Let People Be People

Today's message at church was the type of message I long for: messages that you hear and it challenges you spiritually and leaves you wanting to be more like Christ. The scripture reading for it was

"Blessed are the merciful, for they shall be shown mercy"-Matthew 5:7

By nature, it sounds like such a simple and lovely verse, but when you open your heart and allow God to teach you this verse, you begin to see how serious the matter of showing mercy is. Throughout the Pastor's sermon, I kept personalizing the message to my life and my relationships with people. The pastor mentioned that mercy is more than being compassionate to people. Also, mercy is more than doing good deeds to people. He then concluded by saying that mercy is a combination of compassion and good deeds to those that need it. This is when God spoke to me and reminded me of something I was reading last night. In the book "I kissed Dating Goodbye" by Joshua Harris (I will write about this book some other time), the part that caught my attention was the phrase "Let God be God, and let People be People".   

So often we put people on a pedestal that only God should be placed on. We elevate their position in our lives and unconsciously make them our "gods". The danger in doing this is that we no longer see them as people, flesh and blood like us who are going through this same journey in this wicked world. We no longer see them as dependents on the same special grace of God that we need. We want people to love us without ever seeing fault in us. We want people to constantly, every hour if possible, affirm us, to tell us we are good people, we are beautiful, we are special. We want them to provide for us in all aspects of life from being a listening ear to a problem solver. Basically we just want people to fill all the voids in our life that ONLY GOD can fill. No one on this earth can do and be all these things for us so we begin to shut and cut people out of our lives as soon as they fail us. God did not create anyone with this ability and quite frankly, He had no need to because we are HIS creations. The sole purpose of the Creator is to take care of what He made. He is the only one that will know how to mend a broken heart because He created the heart and emotions. He is the one that constantly brags about how beautiful and special you are because He created you and said this my child is wonderfully and fearfully made! (Psalm139:14) Only God can love, only God can forgive, only God is faithful. The Scripture says,

                                          

"The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; His mercies never come to an end. They are new every morning, great is your faithfulness"- Lamentations 3:22-23

You may be asking now, "Feefe, what does this have to do with showing mercy?" and I tell you, understanding this simple fact has everything to do with showing mercy. Not until we get to a point in our lives where we wholeheartedly Let God to be the absolutely sovereign Lord of our lives, will we ever arrive at the place where we can let people be people.  We will be quick to love people and be compassionate towards them because we understand that they are just as fragile as we are. When they disappoint us, we won't cut them out of our lives, but we will use that opportunity to walk and shine in the light of God's love! The Pastor concluded the message today by saying that the closer we get to God, the more we will exhibit His nature. We will learn the value of being servants and well wishers. We will have a heart that genuinely seeks the best for people, a spirit that forgives quickly and holds no grudge because by walking in mercy, we will come to understand that God's mercy does the same for us. That is the key. In all of this, I have not addressed the very first word in Matthew 5:7 which is "Blessed". Our walking in mercy to everyone with meet, whether we deem them worthy or not, comes with a reward. What is the blessing of showing mercy? It can be found in Proverbs 2:3-4

"Let not mercy and truth forsake you. Bind them around your neck, write them on the tablets of your heart.  So shall you find favor and understanding in the sight of God and man".

The blessing of walking in mercy is divine favor not only with God, but with the people we meet in life! That is amazing! We are being called to a higher level of living and God is able and willing to equip us for this call if we answer to Him. Let us be challenged to go higher and harder for the Gospel of Christ Jesus! Through our lives, His name will be glorified. 

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T.M.V -Luke 6:36

"Be merciful, just as Your Father is merciful"