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The Last Spiritual Gift: Exploring the Gift of Mercy
The focus of this week's podcast is on the spiritual gift of mercy, which is vital for serving others within the church community. Pastor Josh emphasizes that mercy involves not only feeling compassion for those in distress but also taking practical steps to meet their emotional needs. Drawing from Scripture, he highlights how this gift reflects God's own mercy and comfort towards us, urging believers to extend the same grace to those around them. The discussion includes examples from the Bible, particularly the character of Barnabas, who exemplifies the gift of mercy through his actions and support for others. As the series on spiritual gifts concludes, listeners are encouraged to recognize their own gifts and consider how they can serve their local church effectively.
The podcast delves into the profound significance of spiritual gifts within the Christian faith, centering on the concept of mercy as the gift of the week. Pastor Josh outlines the importance of understanding the spiritual gifts mentioned in Romans chapter 12 and 1 Peter chapter 4, emphasizing that these gifts are divinely bestowed for service within the church. The episode highlights the gift of mercy, which is often exercised behind the scenes but is crucial for fostering compassion and empathy among believers. Pastor Josh articulates that mercy involves not only a sympathetic response but also a practical commitment to alleviating the emotional burdens of others, thereby reflecting the character of God who is the ultimate source of mercy and comfort.
Throughout the discussion, listeners are encouraged to recognize the unique contributions of those with the gift of mercy, such as their ability to perceive and respond to the emotional needs of others. Pastor Josh illustrates this by referencing Jesus’s teachings on mercy and the Biblical character Barnabas, the “Son of Encouragement,” who exemplifies the empathetic spirit that this gift entails. The episode also explores the delicate balance between mercy and truth, underscoring the necessity of grounding one’s empathy in the Word of God to avoid the pitfalls of emotional decision-making. Ultimately, the message is clear: the church thrives when members exercise their spiritual gifts in humility and love, working together to reflect Christ’s compassion to the world.
Takeaways:
- The Word of the Week series focuses on exploring biblical words significant to our faith.
- The gift of mercy, defined as empathy, is essential for serving others within the church.
- God extends mercy to us so we can share that comfort with those in need.
- Mercy involves practical actions to meet the emotional needs of individuals in distress.
- Barnabas serves as a biblical example of someone who exemplified the gift of mercy.
- Understanding the balance between mercy and truth is crucial for effective ministry.
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This podcast is produced by Ralph Estep, Jr., host of the Ask Ralph Podcast, a daily podcast on Christian Finance you can find it at https://www.askralphpodcast.com/
Transcript
Hello and welcome to the Middletown Baptist Church podcast, where we are proclaiming the truth to the world.
Pastor Josh:In this podcast series, we're going to be looking into biblical words that have great significance to our faith.
Pastor Josh:The name of this series is called the Word of the Week, where once a week we will dive deeper into these words that we are familiar with in scripture.
Pastor Josh:So come along with me, let's study the Word of the week.
Pastor Josh:Pastor Josh here.
Pastor Josh:The word of the week is gift.
Pastor Josh:This will be our last week looking at the spiritual gifts listed in Romans chapter 12.
Pastor Josh:And it's been quite a journey as we have looked at these gifts given to us by God in His grace for our service to him.
Pastor Josh:And, and we've looked at many passages of scripture, but the two main passages that we are are foundationally looking at these gifts in is first Peter chapter four, and then Romans chapter 12.
Pastor Josh:And in that list there in Romans chapter 12, we see the, the last gift there listed as the gift of mercy.
Pastor Josh:And last week we looked at the gift of administration, or as the King James puts it, ruling.
Pastor Josh:But this year we will look at many different elements of how we can use these gifts for the work of the ministry.
Pastor Josh:But the last one today that we're looking at in its definition is the gift of mercy.
Pastor Josh:And so in First Peter, chapter 4, verses 10 and 11, it tells us that there are gifts that are going to be more public gifts.
Pastor Josh:There's also going to be gifts that possibly could be even behind the scenes.
Pastor Josh:And, and in many ways the gift of mercy is one of those gifts that would be behind the scene.
Pastor Josh:And I think one of the things we have to think about when it comes to the area of mercy is the motivation behind our mercy.
Pastor Josh:And we have to look at the definition of that word, mercy itself.
Pastor Josh:Mercy is essentially withholding something from someone that they might deserve.
Pastor Josh:And so we have to recognize what mercy is and we have to recognize what that looks like in our lives.
Pastor Josh:And so the gift of mercy defined is this.
Pastor Josh:It's the spirit giving gift.
Pastor Josh:And with that gift comes the desire and the motivation to serve God in the body by deeply, authentically emphasizing empathy to other people.
Pastor Josh:So basically perceiving the emotional needs of those that are in distress or needing comfort, maybe people needing relief, maybe even to some degrees in anguish.
Pastor Josh:And I think that for the body of believers, this is a very important ministry.
Pastor Josh:And the purpose again behind the mercy is to point people to Christ, to give glory to God, as First Peter 4 tells us.
Pastor Josh:And so the person with the gift of mercy is the person with the supernatural gift of.
Pastor Josh:Of empathizing with people's emotions.
Pastor Josh:And emotions are a beautiful thing.
Pastor Josh:God gives us those emotions.
Pastor Josh:Even though we can't allow the emotions to dictate to us our truth, we cannot deny the emotions that we face through various circumstances in our life.
Pastor Josh:So, for example, you know, someone could go through a very difficult time with a loss of a loved one or pain in their own life, and that leads to sadness, that leads to sorrow, that leads to pain.
Pastor Josh:And so it's a serving gift that focuses on the emotional needs of an individual and in the broader sense, the emotional needs of the body of believers.
Pastor Josh:And so the.
Pastor Josh:The mercies are motivated to.
Pastor Josh:To meet the emotional needs of people in practical ways.
Pastor Josh:So it's not just, hey, I feel for you.
Pastor Josh:It's.
Pastor Josh:It's not just, hey, you know what?
Pastor Josh:I feel sorry for your pain and I'll cry with you, but it's actually trying to meet these folks's needs in a very practical way that can help in, in that process.
Pastor Josh:And so I think a couple verses that we could look at when it comes to that idea of meeting the practical emotional needs of people within our church could be found in many passages.
Pastor Josh:But I think if you look at Luke chapter 6, Luke chapter 6, and we can look at verse 36, here we see a very important truth given to us.
Pastor Josh:And it says, obviously Jesus is speaking, and he says, be therefore merciful, as your Father also is merciful.
Pastor Josh:I know that's a short statement, but there's a lot packed in there.
Pastor Josh:And essentially what we see is that as believers, we are marked in our identity by our Savior, by, by our Lord.
Pastor Josh:And so we, we take steps to emulate and to model the mercy that God gives.
Pastor Josh:And so obviously, God gives his mercy by meeting needs.
Pastor Josh:Um, God extends grace and mercy and comfort to those in need.
Pastor Josh:And so that's what we do.
Pastor Josh:We don't just say it, but we do it.
Pastor Josh:Another passage of scripture that we're familiar with in our second Corinthians studies, 2 Corinthians, chapter 1, verse 3.
Pastor Josh:Blessed be God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and the God of all comfort.
Pastor Josh:So we see that it's the character of God to extend this comfort and mercy to people, but then it tells us the purpose of that.
Pastor Josh:So, so as God comforts us, verse four, who comforted us in our tribulation, meaning God comforts us, the believer, that we may be able to comfort them which are in any trouble by the comfort wherewith we ourselves are comforted of God.
Pastor Josh:So if you didn't catch that there, it says this God extends mercy and comfort to us so that we can, yes, be given comfort and receiving mercy, but so that also we can share that mercy and comfort with others around us.
Pastor Josh:And so God is always extending that mercy and that grace and that comfort so that, yes, we can be beneficiaries of that, but so that we can share that with others.
Pastor Josh:And so you serve these people and you give them mercy.
Pastor Josh:You show, you extend mercy.
Pastor Josh:But there, there's definitely a difference between mercy and service.
Pastor Josh:But mercy in and of itself is that starting place to demonstrating the, the help.
Pastor Josh:But I, I think the way that you could discern between the two, between the gift of service or the gift of mercy is that the motivation behind.
Pastor Josh:The motivation behind it, right?
Pastor Josh:Meeting needs, yes, but also meeting people on their emotion, I think would be the, the mercy element of it.
Pastor Josh:And so you, you know, you can see a lot of people in scripture that would be examples of this.
Pastor Josh:But the one that comes to mind for me would be Barnabas.
Pastor Josh:Right?
Pastor Josh:Barnabas.
Pastor Josh:He's the, the son of consolation.
Pastor Josh:And I think that that would be an individual that if you studied him out in scripture, you could study out the, the mercy and the grace of, of Barnabas.
Pastor Josh:And, and that would be a good character study.
Pastor Josh:But I, I would encourage you to, if you get a chance, look up Barnabas and look up what he does there with, with Paul and others.
Pastor Josh:And I think that that would be beneficial for us as we study this gift of mercy.
Pastor Josh:So someone with the gift of mercy strongly is driven by love, compassion.
Pastor Josh:And so there's that, there's that desire for genuine love, deep love.
Pastor Josh:Someone who has the gift of mercy is going to be strongly empathetic.
Pastor Josh:And that can go in the positive and the negative.
Pastor Josh:Obviously, as you're feeling, there's emotions, those emotions that can go into a negative place, right?
Pastor Josh:If we allow our emotions to dictate our truth, then our truth is being dictated by a fluctuating thing.
Pastor Josh:And our truth has to be dictated to.
Pastor Josh:Our truth has to be dictated to the Word of God.
Pastor Josh:Dictated by the Word of God, I should say linked to the Word of God.
Pastor Josh:And so I think that that's something that we have to gauge when it comes to this gift.
Pastor Josh:And so, you know, exercising this gift in the flesh would be seen maybe as allowing our emotions to dictate our decisions, but exercising this in the spirit would be saying, I'm going to take my truth from the Word of God.
Pastor Josh:But meet people in their needs and their emotions.
Pastor Josh:And so that, that's something to think about.
Pastor Josh:I think that there is a strong attraction in this gift to connect with people that are stressed, people that are maybe going through difficult times in their life.
Pastor Josh:And maybe even sometimes it feels like they, they come after you, they, they follow you, they find you.
Pastor Josh:And so there is a strong tendency to communicate emotions to other people.
Pastor Josh:And, and I, I think that, you know, there are going to be people that are naturally gifted in this, and there's going to be people like myself that might not be naturally gifted in this.
Pastor Josh:And so, you know, it's.
Pastor Josh:The exhorter will see the, the problem with the situation and the remedy to the situation and will say, hey, look, you know what?
Pastor Josh:This is all you gotta do to do it and kind of separate themselves from the emotional side of things.
Pastor Josh:But the person with the gift of mercy will maybe not necessarily sacrifice truth, but they will meet that person in that emotional distress and empathize with them.
Pastor Josh:And so that mercy and that truth works together wonderfully.
Pastor Josh:And so there's a strong tendency to try to take away stressful situations from people.
Pastor Josh:And, and so I, I would say that that's something as well that would link in with the, the gift of, of mercy.
Pastor Josh:But of course, all those, all those things can fall into the, the fleshly mindset as well.
Pastor Josh:Someone who has the gift of mercy but exercising in the flesh could be maybe more of an indecisive person when it comes to decision making because of the fact that they are.
Pastor Josh:He or she are, is going through the process of trying to allow the emotions to dictate them instead of the truth of God.
Pastor Josh:That the person who's exercising mercy in the flesh might jump to someone's side, taking sides because of an emotion, maybe going to the place of empath, emphasizing the empathy too much and not emphasizing truth.
Pastor Josh:There may be some vulnerability there that could easily lead to hurt, maybe feeling overwhelmed by taking on the pain of others.
Pastor Josh:And I would say, you know, might even get to a place of being too connected with somebody to the point where they can't see the truth.
Pastor Josh:They're too close to the situation that they can't see the truth.
Pastor Josh:Uh, so, so of course the Bible speaks of speaking the truth in love, but if you emphasize the love and have no truth, there is a mistake in that.
Pastor Josh:So that would be, that would be the negative side of acting in the flesh with this gift of mercy in one's life.
Pastor Josh:But it's a needed, needed gift within the church.
Pastor Josh:As all of these gifts are, right.
Pastor Josh:God gives us these manifold gifts, these various gifts for the purpose of being diverse within the church.
Pastor Josh:Because not everyone can be gifted in the gift of mercy, because we would be missing in other areas.
Pastor Josh:But we all are gifted in certain areas for the purpose of the gospel, for the purpose of the glory of God.
Pastor Josh:And it is given to us by grace.
Pastor Josh:We did not earn our salvation and we did not earn our spiritual gift or gifts that God extends to us in his love and his grace.
Pastor Josh:So that's something to think about, never to wrap ourselves up in the pride of our gifts because they weren't something that we earned.
Pastor Josh:It was something given to us in grace that brings us to a place of humility, that brings us to a place of thankfulness, and that brings us to a place of reliance on God, even in the midst of our gifts that God has extended to us.
Pastor Josh:So I've really enjoyed this study.
Pastor Josh:I've really enjoyed the study looking at the spiritual gifts, the ministering gifts there in Romans chapter 12.
Pastor Josh:And certainly we will address these in further study down the road, I'm sure.
Pastor Josh:But we will be moving on to a new Word of the Week next week.
Pastor Josh:If you've been with us now for a while, this has been a long study.
Pastor Josh:I think it's around two months that we've been looking at the spiritual gifts there in Romans chapter 12.
Pastor Josh:And I thank you for following along with that and I hope it's been helpful for you, hope it's been a beneficial study to identify where God has gifted you and where you can serve in your local body there, wherever you are listening this, listening to this podcast.
Pastor Josh:So I hope that you continue on with us as we study more words.
Pastor Josh:There's so many words given to us in scripture and we're thankful for them and we're thankful for the opportunity to grow in our knowledge of the Word of God.
Pastor Josh:So I hope that you have a wonderful rest of your week.
Pastor Josh:We will come back to you next week with another Word of the Week.
Pastor Josh:We'll be praying that God continues to work in your life and we continue to trust in him for his guidance and for his truth.
Pastor Josh:So we thank you, appreciate it.
Pastor Josh:If you could share this podcast with somebody else, that would be wonderful.
Pastor Josh:The more folks we have listening to this podcast, the more we're able to reach out and proclaim the truth to this world.
Pastor Josh:So we will talk to you soon.
Pastor Josh:God bless.
Pastor Josh:Take care.
Pastor Josh:Hey, I really appreciate that you listen to the Word of the Week podcast.
Pastor Josh:If you have any questions about the podcast or about our church, Middletown Baptist Church.
Pastor Josh:You can find more information about us on Facebook or YouTube.
Pastor Josh:Or you can find the podcast on NBCPodcast.org you can contact me directly at Josh Massaroiddletownbaptistchurch.org stay tuned for future Word of the Week episodes where we dive deeper into words that impact our life according to scripture.
Pastor Josh:Thank you so much.
Pastor Josh:God bless.
Pastor Josh:We'll talk to you soon.
