing that as a fact
and giving mental consent to us that that is in any way what
salvation is all about. But I will say this. How could
we ever know anything about God's mercy until we find out something
about how He can be merciful? Suppose I were to say to you,
well, you've got this $10 million debt. You come in here all worried
about it, all fretful about it, all bent out of shape and everything. And I just say to you, why don't
you just quit worrying about that? I'll take care of that. Would that give you any peace? You'd say, well, that's good
news, I guess, but how in the world will that preacher take
care of a $10 million debt? You see, God gives His people
peace and joy and confidence and hope in Christ and in that
mercy that's in Christ because the way He's merciful in Christ, is a way that not only saves
his people, makes them perfectly sinless and righteous, but also
honors himself and maintains his integrity as a just God. How can he show mercy? and deal
with us as this holy God, it is in Christ the substitute for
sinners. It's in Him who is called the
mercy. Now, I want you to listen to
this verse out of Psalm 85. He says, mercy and truth are
met together. Righteousness and peace have
kissed each other. Now, how can that be? If the truth is God is who He
is and we're sinners such as we are, how can mercy and that
truth kiss each other? How can righteousness, God doing
right in all things and dealing with our sin in that right and
just manner, how can righteousness and peace, our peace, kiss each
other? One old writer a long time ago
called this the kisses of the cross. because he does it in the dying
of Jesus Christ. You see, mercy had to be performed. The child was coming to perform
the mercy, to accomplish that death by which his people are
saved. And the sins of those who are
the objects of God's mercy Everyone was punished in the Lord Jesus
Christ. As a matter of fact, I can't
help but believe that this is the picture in Exodus 34. Because the second time that
Moses goes into the mount, God gives this strict instruction,
He said, Don't bring anybody with you. You come up into the
mount with these tables of stone, and you come there by yourself,
and I'll stand with you there." And Moses is a picture of the
one mediator between God and men the man Christ Jesus. And he didn't go up into Sinai,
he went up into Mount Calvary. And the Bible says that he by
himself purged our sin. How sin purged? How sin forgiven? He says, without the shedding
of blood, there is no remission. And Christ paid that price, suffered
that consequence of the sins of all His people. And the Bible
says He put them away. That man hanging on that center
cross outside of Jerusalem, by the name of Jesus of Nazareth. That's the mercy of God. That's God dealing justly with
the sins of His people, having laid all their iniquity on Christ,
and He has made sin for them, this one who knew no sin, in
order that they might be made the righteousness of God in him." That's mercy. That's unquestionable
mercy. That's sovereign mercy. That's the mercy of God. That's the mercy that is in Jesus
Christ. and Him crucified. And there
is no other mercy. He says, by mercy and truth,
iniquity is purged. When He bore our sins in His
own body on the tree, redeemed us from the curse of the law,
being made a curse for us, God forgives iniquity and transgressions
and sin because he imputed them to Christ. They became His, and He suffered
what they were due. is the righteousness of God to
every believing sinner. Now, here's the last thing, and
I'll hurry. When will a sinner seek mercy in Christ? I'm not talking about when will
he seek to find mercy somewhere. Or, when will he feel so bad
about his sin and guilt will wrap him up and he'll go join
somebody's church, get baptized in somebody's pool, or sprinkled
by somebody's water? Something like, I'm talking about,
when will a sinner seek Christ for mercy? Our Lord told these Pharisees, he said, what you need to do
is you need to go find out what it means when God said He'll have mercy
and not sacrifice. Let me read this to you, Matthew
9. And it came to pass, as Jesus
said it be in the house, Behold, many publicans and sinners came
and sat down with him and his disciples. And when the Pharisees
saw it, they said unto his disciples, Why eateth your master with publicans
and sinners? But when Jesus heard that, he
said unto them, They that behold need not a physician, but they
that are sick. But go ye and learn what it means,
I will have mercy and not sacrifice. For I am not come to call the
righteous, but sinners to repent." He said, you need to go and find
out. What it meant when God says,
I'll have mercy, not your sacrifice. Because they thought they had
something to offer God. You see, you'll call out to Christ
for mercy when you find out you don't have anything to offer
God. There isn't anybody else to go
to. You see, he said, the physician
is needed by the sick. My family accuses me of not wanting
to go to the doctor. But every now and then, I get
sick enough, feel bad enough, I'm ready to go. Why? Because of need. If you ever find out what a desperate
condition you're in, if you ever find out just what you really
are before God, if you ever find out how needy you are and how
much in need of His mercy you are, Number one, that's when you'll
cast all hope on Christ. And number two, it'll only be
then because He brought you to that position. When you're flat on your face
in the dust, when you're without strength in your whole being,
when you're vile, and filthy in your own eyes. And you call out with nothing,
knowing you deserve nothing. He said, I'll have mercy on you. I'll have mercy. You see, left
to ourselves, we don't see any need. Left to ourselves, we don't
see the mercy. Left to ourselves, we don't want
this mercy. But by God's mercy, there is a people who are brought
to feel and to know and to see and to understand not only their
needs, but the fact that Jesus Christ
is that mercy, and call upon Him. And everyone who's ever
called upon God for mercy, He shows mercy. That's why that old publican, He says he smote himself on the
breast and he was of such a state that he wouldn't even so much
as lift his eyes to heaven. But he's prayed, God, be merciful
to me a sinner. Many sorrows shall be to the
wicked. But he that trusteth in the Lord,
mercy shall compass him about." David received mercy from God. And he made a terrible mess,
just like we all do. He fell. He lied. But when you find him there in
Psalm 51, what's he doing? He's still crying. Lord, have
mercy upon me, O God, according to Thy lovingkindness, according
unto the multitude of Thy tender mercies, blot out my transgressions. Do you need God's mercy? It's in Christ and Him crucified. It's plenteous. And He has mercy on sinners. Our Father, this day we give
You thanks and praise for that mercy in Christ that
is beyond any ability to express. I pray this morning that you
would take your words, not my words about your word,
but your words, and give faith that we might
look and listen And believe what you've said. And not only call upon you for
mercy, but believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. Because we know you will have
mercy on all who are in him. We thank you and we pray that
you would watch over us as we depart out of this place. Bless
your gospel as it goes out wherever you've ordained it to be preached.
Bless your servants and people as you gather them to yourself. We give you all honor and glory
and praise. In Him. Amen. Amen.