Number nine, imagine this if you can. A man graduates high school or a woman, goes to pre-med, takes a four-year college course in pre-med and gets his doctor's degree, serves out his residency, and he's now thoroughly prepared to begin a practice of medicine.

And so he goes to a town and rents a building, hangs out his shingle and begins seeing patients, sick people, and begins administering medicine to them. and they begin getting well. Anytime you go into his office, you find the waiting room full of sick people. Or if you see him get in his car and drive to some other location in town and go in someone's house, you find out he's gone to the house of a sick person. Now imagine that setting if you can, and then imagine that he gets a visit from the advisory board of the American Medical Association.

And they come to his house and they say, Dr. So-and-so, we have received reports that you've been associating with sick people. And before we took any action against you for that, we wanted to make sure it was true. And so Dr. So-and-so says, yes, daily I'm in contact with sick people. Some of them very sick. Some of them sick unto death with highly contagious diseases. And so the advisory board of the American Medical Association says, well, doctor so-and-so, we just can't understand that.

We thought with your expert training in matters of medicine and good health, you would realize how foolish it is to come in close contact with those that have diseases. After all, you might catch something. We think that rather than visiting the sick, and opening your office in order to heal the sick, you rather should spend your time lauding and applauding those who through good healthy practices have maintained good health. You shouldn't associate with sick people.

You're a doctor. Now isn't that absolutely absurd? If you ever heard of that, would that not just You'd say, well, I can't believe that happened. That's the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard in my life, that a doctor would be rebuked for associating with sick people.

Verse 9, Matthew 9. As Jesus went on from there, He saw a man named Matthew sitting at the tax collector's booth. Follow me, He told him. And Matthew got up and followed him. While Jesus was having dinner at Matthew's house, many tax collectors and sinners came and ate with him and his disciples. When the Pharisees saw this, they asked his disciples, why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners? On hearing this, Jesus said, it's not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick.

But go and learn what this means. I desire mercy, not sacrifice. For I've not come to call righteous, but sinners. As ridiculous as my little story about the doctor and the American Medical Association may sound, That's exactly the mentality most people have with regard to Christ, the gospel, and sinners. It's not for bad people. Christ didn't come here for bad people.

And if you're one of Christ's people, you won't associate with bad people, because after all, you ought to be applauding and lauding those who are good people. Religion makes fools out of those who'd otherwise be wise. Now think of it. I don't know of anybody that appears more stupid than religious people because of the awfully ridiculous things they believe. For instance, that Christ came for good people. If they're good, he wouldn't have had to come. Religion also makes Men despise good for its very goodness.

So what do you mean by that? Well, they despised our Lord for doing the very thing that profits us, that makes Him so good to us. I think we need to turn down this a little bit. The very thing about our Lord which makes Him our Redeemer, The very thing about our Lord which gives us hope, even confidence in approaching God and finding salvation is the very thing for which religious men despised and hated Him. You see, religion makes people hate good things for the very goodness.

Look at Luke chapter 15. I'll show you what I mean. The very aspect of our Savior which makes him good for us sinners, is the very thing which religion hates him most for. Verse 1, Luke 15. Now the tax collectors and sinners were all gathering around to hear him. But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law muttered, this man welcomes sinners and eats with them. Did you ever hear such a thing? If this man were a prophet, he'd know what kind of woman this was and he wouldn't let her touch him.

What? Go to Zacchaeus' house? Why, there's many fine homes in this town in which live many fine religious people. Why is Jesus going to the house of a sinner? They hate goodness for goodness sake. I'll tell you. Our only hope, our only hope, Fred, is that God receives sinners, that Christ receives sinners and eats with them. If He doesn't, you and I and everybody else is dead. Isn't that true?

They do the same thing to God's preachers. It's interesting to hear the kind of insults gospel preachers get. A lady attended Scott Richardson's church in Fairmont, West Virginia, several weeks, maybe even a few months. One day, she finally came over to the office indignant. She says, Reverend Richardson, I've been going to your church for three months, and you haven't preached anything but Christ since I've been here.

He said, well, thank you. I appreciate that. That's a seal of my ministry. I'm preaching Christ. But you see, that woman thought that was an insult. A lady that listens to Pastor Mahan on the TV wrote him a letter one time. Hot, bad. She wrote, you make an idol out of Christ. He said, you better believe I do. You better believe I do. He's my God. He's everything.

But you see, that's the foolishness of the natural mind when it comes to religious things. The very best of things are that which they despise the most. That which can be their eternal life is that which they quickly throw away. The very character of Christ, which is their hope of eternal salvation, is the aspect of Christ which they despise most of all. He associates with low lives. He receives the offscouring of the world.

He takes the things which are not to confound the things which are. He chooses the foolish to confound the wise and the weak to defeat the strong. Well, the Lord's answer to these men and their charge was simple and to the point. He pointed out the absurdity of their thoughts.

He said, it's not the healthy that need a doctor. If God's come to be a Savior, what's the use of Him hanging around righteous people? There weren't any righteous people, but He was talking to them according to their own confession. They thought they were righteous. He said, I didn't come here to call righteous people. I came here to call sinners. And he told them something which probably insulted them down to their very shoes, struck at their very pride, the very heart of their pride.

He said, you go and learn something. Go and learn what this means. I do not desire sacrifice, but mercy. The first observation I want to make is this. No matter how much religious training people have, they have need of learning. They have need of learning.

We live in a time, and I suppose it's been true to a greater or lesser degree throughout history, we live in a time when we think that understanding of God comes through education. If we'll just teach enough, if we'll just catechize enough, if we'll just have enough programs, if we'll just have enough schools, if we'll just go to seminary long enough, we'll learn the truth. It ought to open our eyes to realize that of the 12 apostles, Only one of them went to seminary and he says he threw away everything he learned there. But see, we think that the accumulation of Bible facts is actually spiritual learning. It's not. It's not. The Pharisees were experts in Bible facts. They searched the Scriptures from cover to cover. They knew them better than anyone else.

If you stood among a group of Pharisees and quoted some obscure portion of Scripture, but left one jot or one tittle out, a Pharisee would be able to tell you where he's wrong. According to my understanding of it, at least a modern day Converted Pharisee, I heard speak. He said a Pharisee had to memorize, commit to memory the entire Old Testament. And they had it by memory. They knew the Bible so well, you could go over there to Genesis 5, I believe it is, and start reciting that genealogy with all the Andy dides in there and everything. And if you got any point of it wrong, if you pronounced anyone's name wrong, they could tell you. They knew their Bible. And Christ said to them, you go and learn. Go and learn. It doesn't matter how much religious knowledge you and I have. There's some things we need to learn. Note to whom it was that our Lord said this. Pharisees, the most educated and dedicated people in Israel. Most religious people in Israel. Pharisees studied hard and long. They counted the scriptures to be life themselves. That's why the Lord said to them, you search the scriptures for in them you think you have life. And they did search them. They say, give the devil his due. Well, give the Pharisees their due.

They did study and they knew their Bibles. They were also conservative. These weren't the old Sadducees that didn't believe in a resurrection. that tried to mix Greek philosophy with Bible truth. No, these were the verbal plenary inspiration believers. These were the conservatives.

These were the ones who said, God has spoken and we must believe what God has spoken. Just take Him at His Word. I put in a bulletin that little thing by Thomas Akimpas where he says that God did not write the Word for our opinion but for our obedience and belief. Pharisees believed that. That was a tenet of Phariseeism. Pharisees, you know what their word meant?

What their name meant? It meant separated. These were the separated people, the unworldly people, according to their own definition. These were the ones who touch not, taste not, and handle not. These are the ones who got more rules than you can shake a stick at, and they never do anything wrong outwardly. These were. exactly what religion today would call the best of people. In fact, here's an amazing thing about Pharisees that many grace people don't know. They were charitable folk. They believed in charity. They believed in taking care of the poor and they had instituted programs to do that. Institutions. Because after all, it's written in the law. And they did everything written in the law.

In fact, a Pharisee wasn't hard to get along with, as long as you didn't mention Christ. The Pharisees were profitable citizens until Christ came on the scene. The Pharisees were relatively nice people until Christ came on the scene. And you know, that's what you'll find out. about good religious people. They're fine folks, good to know, good to do business with, until Christ comes on the scene. Those Pharisees gave you a hundred cents on the dollar, maybe some more. Those Pharisees did honest business. Those Pharisees did everything right, and they were relatively kind. But when Christ came, they became vicious.

All you have to do is go among a group of religious people and you'll get along with them fine until you preach Christ. Until you do like Christ said and say, go and learn something. Go and learn what this means. Now, how could those who knew so much be so wrong? How could those Pharisees, and I spent a little time trying to convince you how good these people were. Humanly speaking, they were great folks. And they knew a lot. Scholars. How could those who knew so much be so wrong? Their whole religion was wrong because they were in error about the nature and the ways of God.

You see, they were right in the jots and the tittles. They were right in the dotted I's and the cross T's. The little points and minor strokes of a pen. But they're so busy with the jots and tittles, they never read the words. Or they were so busy with the words, they never saw the person.

They didn't know what God was like. They knew what God demanded, but they didn't know what God was like. They knew God's rules, but they didn't know God's ways. They knew God's commands, but they didn't know anything about God's grace. They didn't know God. Jeremiah said, don't let the strong man glory in his strength. Don't let the mighty man glory in his influence. Don't let the wise man glory in his wisdom. But if any man glories, let him glory in this.

He knows me. He knows me. I know lots of people who know the Bible. Some of them know God. These Pharisees knew the Bible, they didn't know God. And that was the difference between life and death. Didn't know God. The knowledge of God is where everybody's wrong. I don't care what error you find in religion, it has at its root error regarding the person of God.

Now, we need to quit talking about them and start talking about us. We got to be careful. This is some of that self-righteousness we need to avoid. We need to make sure that we aren't railing on the Pharisees while we're Pharisees ourselves. Too often we rail on those who are wrong and never apply the principle to us. So let's apply this to us. Are we wrong about God?

Every attitude of self-righteousness. Now think about this. Every attitude of self-righteousness, every legal fear, every hesitation to approach God through Christ, Every useless ceremony and rule comes from a misunderstanding of this principle which Christ told these Pharisees to go learn. And you and I are guilty too. Because if we understood this principle perfectly, we'd never fear. We'd never be tied up with useless rules. We'd never be burdened with useless ceremonies. We wouldn't be getting all upset at each other. No, we wouldn't.

All our problems, stemmed from a misunderstanding of this character of God. You got afraid. Well, that means you forgot. See, believers have trouble with this too. We get afraid. You know why we get afraid? We get afraid because we forget that God desires mercy and not sacrifice. We get worried about someone else's censure. We get worried about what someone else thinks of us. You know why? Because we forget that God desires mercy, not sacrifice. We get worried about our failures as though they'll separate us from Christ. You know why? Because we forget that God desires mercy, not sacrifice.

What I'm saying is this. And I don't know if I can communicate all of this to you, but the gospel is a radical departure from everything you and I naturally believe about God. Now, I'm putting the word naturally in there. Some of us have learned the gospel. I hope a lot of us have. And if we've learned the gospel, we've learned some of these radical departures.

What I'm saying is, is that natural understanding of God, those feelings about God that are common to all humanity and which are natural to us and which are still in there even though we're converted. The gospel is a radical departure from every one of them.

Nothing you can know about God naturally is right. Now we can know naturally that He's the Creator, but we truly don't understand His creatorhood. We know He's holy from nature, but now we don't understand His holiness, not naturally. And most of all, we don't understand naturally how to approach God. And we don't understand what pleases God and what He likes, not naturally.

I'm saying this, you can take all your natural thoughts about God, add to that all your natural expectations regarding salvation. It might do you well to do that. Just sit down and say, well, now, how do I think God's gonna do things? And you just mull that over in your mind a while, and you think it all up, and you get that whole system set before you, and then you do a 180-degree turn, and you'll see the gospel, because it's exactly opposite of what you and I think it is. That is.

It's exactly the opposite of what Bible scholars think it is. Because the Pharisees were Bible scholars. And they're exactly the opposite from the gospel. It's exactly the opposite of what most seminary-trained preachers say it is. And it's the exact opposite of what the natural heart tells you it is. It's radical. It's different. And it's different in a good way.

But Isaiah 55.8, now let's read that.

Isaiah 55.8. For my thoughts, here's God speaking, He's speaking to men.

He says, my thoughts are not your thoughts. Neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord. So whatever you think naturally, it's wrong. It's not God's thoughts. He's already told us that. He says, As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts. Now, in what way are they higher? In what way are they different?

Well, let's look back up at verse 6. Seek the Lord while he may be found. Call on him while he's near. Let the wicked forsake his way. What way is he talking about? His own way of life. That is his own way to eternal life. The way he thinks he can gain eternal life.

Everybody on this earth thinks he's working for heaven. I don't know anybody that really thinks they're going to hell. I know some people like to say they believe that. But the only one who ever said, I actually believe that I'm going to hell is someone whom God was going to save shortly thereafter.

No, he's wicked, forsake his ways. He's wicked, doesn't know he's wicked. He thinks he's right. Let him forsake his way. The evil man, his thoughts. What thoughts? Well, his thoughts about how good he is. His thoughts about how much he's pleased God.

Let him forsake those things. Let him turn to Jehovah and Jehovah will have mercy on him and to our God for he'll freely pardon. I'm telling you, that's what's radically different. You and I, we're sovereign grace people. We claim to believe the grace of God. But I'm convinced of this, you and I haven't yet scratched the surface of how gracious God is. We're still holding back. He says, I'll freely pardon. I'll freely pardon.

And you see, that's what the radical difference is. Those Pharisees, now they were the, I suppose, the very pinnacle of this self-righteous attitude, but they were approaching God through works. They said God's holy, the only way we can approach Him is to be good, so they're trying to be good. But the truth of the matter is, the way to approach God is to give up on being good. to abandon your own attempts at self-righteousness, to forsake your way of eternal life, to give up your thoughts of your own righteousness and turn to the Lord, seeking Him, and He'll freely pardon you without one bit of work out of you. And I'm confident of this, that's 180 degree difference from what's preached in religion. And I'll have to admit this, It's 180 degrees off what I often feel.

Because if I believed that as loud as I just preached it, I'd never fear anything. I'd never worry about my sin. I'd grieve over it, but never worry about it. See what I mean? I'm telling you, this thing of grace is, you cannot talk about grace, you cannot outgrace God. You can't talk about His grace bigger than how He's going to exercise it in the hearts of His people. Now, I know that He's not going to be gracious to everybody, but I know this, those to whom He is gracious, He's gracious far above their ability to understand or even conceive.

Now, is that true? Proverbs 14, 12 says this. Now, here's another one. that natural religion is 180 degrees from the gospel. In Proverbs 14, 12, it says, there is a way that seems right to a man. And there is. All of us had one. Or all of us had several. We thought we had it figured out. Seemed right to us. Seemed a good idea to us.

Not talking about the way of immorality, no. The Proverbs is saying there's a way that seems right to a man, a way to approach God, a way to come to God, a way to attain eternal life. There's a way that seems right to a man, but it leads to death. It seems right, but it's dead wrong. Now, if the way that seems right to us leads to death, that tells me then that the way to life must be exactly opposite of what I think. And that's what the Lord was telling the Pharisees.

He said, you've got a lot of Bible knowledge. You've got a lot of Bible facts. You're searching the scriptures from end to end. But the truth of God is exactly the opposite of what you're teaching and what you're believing. And the area in which these Pharisees were wrong is the same area in which you and I fail, and it's the grace of God. If God's more gracious than you and I can possibly imagine, then we do ourselves a great disservice when we short God on His grace. And I can't understand why we do it. I guess it just shows that there is yet inward depravity in our soul because it's not like God's hid the fact.

It's not like He's just gave scant attention to His grace in the Scriptures, but He has put it in bright lights And he sent preachers all over the world to tell us about it. He told his apostles to write it down. For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, how that though you were rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, that through his poverty you might be made rich. How clear can you get that it was the very intention of Christ when He emptied Himself of His glory and vacated heaven with all its riches and came down here in the form of a servant being made the likeness of sinful flesh.

And He bore our sins on the tree and we try to measure the distance from the glories of heaven to the very depths of judgment which Christ went. And that's the measure of His grace. And we still bring it down to this small. We still think He's going to get mad at us for our sins when He's shown us such grace in His Son. Or He tells His Apostle Paul, He says, pen these words, that the law was given that the trespass might abound and increase. But where sin abounded, grace did much more abound. And we still believe that we somehow or another out-sin God's grace. Why can't we just believe God? Why can't we just believe the gospel?

Well, what did he tell these Pharisees? He said, go learn. He told them to go. I like that. Our Lord didn't say, well, now, let's have a meeting a little here later and we'll discuss this. He said, you go and learn. There's a time to quit talking to people, you know that? There's a time to leave them alone with the Word of God. I used to try to argue with people about the sovereignty of grace. God's sovereignty and salvation, you know. Taking this verse, and I'd argue with them logically, you know, and if this is so, this is so, finally you just learn, eventually you say, well now, you go and learn what this means, and you give them a portion of Scripture. A lady came, Ralph Barnard preached one time, in his inimitable style, which is pretty rough. He was shaking hands at the back door and some lady come up and he said, Reverend Bernard, what about? He said, hold on a minute. Hold on a minute.

We'll take care of your whatabouts when you're done taking care of my whatabouts. He says, I gave you a lot of scripture when I was preaching. You go and learn what they mean. And when you've got that figured out, we'll talk about your whatabouts. And I came here preaching. I got lots of whatabouts. I got lots of questions. I answered some of them. But I said, before we bother with that, go learn what this means. I desire mercy, not sacrifice.

And the interesting thing is, everybody that learned what that meant didn't have any more questions. All their whatabouts disappeared. Well, what about election? Wait a minute. You go learn what this means. Mercy, not sacrifice. Well, what about the Sabbath? Wait a minute. Go learn what this means. I desire mercy, not sacrifice. Well, what about practical godliness? Wait a minute. Go learn what this means. I desire mercy, not sacrifice. What about the law? Wait a minute. Go learn what this means first. I desire mercy, not sacrifice. Anybody ever learned that? Never asked me, what about the law again? Anybody ever learned that? Never said, what about the Sabbath again?

It seemed they figured it out. He said, now go learn this. You go, and when you understand what this is, we'll move from that point after that. But you get a handle on this. What does this mean? Now, what did he tell them to go learn? First of all, it was something very simple. And I'm confident of this. that what men are wrong on in the gospel is not some intricate point of theology, it's something very simple. Very simple. He told those Pharisees, here's what I want you to go learn.

You go learn what this means. He says, I desire mercy, not sacrifice. I, who's I? Who said this? Well, God said this. Hosea 6, verse 6. He said, I desire mercy, not sacrifice. Our Lord quoted the words of God. We're talking about God here. We need to know God's nature. You see, that's where our hope lies. So my hope is in the person and work of Christ. That's true. My hope is in the gospel. That's true. It is.

But you know why? Because His Son and His Son's work are just an expression of God's nature. And I'm not gonna understand who Christ is or what he did or why he even bothered to do it unless I begin to understand something of God's nature. Look at Psalm 130. I wanna show you something here.

Now, doctrine's good and we need it. The Bible says, take heed to your doctrine. But our hope's not in doctrine. Doctrine is a means to an end. Doctrine is simply a means to understand some of the inner workings of how God accomplished the salvation of His people. But our hope isn't in doctrine.

Our hope is in the Lord and in His character. Now look, Psalm 130 verse 7, O Israel, put your hope in the Lord. Why? Because with the Lord is unfailing love. What do we tap into for hope? Well, I could say, well, I tap into the particular redemptive work of Christ. Yes, I do. That's where my hope is. But why was there any redemptive work of Christ? Because of the unfailing love of God. That's why.

He'd send us to hell lock, stock, and barrel if He didn't love us. Wouldn't He? You would. You and I would. If we're God, we'd send the rest of us to hell. Heard a preacher preaching one time and he talked about, he said, do you think I'd let somebody take my son? And he went on and described the crucifixion. He says, no, I wouldn't. Aren't you glad I'm not God? You better be glad I'm not God. And I'm awful glad you're not God. You see, I hope in God because with him there's unfailing love. unfailing love. It's God's Word too, it's not man's opinion.

Our Lord said, go learn what this means. He said, you see those Pharisees, they not only read the Bible, they read all the commentators, all the Everybody's opinion about what the Bible said. We need to be done with this and that man's opinion of the Bible as though it carries any authority. Once in a while I quote fellows, but that's because they say it in a nice and interesting way that might stick in our minds.

I tell you, Spurgeon's got no authority. He doesn't. He's just a preacher. He's a sinner whom God saved and gave his gospel. Henry Mahan's got no authority. He just says, preaches the gospel well. When he's preaching the gospel, he's got the authority of God, but he has no authority in himself, and neither do I. And our Lord didn't say, now you go read what Rabbi so-and-so said about this issue.

He said, you go find out what God said, you learn what God said. He said, I, we're talking about God now, desire. We're talking about what God delights in. Now everybody in the world knows you need to please God. The question is, how you gonna do it? That's the big issue of religion. Now here, God is going to tell us what He desires, what He wants. What is it God wants? What's He want from you? Well, He tells us in pretty plain words.

And I'm going to start at the end because I want to tell you what He doesn't want first. He doesn't want sacrifice. Not from you, He doesn't. People think they've got to give up something to be saved. God's not asking you to sacrifice anything. Not in the sense we normally think of sacrifice. He's not asking religious activity out of you. In fact, in its context in Hosea chapter 6, that's what the Lord's talking about.

He's rebuking the Israelites. He says, you're being very religious. You're offering all the sacrifices, but you're being mean. You're being mean and you're not seeking me and you're not treating your neighbor right. He says, I'm not interested in all your sacrifices. I'm interested in mercy.

That's what he told him in Isaiah too. He said, who asked you to trample my court with all these useless, vain sacrifices? In salvation, God doesn't ask us to get religious. In fact, if he asks us to sacrifice anything, he's telling us to sacrifice all our religious activities and give them up. I didn't want them in the first place.

You go on to church. Isn't that what we do? We think we got to give God a little something to excite him to save us. And so we get in a little trouble and get a little scared about dying and think, Lord, you get me through this one. You take me to heaven.

I'll raise my 10% to 12%. Well, Lord, I won't do anything on Sunday. I'll just sit on the couch and twiddle my thumbs if you'll save me. Well, Lord, I'll get up at five o'clock for my devotions. Or I won't get up at five, I'll get up at noon. I'm going to have devotions. Read that article I read about religious activity. Oh, how we try to bargain with God.

God said, I don't want any of it. I don't deal in that kind of currency. I don't take your visa and MasterCard, your spiritual money. He said in Isaiah, he said, come and buy. He said, oh boy, that sounds like religion coming by. He says, you that have no money. God won't accept anything for his salvation. He said, I don't desire sacrifice. I don't delight in it. It means nothing to me. Nothing.

If you're trying to please God with religious activity, all you're doing is making God more and more angry. and you're filling his courts with something he doesn't want. You're going out to the hog confinement and bringing in shovel loads and putting it in his living room and he doesn't want it. That too harsh? Not as harsh as God would make it.

That's what it is to God. Paul says, I count it all done. He says, and I count it that for that's exactly what it is. I don't desire sacrifice. What does He desire? What does God want from you and me? Or what attitude does He want expressed in us? Mercy. Mercy. He doesn't want us to come to Him on the basis of some sacrifice we've made. He wants us to come on the basis of His mercy.

He said, just believe me. Just see my Son and believe on Him and quit all your working. Quit filling my courts with stuff I don't want. Quit trying to pay in currency I won't receive. Just come and buy without money. Come and buy with the blood of my Son. Look at Micah chapter 7 real quick and that'll be the end. Here's all I've been trying to tell you for 45 minutes now. We can be done with works. We should have been a long time ago, but all of us still hang on to it.

I'm telling you that the gospel of God's grace is so free, it's so sure, it is so gracious that you can't begin to understand it. you can't begin to lay hold of just how free this thing really is. But it is really, truly, absolutely free. God doesn't require any works of us to gain it or any works of us to keep it. I'm not interested in sacrifices. That's not what delights me.

Look what He delights in. Micah 7 verse 18, Who is a God like you who pardons sin? and forgive the transgression of the remnant of his inheritance. You do not stay angry forever, but delight in showing mercy. We think God's delighted with how good of Christians we are.

He's not. He's not delighted with how often we go to church. He's not delighted that we can preach longer than other people can. He's not delighted that we can tolerate more church than other people do. He's not delighted with the fact that out of our hearts we give more than other people do. He's not delighted with how miserable we make ourselves on any particular day of the week.

He's delighted when he shows mercy to lost sinners. That's what delights God. Until you're ready to receive mercy, Plain old mercy. Mercy free and clear. God won't be delighted with you. One preacher wrote, I thought it was good. He said, God's hard to satisfy, but easy to please.