God’s act of initiating covenant and then His fulfilling of every promise made in the covenant is an act of grace and mercy renewed every day. It is with this in mind that the translators chose the word “mercy” for the Hebrew hesed. The very thought of covenant love from God could only be translated in terms of mercy (which means that we do not get from Him what we deserve) and grace (which means that we get from Him what we do not deserve)!
There was no pressure on God to seek after humans when they had freely chosen to sever themselves from Him. We must never forget that God freely chose to save us. There was no demand placed upon Him to do so from outside of him, nor was there an incompleteness within Him that He needed humans to fill. Complete in Himself, He chose to save us out of sheer love. His covenant is a unilateral covenant originated in the mind of God before time, initiated and achieved by God alone. The only reason behind His desire to make such a covenant, to bring sinful humans into a relationship at infinite cost to Himself, is His unconditional love for us.
This is the Gospel, or as it was defined in the seventeenth century, “the good, glad, merry news that makes a man fairly leap for joy!” It is the news about God, who He is and what He has done for us. The word hallelujah literally means to brag and rave to others about God! When we realize that He is hesed, we will know why He is worthy to be raved about.
It is in the revelation of Himself that God has given us that we part company with all the other religions in the world. Up to a point, we can agree with other world religions when speaking of a supreme deity. Such a deity, we all agree, must be sovereign, omnipotent, and omniscient; but no other religion has the beginning of the concept that God is love, and He loves each man and woman with a passionate and unconditional love.
The human mind could never arrive at such a conclusion. We only know that His is love because He has revealed himself to us through the Hebrew patriarchs and prophets and finally in His son, the Lord Jesus.
With that in mind, hesed as mercy should never be far from our understanding. We are the weaker party of this covenant, seeking the protection and blessing of the God of infinite love. We do not dictate the terms, nor do we tell Him how and when He must fulfill his promises. There are many believers today who should deeply understand that the covenant and the ensuing acts of loving-kindness are pure mercy, and they should stop their ungodly demanding of God that He act according to their dictates.
However, there are millions of believers who have lived their lives around the cry to God, “Lord, have mercy,” and they need to see the vast scope of hesed in terms of the strong love of God committed to being there for us at all times and under all conditions. If we do not see that mercy springs for the from the molten core of the infinite passion of holy love for us, we very quickly assume the posture of a beggar whining at the temple gates and shocked if told that the lord has answered! As you invoke His covenant mercy, do so with a heart filled with praise. The mercy is in Jesus Christ, and we come not as beggars but a sons, heirs of God and joint heirs with Jesus.
Malcolm Smith
This excerpt is from the book “The Lost Secret of the New Covenant” by Malcolm Smith To purchase this book click the link below.
HESED AS MERCY
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