The Lord is kind and merciful!
The Lord is kind and merciful!

At the time of Jesus,
the rabbis taught
that one ought forgive
someone three times
before writing them off completely.
So, Peter thought that he was being generous
in offering to forgive someone seven times.
But that was not enough for Jesus.
He insisted that one must forgive
so many times that its hard to keep track of your mercy.

The Lord is kind and merciful!

When I was a child,
I remember my mother insisting
that I had to apologize
and I had forgive.
“Tell him you’re sorry,”
she’d insist.
“Now tell him you forgive him.”
She made us practice mercy,
even when we didn’t really mean it.
She hoped that we’d eventually learn
the ways of God.

The Lord is kind and merciful!

A friend of mine was married to a sailor for twenty years.
They’d spend about a month together every year.
But when he retired,
he decided to look for a new model.
He left her and their children,
and she hated him for it.
One day, while talking to a priest friend of hers,
he suggested that she might practice mercy.
He simple suggested that every morning,
shortly after waking up,
she might look to the heavens
and say,
“God bless Charlie.”
She wasn’t to tell God
how to bless Charlie.
Like the advice Jesus gives Peter today,
she was  to practice mercy
over and over again,
until she got it right.

One day, she woke up,
said “God bless Charlie,”
and suddenly wondered
when she had begun to mean it.
The grace of God turned a simple phrase
into a meaningful prayer.

After Charlie became a part of her life once again.
She began inviting him to their children’s birthday celebrations,
and to other special occasions in the life of their family.
Charlie was married to someone else,
but my friend, Gerry, had learned to love him,
and his new wife,
in a new way.

The Lord is kind and merciful!
The Lord is kind and merciful!

Like the woman I talked about last week,
Gerry finally felt free.
She no longer carried hatred in her heart,
and she could love in a new way.

Later Gerry became a pastoral minister
and a preacher of retreats and parish missions.
That’s where I met her
and heard her story.

Following the advice given to Peter
to forgive over and over again,
and the advice given to her by a priest friend,
her life was changed,
and so was Charlie’s.

The Lord is kind and merciful!
The Lord is kind and merciful!

Like the God Jesus describes in the parable
he tells us today,
we are to allow our hearts be “moved with compassion”
and offer forgiveness to those who may owe us a debt.
Forgiveness received,
Jesus instructs us,
is forgiveness to be offered to others.
As we have been forgiven
we are to forgive.

The Lord is kind and merciful!

Each time we pray the Lord’s Prayer,
we say,
“Forgive us our trespasses
as we forgive those who trespass against us.”
We pray that we might become
as kind and merciful
as the Lord is.

The Lord is kind and merciful!
The Lord is kind and merciful!

God pardons all your iniquities,
and comforts your sorrows,
redeems your life from destruction
and crowns you with kindness.

The Lord is kind and merciful!
The Lord is kind and merciful!

Merciful, merciful, and gracious is our God;
slow to anger, abounding in kindness.

The Lord is kind and merciful!
The Lord is kind and merciful!