Albert the Bear. Edward the Eloquent. Charles the Hammer. Olaf the Peaceful. Alexander the Great. All through history rulers have been given nicknames or cognomens that describe them and their rule. Sometimes those are flattering things like “Great” or “Powerful” or “Brave.” Sometimes they’re not so flattering, like “John George the Beer Jug,” or “Wenceslaus the Idle” or “Piero the Unfortunate.” Those are all real people. Wikipedia has a whole page dedicated to a list of monarchs by nickname. It’s fun to read through them and think what nickname you might want if you were a ruler and had the opportunity to choose.
One name that isn’t anywhere on Wikipedia’s list is “the Merciful.” There actually is one ruler I found with that name. John III Doukas Vatatzes, Emperor of Nicaea from 1221 to 1254, after his death was named a saint by the Eastern Orthodox church under the name John Vatatzes the Merciful. I couldn’t find any particular story though as to why he was given that name.
The only other place I could think of that nickname for a ruler is in fiction, in the movie Gladiator, where the Roman emperor Commodus names himself, “Commodus the Merciful.” But as the villain of the story the audience sees the great irony in that title because he is very much anything but.
It’s actually a shame that there aren’t more earthly rulers who are known as “the Merciful.” Maybe it’s because mercy is a rare trait. Maybe it’s because mercy isn’t always considered to be a great quality in a ruler. But even for us who don’t rule a country, Jesus points to this descriptor. He tells us that it ought to describe us. And what a great descriptor this is, because it describes God. Jesus says, “Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.”
Our sermon text for today comes from Luke 6, which seems to be Luke’s account of Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount. However, it is a little different from what Matthew records. Jesus certainly taught the same kinds of things many times, and so Luke could have drawn this from a different occasion. Jesus is preaching here to disciples, to people who believe in him and want to hear his word. He’s telling them what it means to live and walk as children of God. And it’s here in this sermon that Jesus holds up this great quality of mercy. “Be merciful.”
Even though not many rulers have the nickname of “the Merciful,” we all know what merciful means and we all recognize it as a good thing. Martin Luther gave a nice definition. He said, “Merciful means a person who bears a friendly, kind heart toward his neighbor, has compassion for him, and seriously takes his need and misfortune, whether it concerns his soul, body, love, or property, and lets it touch his heart so that he thinks how he can help him; prove it with deeds and do it with joy and gladness.”
So in Luther’s definition “merciful” describes both a person’s heart and a person’s actions. That’s not just Luther’s idea though. He learned it from Jesus, who goes on to describe how mercy shows itself in words and actions, saying,
“Do not judge, and you will not be judged. Do not condemn, and you will not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven. 38Give, and it will be given to you. A good measure pressed down, shaken together, and running over will be poured into your lap. In fact, the measure with which you measure will be measured back to you.”
Here our Lord tells us both what we must not do and what we must do. Do not judge. Do not condemn. Do forgive and do give.
Judging and condemning are similar things, but they aren’t exactly the same. Judging refers to the outward actions of someone and their quality. Are those things good or bad, to be praised or rejected? Condemning refers a person’s heart. Is that person a Christian or not? Jesus tells us not to do either one.
People today love to point to this passage and others like it. They’ll say, “Don’t tell me that what I’m doing is wrong. Even Jesus says, ‘Do not judge!’” But that is certainly not what Jesus is saying here. All authorities, which are established by God, are to judge. Parents are to discipline their children. Kings wield the sword to punish the wrongdoer. The church is to hand the impenitent over to Satan. For any of them to refuse to judge would be to abandon their responsibility from God. And what if you are not in a position of authority? There too, you should test the spirits to see if they are from God. You should flee from temptation. Psalm 1 says
How blessed is the man
who does not walk in the advice of the wicked,
who does not stand on the path with sinners,
and who does not sit in a meeting with mockers.
How could you even do that unless you judge?
This isn’t a difficult problem. Jesus explains what he means when he tells us the opposite. He doesn’t say, “Tolerate evil.” or “Ignore sin.” or “There is no such thing as right and wrong.” Instead he says, “Don’t judge or condemn, instead, forgive.”
Can a courtroom judge be merciful and still put people in prison? Certainly. Mercy doesn’t ignore the law. Mercy cares about justice and about the victims of a crime. But mercy also doesn’t take pleasure in doling out punishment. Can you be a merciful parent and still discipline your children? Absolutely. It is not mercy if you let your children go undisciplined. But at the end of the day, when that child comes back to you with tears in her eyes, don’t you hold her in your arms and say, “I forgive you”?
Mercy is also quick and generous to give, in every need. And if we trust in God to care for our needs, why wouldn’t we? Jesus uses a wonderful picture here of “a good measure pressed down, shaken together, and running over.” There is no stinginess from our heavenly Father.
So be merciful, Jesus tells us, but there’s a good reason why there are not many rulers with the cognomen of Merciful, and there’s a good reason why that might not be the first nickname you’d receive either. Emperor Commodus in the movie shouts “Am I not merciful?” and the answer is, “No, of course not. You’re greedy and power-hungry and proud and cruel.” And I have to ask then, “Am I merciful? Don’t I also have a human heart that so easily swells with pride and puts my needs ahead of others? Am I not at times quick to judge and slow to forgive? Is the measure that I use to give one that truly reflects God’s rich and overflowing generosity to me, or is it a half-heartedly half-filled thimble?”
Jesus warns us with these parables:
A blind man cannot guide a blind man, can he? Won’t they both fall into a pit? 40A disciple is not above his teacher, but everyone who is fully trained will be like his teacher. 41Why do you look at the speck in your brother’s eye, but fail to notice the beam in your own eye? 42Or how can you tell your brother, ‘Brother, let me remove the speck in your eye,’ when you do not see the beam in your own eye? Hypocrite! First remove the beam from your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck in your brother’s eye.
“Hypocrite!” Jesus says, and he’s not directing that accusation against the Pharisees and the Sadducees of his day, but against the Pharisee that lives in my heart. That little Pharisee that lives in each one of us boasts about how merciful he is, how able he is to lead the blind, and how much more he knows than all his teachers. How quickly we offer to remove the speck from our brother’s eye, acting as if this is a gift of charity, while overlooking the beam in our own eye. Am I not merciful?
But where does mercy come from in the first place? Jesus told us right from the beginning. “Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.”
There are so very many names that can describe who God is. He is great. He is powerful. He is just. He is holy. He is omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent. But how does God reveal himself above all? What is the first cognomen God wants you to call him? He is the God who shows mercy to a thousand generations of those who love him. He is the God whose faithful mercy will never depart from the house of David. He has shown us his mercy, and in his mercy he has redeemed us. Forty-two times in the Old Testament it says, “His mercy endures forever.” And Paul says to Titus “He saved us—not by righteous works that we did ourselves, but because of his mercy.”
Mercy starts with our Father in heaven, and it’s even his mercy that he calls himself our Father. If anyone should judge and condemn us for our sins, is it not God who is perfect and holy and against whom we have sinned so many times? And yet what does he do? He forgives our sins and gives us a rich measure of his grace, far more than we would ever think to ask for.
You can be merciful because your Father in heaven has been merciful to you. He has forgiven you of all your sins for the sake of Jesus. He himself replaces your hypocrite heart that boasts in fake mercy with a true heart that loves as Christ has loved you. Instead of trying to make other people righteous, concern yourself with following Jesus, the one man who isn’t blind, the perfect teacher, the only one who can remove the beam from your eye.
Who is your God? Look to the cross and see there his mercy. With such a loving and merciful God to forgive your sins and give you life and salvation, you too may be “the Merciful.” Amen.