There is one aspect of the character of Almighty God that should cause us to fall in love with Him. It is His mercy. Mercy means to receive forgiveness that one does not deserve. We all recognize that:

All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23).

The result of that sin is that we are separated from God, our Creator, which has eternal consequences if we do not recognize our need for mercy and avail ourselves of God’s offer:

For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord (Romans 6:23).

Without purposely attempting to disobey God, whenever we take our focus off of Him, and make our own decisions without Him, but using the best wisdom we can, we inadvertently partake in an act of disobedience. We know that our human wisdom is not the same as God’s wisdom. As God has told us:

For My thoughts are not your thoughts, and your ways are not My ways… For as heaven is higher than earth, so My ways are higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts (Isaiah 55:8-9).

Hence, any action based on our own understanding alone is an act of rebellion against our Creator. Disobedience requires repentance and a turning away from the attitude and action. However, there can be no reasonable expectation that the offending party should be forgiven. We can only truly understand mercy when we understand the perfect holiness of God. It is entirely up to the offended party to offer forgiveness for the offense. That is the mercy of God. Consider these appeals to God for mercy:

Lord, do not rebuke me in Your anger; do not discipline me in Your wrath (Psalm 6:1).

Lord, hear my prayer; listen to my plea for mercy (Psalm 86:6).

And then this acknowledgement of having received the requested mercy:

I love the Lord because He has heard my appeal for mercy (Psalm 116:1).

Understanding the need for mercy is not just for the religious or those who are powerless. It is also for those with responsibility for governing the population. The two requests for mercy above were expressed by a king, King David. In this case, it is a request for himself, personally, as an individual, as a private citizen. Do leaders need the capacity to receive mercy? There is the argument that the larger the authority and power, the more potential for damage resulting from errors in judgment. Hence, it is inevitable that the leader should understand the need for mercy.

We know that the mercy God extends is based upon the payment for our sins that He as Jesus Christ made with His sacrificial death and resurrection. One way for understanding God’s extending mercy is through an illustration I once was told. A small town had a judge whose son was brought before him for an offense. Being a just judge, he had to declare the son guilty and impose sentence, knowing that his son was unable to pay the penalty. Then, the judge took off his robe, stood beside his son and paid the fine for him. That exemplifies mercy as God has provided for us.

God’s promise is available to everyone, whether religious or non-religious, commoner or king:

“Return to Me, and I will return to you,” says the Lord of Hosts (Malachi 3:7).

Therefore, the Lord is waiting to show you mercy, and is rising up to show you compassion (Isaiah 30:18).

Hence, as leaders, we understand the need for mercy from God for ourselves in our personal capacity. It is necessary that we understand the need for mercy, and then that we be eager to receive mercy. I, in my own journey, like the Apostle Paul, initially rejected God’s mercy. Paul’s journey expresses my own:

…one who was formerly a blasphemer, a persecutor, and an arrogant man. But I received mercy because I acted out of ignorance in unbelief…. But I received mercy for this reason, so that in me, the worst of them, Christ Jesus might demonstrate His extraordinary patience as an example to those who would believe in Him for eternal life (1 Timothy 1:13,16).

Mercy is offered to us, but we must recognize our need for it and choose to receive it. In 1830, George Wilson was convicted of murder and robbery by a U.S. court, and sentenced to be hanged. Andrew Jackson, President of the United States, granted him a presidential pardon – a legal expression of mercy. Amazingly, Wilson rejected the pardon, and insisted that it was not a pardon unless he accepted it. The American legal system was young and relatively undeveloped so that the question was brought before the U.S. Supreme Court. The Chief Justice John Marshall wrote the following decision:

A pardon is a paper, the value of which depends upon its acceptance by the person implicated. It is hardly to be supposed that one under sentence of death would refuse to accept a pardon, but if it is refused, it is no pardon. George Wilson must hang.

George Wilson won his point. He rejected mercy and was hanged. My fear is that one of my friends would reject God’s offer of pardon — a pardon that would free us from an eternity of hell. That rejection would be extremely tragic.

This is a truth that needs to be applied personally. Let us apply this truth as King David did when he prayed:

Be gracious to me, God, according to Your faithful love; according to Your abundant compassion, blot out my rebellion.  Wash away my guilt and cleanse me from my sin. For I am conscious of my rebellion, and my sin is always before me. Against You—You alone—I have sinned and done this evil in Your sight. So You are right when You pass sentence; You are blameless when You judge (Psalm 51:1-4).

King David went on to describe the mercy he received from God:

The Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger and rich in faithful love…. He has not dealt with us as our sins deserve or repaid us according to our offenses. For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is His faithful love toward those who fear Him. As far as the east is from the west, so far has He removed our transgressions from us. As a father has compassion on his children, so the Lord has compassion on those who fear Him (Psalm 103:8-13).

Let us do as this king and stand in awe of God’s mercy and benefit from it.

The post The Statesman Stands in Awe of God’s Mercy appeared first on CENTRE FOR STATECRAFT.

One of the most powerful concepts in the life of the statesman is mercy. This begins with receiving mercy. Understanding mercy entails understanding that we have forgiveness available to us that we do not automatically deserve. The most important mercy we will ever receive is from the God of the Universe when we recognize that we have offended the perfectly holy King of the Universe, that we have offended Him and deserve judgment, yet that He has offered us forgiveness through dependence upon Jesus. Once we have received this mercy, we become overwhelmed with the significance of this mercy. We are reminded:

How joyful are those whose lawless acts are forgiven and whose sins are covered! (Romans 4:7)

Based upon that recognition, we realize that we are called upon to exercise mercy among our fellow humans. Our Lord has taught us that we are to:

Forgive one another if anyone has a complaint against another. Just as the Lord has forgiven you, so you must also forgive. (Colossians 3:13-14).

This presents a special challenge to the statesman, whom God defined through King David:

The one who rules the people with justice, who rules in the fear of God (2 Samuel 23:3).

And yet, King David also recognized:

How joyful is the one whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered! (Psalm 32:1)

The recognition of one’s own receiving mercy from God leads the Statesman to recognize that he is operating among an imperfect humanity also in need of mercy. This causes the Statesman to be sensitive to exercising mercy to others. How does this work out in the life of a Statesman? Let me give two practical examples of displaying mercy.

The late President Levy Mwanawasa of Zambia provides us with an example of statesmanlike behavior in the way he treated his fiercest critic. Michael Sata was continually critical of the President. His attacks on President were at times very personal. And yet, Sata saw Mwanawasa differently after he personally suffered a serious heart attack. The President intervened to have Sata airlifted to South Africa for treatment, all at Government expense. Sata came to recognize that his differences with Mwanawasa were not personal but simply policy differences. I consider Mwanawasa’s act of mercy to be statesmanlike because of his work to preserve a dissenting voice. As a result of this action, they reconciled and Sata came to appreciate the President, not necessarily as a policy-maker but as a human. It is likely that Mwanawasa’s action saved the life of Sata, who went on to become President himself later.

Upon Sudan’s independence in 1956, the southern Sudanese, with their ethnic and religious differences from the majority Sudanese, aspired to form an independent nation of their own. Joseph Lagu displayed statesmanlike behaviour while leading an independence movement. One particularly difficult time was in 1971 after government troops had attacked a rebel village in the south, including burning down a church and killing a number of worshippers. Days later, while the pain was still strong, a plane carrying northern Sudanese civilians crashed into rebel-held territory, with 29 survivors. Although the temptation was for revenge, General Lagu ordered the survivors released. As related by General Lagu, his decision resulted from considering the question “What would Christ have me to do?” While reflecting on this question, “his first thought was of Christ feeding the 5,000 when they were in need. His second was of the scriptural admonition concerning the number of times that one should forgive one’s enemy — 70 times seven. His last thought was of some advice a chaplain had given him when he was a young man: ‘If I ever had a thought in the cool hours of the morning, I should act on it and not dilute it by consulting others. God was talking to me, not them.’” General Lagu’s decision contributed to the Addis Ababa settlement of 1972, one of several steps that eventually led to the independence of South Sudan in 2005. (These two examples are taken from Challenge to Govern as Statesmen, pp. 49-50, which can be downloaded at https://centreforstatecraft.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/Challenge-to-Govern-as-Statesmen.pdf)

We are called upon to exercise mercy to others in the way mercy has been extended to us. It does not need to interfere with our responsibility to administer justice. When a leader exercises mercy to others, as these two leaders demonstrated, it can have powerful consequences. And as we study their actions, we cannot help but admire both of them, and learn from them.

CONIDERATION FOR THE STATESMAN:

What are ways I have received mercy?
What are practical ways I can show mercy in the midst of my responsibility to administer justice?

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