“The Lord is gracious and merciful.” Is God a God of wrath or a God or mercy? We hear in today’s Responsorial Psalm that God’s mercy surpasses his wrath: “The Lord is gracious and merciful; slow to anger, and of great kindness… The Lord is good to all and compassionate toward all his works.” While a just God punishes sinners, a merciful God forgives sinners. While God is certainly just, God is even more merciful than just.
Jesus shows us and incarnates this one true God in his ministry of mercy. He associates with tax collectors and sinners. He declares to the woman caught in adultery: “Nor do I condemn you.” He deals patiently with His fallible disciples. Many of Jesus’ parables bring out the richness, even the wastefulness of God’s mercy. God is the prodigal father who runs out and forgives his son even before he asks for forgiveness. Jesus embodies the Lord we proclaim in today’s Psalm: “The Lord is gracious and merciful; slow to anger, and of great kindness.”
The other New Testament writings continue to preach this message of Jesus and to embody the words of this Psalm. Paul writes to the Ephesians about God’s abundant mercy: “But God, who is rich in mercy, because of the great love he had for us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, brought us to life with Christ” (Ephesians 4:4-5).
Unfortunately, too many of us have been raised on the image of a God of wrath and not an image of the God of mercy. We live in fear of God instead of living in thankfulness for the gift of God’s love and mercy. Let us hear, proclaim, and embody today’s Responsorial Psalm: “The Lord is gracious and merciful; slow to anger, and of great kindness.”