Complained to her husband... Isn’t my love enough for you?
She was deeply distressed and prayed to the LORD and wept bitterly.
God heard her prayer and gave her a son, whom two books of the Bible are named after
Hannah’s prayer: 1 Samuel 2:1–8
“There is none holy like the LORD; there is none besides you; there is no rock like our God.…
Talk no more so very proudly, let not arrogance come from your mouth; for the LORD is a God of knowledge, and by him actions are weighed.
Hannah’s prayer: 1 Sam 2:1–8
The bows of warriors are shattered, but those who stumble find their strength reinforced.
The LORD makes poor and makes rich; he brings low and he exalts.
He raises up the poor from the dust; he lifts the needy from the ash heap to make them sit with princes and inherit a seat of honour…
He is the kind of God who does this kind of thing
Jesus exemplified this compassion:
Can you think of any stories?
Jesus’ compassion
When he saw the crowds, he had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. Matt 9:36
There seems to be a connection between Jesus healing people and having compassion because very often the text mentions this,
When he went ashore he saw a great crowd, and he had compassion on them and healed their sick. Matt 14:14
Then Jesus called his disciples to him and said, “I have compassion on the crowd because they have been with me now three days and have nothing to eat. And I am unwilling to send them away hungry, lest they faint on the way.” Matt 15:32
Compassion not for people who were committed to him but to people in general.
Matthew 20
And there were two blind men sitting by the roadside, and when they heard that Jesus was passing by, they cried out, “Lord, have mercy on us, Son of David!”
The crowd rebuked them, telling them to be silent, but they cried out all the more, “Lord, have mercy on us, Son of David!”
And stopping, Jesus called them and said, “What do you want me to do for you?”
They said to him, “Lord, let our eyes be opened.”
And Jesus in compassion touched their eyes, and immediately they recovered their sight and followed him.
One of Jesus’s main roles was to reveal to us the full revelation of the character of God
Not just one aspect
Luke 7
As he drew near to the gate of the town, behold, a man who had died was being carried out, the only son of his mother, and she was a widow, and a considerable crowd from the town was with her.
And when the Lord saw her, he had compassion on her and said to her, “Do not weep.”
Then he came up and touched the bier, and the bearers stood still. And he said, “Young man, I say to you, arise.”
And the dead man sat up and began to speak, and Jesus gave him to his mother.
In the N.T. we have very clear parables like the Good Samaritan, but the same ideas are there in seed form in the old
Leviticus 19
When a foreigner resides with you in your land,
you must not oppress him.
The foreigner who resides with you must be to you like a native citizen among you;
so you must love him as yourself,
because you were foreigners in the land of Egypt.
I am the LORD your God.
How should we respond to this?
We should be like God in this way
James 1:27 Pure and undefiled religion before God the Father is this: to care for orphans and widows in their misfortune and to keep oneself unstained by the world.
Why is it hard for us to think of God as tender & compassionate?
It can almost seem like a weakness to be soft-hearted!
Stories of God’s Compassion & Grace
Compassion & grace to those in need, especially those who cry for help
Grace & forgiveness to everyone who asks for it
Being a person of compassion & grace
2. Grace & forgiveness to everyone who asks for it
There is not a single recorded instance in Old or New Testament of someone who comes humbly to God and is turned away.
This is the story of Manasseh, the son of King Hezekiah, a good king,
but Manasseh was probably the most evil king of all of them
2 Chronicles 33 —Manasseh
Manasseh was twelve years old when he became king, and he reigned for fifty-five years in Jerusalem.
He did evil in the sight of the LORD and committed the same horrible sins practiced by the nations whom the LORD drove out ahead of the Israelites.
He rebuilt the high places that his father Hezekiah had destroyed; he set up altars for the Baals and made Asherah poles. He bowed down to all the stars in the sky and worshiped them.
2 Chron 33 cont’d
He built altars in the LORD’s temple, about which the LORD had said, “Jerusalem will be my permanent home.”
In the two courtyards of the LORD’s temple he built altars for all the stars in the sky.
He sacrificed his sons in the Valley of Ben-Hinnom and practiced divination, omen reading, and sorcery. He set up a ritual pit to conjure up underworld spirits and appointed magicians to supervise it. He did a great amount of evil in the sight of the LORD and angered him.
2 Chron 33 cont’d
He put an idolatrous image he had made in God’s temple…
But Manasseh misled the people of Judah and the residents of Jerusalem so that they sinned more than the nations whom the LORD had destroyed ahead of the Israelites.
2 Chron 33 cont’d
The LORD confronted Manasseh and his people, but they paid no attention.
So the LORD brought against them the commanders of the army of the king of Assyria. They seized Manasseh, put hooks in his nose, bound him with bronze chains, and carried him away to Babylon.
2 Chron 33 cont’d
In his pain Manasseh asked the LORD his God for mercy and truly humbled himself before the God of his ancestors.
When he prayed to the LORD, the LORD was moved by his entreaty and listened to his cry for mercy. The LORD brought him back to Jerusalem to his kingdom. Then Manasseh realized that the LORD is the true God.
2 Chron 33 cont’d
He removed the foreign gods and images from the LORD’s temple and all the altars he had built on the hill of the LORD’s temple and in Jerusalem; he threw them outside the city.
He erected the altar of the LORD and offered on it peace offerings and thank offerings. He told the people of Judah to serve the LORD God of Israel.
But once again, Jesus is the full revelation of God’s compassionate love
Jesus in John 3
“For God so loved the world,
that he gave his only Son,
that whoever believes in him should not perish
but have eternal life.
As the Kingdom grows, there’s an evil man who Satan is using to attack and kill God’s people
One day when this wicked man is travelling to kill even more Christians, God strikes him down dead?
No, he shows his love and grace to this man, Paul, who ends up being one of the greatest apostles.
How should we respond to this?
A Christian is someone who has received God’s compassion and grace
You can receive this so easily!
Admit that you need his forgiveness, you need his help, you can’t do it yourself
Trust yourself to his leadership for your life. Surrender control to him, trusting that he will give you life
Stories of God’s Compassion & Grace
Compassion & grace to those in need, especially those who cry for help
Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin!…
Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight…
Sprinkle me with hyssop, and I shall be clean; wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.
Hide your face from my sins, and blot out all my iniquities.
Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me.
And God did!
Psalm 116
I love the LORD, because he has heard my voice and my pleas for mercy.
Because he inclined his ear to me, therefore I will call on him as long as I live.
The snares of death encompassed me; the pangs of the grave laid hold on me; I suffered distress and anguish.
Then I called on the name of the LORD: “O LORD, I pray, deliver my soul!”
Gracious is the LORD, and righteous; our God is merciful.
How should we respond to this?
It’s very important that we relate to God as someone who is ready to forgive us
Our Response
Many Christians live under a “harsh” God
Our experience of authority is that it is not kind and gentle
Most of us need a huge change in our view of God
need to read the stories, esp of Jesus, and say “This is God”
He is like the father in the parable of the “lost son”
I want to strongly encourage you to work on the image of God in your mind
Especially that he is forgiving!
Nehemiah 9
They refused to obey and did not recall your miracles that you had performed among them. Instead, they rebelled…. But you are a God of forgiveness, merciful and compassionate, slow to get angry and unfailing in your loyal love (chesed). You did not abandon them,
Nehemiah 9 cont’d
even when they made a cast image of a calf for themselves and said, ‘This is your God who brought you up from Egypt,’ or when they committed atrocious blasphemies.
“Due to your great compassion you did not abandon them in the desert. The pillar of cloud did not stop guiding them in the path by day, nor did the pillar of fire stop illuminating for them by night the path on which they should travel.
God’s very nature is to have compassion—be like that!
gentleness and tenderness
If someone were to describe you, would they use those words:
compassionate, merciful, gentle, tender, kind
If God is like that in the core of his being, and we are to be like God,
Then that should describe us!
Some people preach grace, but:
They are so strong on Grace, that you had better not disagree with them
You’ll get attacked and condemned if you don’t preach grace like they do!
There are consequences to sin, but God is ready to hear you any time
We feel he is angry with us, but we need to remember these stories of his compassion
The voice in your head that criticises you
One day when I set off to spend a day in Oakville, I was supposed to have taken a bag with me.
Andrew you are so stupid. What an idiot. How could you have possibly forgotten it. You are so dumb!
What’s the problem with talking to myself like that?
What should I have said?
I didn’t intend forget it. I always have a million things on my mind as I leave, so how can I avoid it happening again?
Do you ever do it? Would people be shocked if there were a “microphone”?
Three reasons for receiving God’s compassion
Our self-talk is out of alignment with what God is saying about us.
People who don’t receive God’s compassion, rarely know how to give it to others
We reduce our effectivness as Christians who are to reflect God to this world.
We are out of alignment with what God is saying about us.
This is actually very serious because we tend to mix up this inner critical voice with God’s voice
If we allow ourselves to do these self-attacks, we’ll damage our relationship with God
People who don’t receive God’s compassion, rarely know how to give it to others
Self-critical people are critical of others. (e.g. other drivers)
My grandfather was a very angry man
We reduce our effectivness as Christians who are to reflect God to this world.
Conclusion
Be compassionate and grace-filled to others
stepping out in dependence on God’s strength
Enjoy God’s gentleness and kindness to you
especially in the way you talk to yourself
Catch yourself when you say these things to yourself
