Our District 7 Convocation theme calls us to contemplate a well-known subject that we can all relate to i.e., ‘the mercies of God’. It is very important that we spend quality time to reflect upon what God’s mercy means as it relates to our personal experience.

 

Every human being needs God’s mercy, which is defined as pity, compassion to feel sympathy but in a nutshell, it is the bestowal of undeserving loving kindness or forgiveness to those who don’t deserve it.

 

The words grace and mercy are closely connected. The German scholar Bengel differentiated grace and mercy in the following manner “Grace takes away the guilt and mercy takes away the misery”.

 

The Bible decares “…all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God; ...” (Rom.3:23). Therefore, we all need God’s forgiveness in order to be reconciled with Him. In the Old Testament the Mercy Seat (place of propitiation) which was the lid of the Ark was the place where sins were covered once a year. However, God’s mercy in the Old Testament pointed to Christ who would be the once and for all sacrifice for sin (Hebrews 10:10,14; I Peter 3:18).

 

Knowing and experiencing the mercies of God should inspire praise and worship of God and drive our spiritual ambition to give the best of our service to God.

The very thought of God’s mercy and compassion towards us should be the catalyst for worshipping God in Spirit and in Truth (John 4:24) and expressing our gratitude to Him 24 / 7.

 

We have experienced God’s mercy in many ways e.g., by the fact the he has led us into his truth and thereby his liberty. The statisticians tell us that there are over 4000 religions in the world, but God has mercifully led us into the right religion (John 8:32; James 1:27).

 

During this convocation we will be going down ‘memory lane’ with an historical review of the Apostolic church and yet again this is a reflection of the mercies of God towards us.

 

We will ruminate on what God’s word teaches us about His mercy in order to understand how the church was established, grew and spread across the world. In addition, we will explore the key part that the mercies of God played in bringing us all to this point and place of blessing in the church.

 

During this convocation it is my hope that we gain a greater appreciation about what the mercy’s of God means to us from a personal point of view and that this will inspire even greater dedication to the service of the Lord.

 

Focus questions for consideration:

 

1) What does the mercies of God mean to you?

2) How important is God’s forgiveness when it comes to our salvation?

3) Discuss with examples how receiving God’s mercy should shape and influence our worship and praise life.