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The Year of Mercy: Gimmick or an invitation to life?
Tuesday, November 17, 2015 6:11
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The Year of Mercy: Gimmick or an invitation to life?
Gimmick: A trick or device intended to attract attention, publicity, or trade.
Mercy: Compassion or forgiveness shown towards someone whom it is within one's power to punish or harm.
Evangelisation is designed to draw people into the mystery of faith, I think it is best when it involves showing a good example. I have always been wary of gimmicks that are used to promote the faith. Icebreakers in youth gatherings would always leave me cold, (pun intended) I reneged against the smile for smile sakes insistence! Gimmicks can fall flat and turn people off, for example an extreme case of gimmicks is the phenomena of “Television Evangelists” they can annoy and disgust most authentic religious people. What are they in it for? For it becomes a lucrative business, preying upon fears and vulnerability. What is the end goal for them, Christ or a pot of gold?
There is not to be a supermarket mentality of buy one, get one free, when it comes to the faith we receive! It’s not a case of “Get baptised, get heaven thrown in for free!” Baptism is the beginning of the journey, it begins the joy of walking towards God, of being accompanied by Christ. The example of others helps or hinders that journey. What is not a gimmick is that God’s love is free, unconditional, his plan for us is that he loves us and wishes us to catch on to that fact as we live.
The gospel message can be wrapped up in a new age philosophy of well-being and feeling good. The gospel can be reduced to a nice program of affirming life style and choices. It can be presented in a fuzzy, let us all hold hands way. Some interpretations of the gospel become wet, limp, vague and wishy washy. There is almost a pantomime or a parody of the gospel that seeks above all the value of fitting in; a case of inclusivity or bust. I wonder is the Year of Mercy perceived as just a gimmick?
There is no gimmick when it comes to faith, the message of Jesus is about salvation, about sin, about repentance, about conversion, a change of heart. Faith is about sacrifice, about forsaking self and living for others. Faith is about service and taking up the cross each day, it is a demanding, life changing and life giving challenge to embrace. To love your enemy is not a snazzy soundbite. It requires great love, strength and a hope and trust that if I place myself humbly before God’s mercy he will give me the grace to try to love. How hard is it to love your neighbour when your neighbour hates you, yet it is a command from Jesus. How many times must I forgive? All the time….good luck with that! Yet Jesus demands it of us. When I am challenged by the gospel message, I then realise that mercy is not a gimmick, but a necessary and essential part of faith.
The Year of Mercy is an opportunity to examine our own responses to the gospel challenge. Do I seek God’s mercy for myself, so as to show mercy in my own living? When the gospel message is hard to live out, do I take seriously the grace of mercy and how it can transform my living? Instead of making the gospel something just nice and tepid, or vague and fuzzy, the concept of mercy underpins the gospel. By immersing myself in that healing stream of grace and mercy that flows from the person of Christ then I can really challenge myself to take up my cross, to love my enemy, to forgive those who hurt me, and to authentically love my neighbour.
An example of mercy is demonstrated in a wonderful book called “A Higher Call” An extract from it is below and a link to it also. It tells of a pilot on the side of the enemy who took mercy and did not shoot, and the friendship that developed years later because of that act of mercy
The pilot glanced outside his cockpit and froze. He blinked hard and looked again, hoping it was just a mirage. But his co-pilot stared at the same horrible vision.
“My God, this is a nightmare,” the co-pilot said.
“He’s going to destroy us,” the pilot agreed.
The men were looking at a gray German Messerschmitt fighter hovering just three feet off their wingtip. It was five days before Christmas 1943, and the fighter had closed in on their crippled American B-17 bomber for the kill.
The B-17 pilot, Charles Brown, was a 21-year-old West Virginia farm boy on his first combat mission. His bomber had been shot to pieces by swarming fighters, and his plane was alone in the skies above Germany. Half his crew was wounded, and the tail gunner was dead, his blood frozen in icicles over the machine guns.
But when Brown and his co-pilot, Spencer “Pinky” Luke, looked at the fighter pilot again, something odd happened. The German didn’t pull the trigger. He nodded at Brown instead. What happened next was one of the most remarkable acts of chivalry recorded during World War II. Years later, Brown would track down his would-be executioner for a reunion that reduced both men to tears.
Source: http://humblepiety.blogspot.com/2015/11/the-year-of-mercy-gimmick-or-invitation.html
