Podcasts about severe mercy

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January 25th, 2025 God's Severe Mercy to St Paul Repent for the Kingdom of God is at Hand Make Jesus Your Center and Reason for Living The Path to Heaven

Jesus and The Ministry of Mercy | A Severe Mercy (Luke 10:13-14)

QUOTES FOR REFLECTION“It is a Christian duty, as you know, for everyone to be as happy as he can.”~ C.S. Lewis in A Severe Mercy by Sheldon Vanauken “Perhaps his purpose is simply to draw us closer to himself in conscious communion with him; for it is often the case, as all the saints know, that fellowship with the Father and the Son is most vivid and sweet, and Christian joy is greatest, when the cross is heaviest.”~ J. I. Packer, Knowing God “Man's happiness was never meant to be determined by his circumstances, and that is the fatal blunder that we all tend to make… We must come back to the soul and to God who made it. We were made for Him, we are meant for Him, we have a correspondence with Him, and we will never come to rest until, like that needle on the compass, we strike that northern point, and there we come to rest – nowhere else.”~ Martyn Lloyd-Jones (1899-1981), Welsh minister and medical doctor “The mass of men have been forced to be gay about the little things, but sad about the big ones. Nevertheless (I offer my last dogma defiantly) it is not native to man to be so. Man is more himself, man is more manlike, when joy is the fundamental thing in him, and grief the superficial. Melancholy should be an innocent interlude, a tender and fugitive frame of mind; praise should be the permanent pulsation of the soul. Pessimism is at best an emotional half-holiday; joy is the uproarious labor by which all things live.”~ G.K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy “But in this world everything is upside down. That which, if it could be prolonged here, would be a truancy, is likest that which in a better country is the End of ends. Joy is the serious business of Heaven.”~ C.S. Lewis, Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on PrayerSERMON PASSAGEselected passages (ESV)Psalm 374 Delight yourself in the Lord,   and he will give you the desires of your heart. Proverbs 1225 Anxiety in a man's heart weighs him down,   but a good word makes him glad. Proverbs 139 The light of the righteous rejoices,   but the lamp of the wicked will be put out….12 Hope deferred makes the heart sick,   but a desire fulfilled is a tree of life. Proverbs 1410 The heart knows its own bitterness,   and no stranger shares its joy.11 The house of the wicked will be destroyed,   but the tent of the upright will flourish.12 There is a way that seems right to a man,   but its end is the way to death.13 Even in laughter the heart may ache,   and the end of joy may be grief….30 A tranquil heart gives life to the flesh,   but envy makes the bones rot. Proverbs 1513 A glad heart makes a cheerful face,   but by sorrow of heart the spirit is crushed.14 The heart of him who has understanding  seeks knowledge,   but the mouths of fools feed on folly.15 All the days of the afflicted are evil,   but the cheerful of heart has a continual feast.16 Better is a little with the fear of the Lord   than great treasure and trouble with it….30 The light of the eyes rejoices the heart,   and good news refreshes the bones. Proverbs 2525 Like cold water to a thirsty soul,   so is good news from a far country. Luke 2 8 And in the same region there were shepherds out in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. 9 And an angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were filled with great fear. 10 And the angel said to them, “Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. 11 For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. John 1624 Until now you have asked nothing in my name. Ask, and you will receive, that your joy may be full.

In dieser Folge von "Severe Mercy" beschäftigen wir us damit, wieso Gott manchmal schweigt.Wieso müssen wir durch schwierige Zeiten gehen? Und was ist da draußen bitte los?P. George möchte uns ein paar Einblicke in sein Leben geben und uns 4 praktische Tipps geben, wie ich mit diesem "Verlassen sein" umgehe. Diese Predigt ist aus der YP des Gaudete Sonntags am 16.12, und wurde von P. George Elsbett gehalten.

In dieser Folge von "Severe Mercy" beschäftigen wir us damit, wieso Gott manchmal schweigt. Wieso müssen wir durch schwierige Zeiten gehen? Und was ist da draußen bitte los? P. George möchte uns ein paar Einblicke in sein Leben geben und uns 4 praktische Tipps geben, wie ich mit diesem "Verlassen sein" umgehe. Diese Predigt ist aus der YP des Gaudete Sonntags am 16.12, und wurde von P. George Elsbett gehalten.

Mensch, wo bist du? Die Frage, die Gott Adam und Eva stellt, nachdem sie sich vor ihm versteckten - und die Frage, die Gott uns bis heute stellt. Nicht als Vorwurf, sondern eher als Einladung. Advent ist die Zeit der Sehnsucht, aber auch die Zeit, an der die Welt uns wahnsinnig viele Dinge anbietet, mit der wir die Sehnsucht (wenn auch nur kurz) füllen können. Aber, gibt es mehr als das, was die bunten Lichter und die Schleifchen auf den Geschenken versprechen? Diese Predigt wurde am Vorabend zu Maria Empfängnis, dem 7.12.2024 von P. Georg Rota bei der BeFree Messe gehalten.

Mensch, wo bist du? Die Frage, die Gott Adam und Eva stellt, nachdem sie sich vor ihm versteckten - und die Frage, die Gott uns bis heute stellt. Nicht als Vorwurf, sondern eher als Einladung. Advent ist die Zeit der Sehnsucht, aber auch die Zeit, an der die Welt uns wahnsinnig viele Dinge anbietet, mit der wir die Sehnsucht (wenn auch nur kurz) füllen können. Aber, gibt es mehr als das, was die bunten Lichter und die Schleifchen auf den Geschenken versprechen? Diese Predigt wurde am Vorabend zu Maria Empfängnis, dem 7.12.2024 von P. Georg Rota bei der BeFree Messe gehalten.

"Wenn sich mein Herz an Dinge hängt, bei denen ich versucht bin sie zu Götzen zu machen, dann kann es wehtun, wenn diese losgerissen werden". In diesem Advent führen wir parallel zur Challenge von Hallow auch eine Predigtserie zum Thema der "Harten Gnade". P. George spricht in dieser Folge einerseits über das Vertrauen, aber auch darüber, dass Gnade und Liebe manchmal schmerzen kann - und die Gnade selbst Gott etwas gekostet hat. Kann Liebe auch wehtun? Diese Predigt wurde von P. George Elsbett am 1. Dezember, dem 1. Adventsonntag 2024 bei der YP Messe gehalten.

"Wenn sich mein Herz an Dinge hängt, bei denen ich versucht bin sie zu Götzen zu machen, dann kann es wehtun, wenn diese losgerissen werden". In diesem Advent führen wir parallel zur Challenge von Hallow auch eine Predigtserie zum Thema der "Harten Gnade". P. George spricht in dieser Folge einerseits über das Vertrauen, aber auch darüber, dass Gnade und Liebe manchmal schmerzen kann - und die Gnade selbst Gott etwas gekostet hat. Kann Liebe auch wehtun? Diese Predigt wurde von P. George Elsbett am 1. Dezember, dem 1. Adventsonntag 2024 bei der YP Messe gehalten.

God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world.  – C. S. Lewis

Time:MorningMinister:Rev. Phil GrotenhuisTexts:Jonah 2

Preacher:  Pastor Tim Van Lant Passage:  Isaiah 5:1-7 Series:  Rebellion and Redemption: Isaiah 1-12 For more information about Rocky Mountain Presbyterian Church, please visit us at rmpca.org. 

The calm before the great storm is nearing its end. When it has given way to the ill winds of the Great Tribulation many will die.

Pastor Casey Fritz takes us through Jonah 1:4-16 where Jonah runs from the presence of the Lord. We look at what it means when God sends storms our way and their purpose in our lives.

A new MP3 sermon from OnePassion Ministries is now available on SermonAudio with the following details: Title: Severe Mercy Subtitle: Steadfast Hope Speaker: Dr. Steven J. Lawson Broadcaster: OnePassion Ministries Event: Devotional Date: 6/18/2024 Bible: Isaiah 6:6-7 Length: 11 min.

For a deeper study of God's Word, plus daily resources for your walk with Jesus, visit https://passionequip.com/.—With Passion City Online, you can join us every Sunday live at 9:30a and 11:45a, and our gatherings are available on-demand starting at 7p! Join us at https://passioncitychurch.com—Subscribe to our channel to see more messages from Passion City Church: https://www.youtube.com/passioncitychurch—Looking for content for your Kids? Subscribe to our Passion Kids Channel:https://passion.link/passionkidsonline —If you would like to give to our house, visit https://passioncitychurch.com/give/—Check out Passion's books, music, and more at https://passionresources.com/—At Passion City Church, we believe that because God has displayed the ultimate sacrifice in Jesus, our response to that in worship must be extravagant. It is our privilege and our created purpose to reflect God's Glory to Him through our praise, our sacrifice, and our song. —Follow Passion City Church: https://www.instagram.com/passioncity/ Follow Louie Giglio: https://www.instagram.com/louiegiglio Passion City Church is a Jesus church with locations in Atlanta and Washington D.C.

Chaplain Frank Mercer continues his study in the book of Exodus. Even though God is orchestrating plagues that make Egypt unbearable, it is truly an act of mercy. Have you ever considered that God shows tender mercy, but also severe mercy? Pharaoh's hard heart and constant disobedience requires God to take action. The plagues are terrible, but they are also opportunities for Pharaoh to see and believe who God is.

Chaplain Frank Mercer continues his study in the book of Exodus. Even though God is orchestrating plagues that make Egypt unbearable, it is truly an act of mercy. Have you ever considered that God shows tender mercy, but also severe mercy? Pharaoh's hard heart and constant disobedience requires God to take action. The plagues are terrible, but they are also opportunities for Pharaoh to see and believe who God is.

Here the call to obey Jesus regardless, it's a terrifying word because Jesus is always testing to see if we're faithful and true to Him.

Jude turns 15 and gets a visit from Ben, Katherine has a tea with the book club ladies, American Fiction is super sharp but problematic, and A Severe Mercy deserves a reread every decade or so.   Movies & TV: American Fiction Resident Alien   Books: The Ferryman by Justin Cronin   Ben's short film: Something's Out There   Other great stuff we like: Sam's Instagram Pacem in Terris Retreat Center Picnic Blanket Restoration of Christian Culture from Our Lady of Clear Creek Abbey Restoration of Christian Culture PDF Spiritual Direction.com Sam's podcast: To Interview Them https://www.fatimafarm.com/ liturgical calendar from Sofia Institute Press Wyoming Catholic Gregory the Great's St. Nicholas Guild Total Consecration to Jesus Through Mary Mac's Woodworking Shop   Mac's Online Woodcraft Store Mac's book! Clueless in Galilee   Please support us through Patreon Find us on our website Our libsyn page where you can find all our old episodes   Theme song by Mary Bragg.   Our other show: Spoiled! with Mac and Katherine   We use Amazon affiliate links. We may get a little kickback if you use the link above to purchase from Amazon.  

Do you ever read passages like Isaiah 3 & 4 and see God as mean and uncaring? Be honest! Today, we are going to look at God's heart of compassion for His people and for you by looking at an example of God's shocking forgiveness and restoration of one of the most evil kings in Judah's history. For your own study: Isaiah 3-4 Jonah 4:2 2 Chronicles 33:1-13 Isaiah 30:18 Lamentations 3:33 Isaiah 40:11 Suggested memory verse: Isaiah 30:18 Suggested song for this week: Isaiah 40 by Project of Love Subscribe on YouTube: @meetmeinisaiah6113 Follow us on Instagram: @meetmeinisaiah

Morgan Stephens

Pastor Morgan Stephens

A Severe Mercy by Sheldon Vanauken https://amzn.to/41AsBAy (affiliate link)    Paul Vander Klay clips channel https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCX0jIcadtoxELSwehCh5QTg Bridges of Meaning Discord https://discord.gg/eex6RuVC https://www.meetup.com/sacramento-estuary/ My Substack https://paulvanderklay.substack.com/ Estuary Hub Link https://www.estuaryhub.com/ If you want to schedule a one-on-one conversation check here. https://paulvanderklay.me/2019/08/06/converzations-with-pvk/ There is a video version of this podcast on YouTube at http://www.youtube.com/paulvanderklay To listen to this on ITunes https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/paul-vanderklays-podcast/id1394314333  If you need the RSS feed for your podcast player https://paulvanderklay.podbean.com/feed/  All Amazon links here are part of the Amazon Affiliate Program. Amazon pays me a small commission at no additional cost to you if you buy through one of the product links here. This is is one (free to you) way to support my videos.  https://paypal.me/paulvanderklay Blockchain backup on Lbry https://odysee.com/@paulvanderklay https://www.patreon.com/paulvanderklay Paul's Church Content at Living Stones Channel https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCh7bdktIALZ9Nq41oVCvW-A To support Paul's work by supporting his church give here. https://tithe.ly/give?c=2160640

 @grailcountry  Love Covers a Multitude of Sins https://www.youtube.com/live/pGli8SLUVaQ?si=cNUDX_UjnH0TnVPa  @consilienceproject3122  The Psychological Drivers of the Metacrisis: John Vervaeke Iain McGilchrist Daniel Schmachtenberger https://youtu.be/-6V0qmDZ2gg?si=hGH1aClBvW-OAlfV  @SimoneandMalcolm  Why Do More Rights Make Women Less Happy? https://youtu.be/tAbX7CngzSU?si=t4EFxsi0LEXmZFDR  @marshmello  Marshmello - Alone (Official Music Video) https://youtu.be/ALZHF5UqnU4?si=F78iX14TggNvj1s1 Mabel Story https://paulvanderklay.me/2009/10/03/mabel/ A Severe Mercy by Sheldon Vanauken https://amzn.to/41AsBAy (affiliate link) Paul Vander Klay clips channel https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCX0jIcadtoxELSwehCh5QTg Bridges of Meaning Discord https://discord.gg/eex6RuVC https://www.meetup.com/sacramento-estuary/ My Substack https://paulvanderklay.substack.com/ Estuary Hub Link https://www.estuaryhub.com/ If you want to schedule a one-on-one conversation check here. https://paulvanderklay.me/2019/08/06/converzations-with-pvk/ There is a video version of this podcast on YouTube at http://www.youtube.com/paulvanderklay To listen to this on ITunes https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/paul-vanderklays-podcast/id1394314333  If you need the RSS feed for your podcast player https://paulvanderklay.podbean.com/feed/  All Amazon links here are part of the Amazon Affiliate Program. Amazon pays me a small commission at no additional cost to you if you buy through one of the product links here. This is is one (free to you) way to support my videos.  https://paypal.me/paulvanderklay Blockchain backup on Lbry https://odysee.com/@paulvanderklay https://www.patreon.com/paulvanderklay Paul's Church Content at Living Stones Channel https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCh7bdktIALZ9Nq41oVCvW-A To support Paul's work by supporting his church give here. https://tithe.ly/give?c=2160640

A new MP3 sermon from Hopewell Associate Reformed Presbyterian is now available on SermonAudio with the following details: Title: Severe Mercy, Subduing Mercy, Superlative Mercy Subtitle: Family Worship Speaker: James Hakim Broadcaster: Hopewell Associate Reformed Presbyterian Event: Devotional Date: 11/29/2023 Bible: Isaiah 30; 2 Timothy 4:3-4 Length: 25 min.

How does the Lord show mercy to those who prefer human wisdom to God's authoritative Word-- Isaiah 30 prepares us for the first serial reading in public worship on the Lord's Day. In these thirty-three verses of Holy Scripture, the Holy Spirit teaches us that if men prefer their own wisdom to God's Word, it is a mercy when God visits their plans with devastating failure.

Jonah 4.1-11--Jonah and the Severe Mercy of God: The Compassionate King by Lettered Streets Covenant

Jonah 4.1-5--Jonah and the Severe Mercy of God: Exposing Our Double Standard by Lettered Streets Covenant

Jonah 3.1-10--Jonah and the Severe Mercy of God: Judgement Overturned by Lettered Streets Covenant

2023.10.29 A Severe Mercy | Jonah 1:11-16 |Jay Mitchell by EP Church Annapolis

Jonah 1.17-2.10--Jonah and the Severe Mercy of God by Lettered Streets Covenant

Jonah 1.11-16--Jonah and the Severe Mercy of God: Faith as Practice by Lettered Streets Covenant

Jonah 1.6-10--Jonah and the Severe Mercy of God: Neighbors by Lettered Streets Covenant

What do we need to learn about the incredible mercy of God? Join us this Sunday at CrossWinds Church in Spencer as we consider the answer from 2 Samuel 12.

Jonah 1.4-6--Jonah and the Severe Mercy of God: Storms by Lettered Streets Covenant

Jonah 1.1-3--Jonah and the Severe Mercy of God: Resistance by Lettered Streets Covenant

"Is God good? I know he loves the people around me, but does he love me the same? Sometimes the questions feel louder than the belief in me, what do I do with that?" These questions are common to the Christian journey of faith and our guest today, Stacey Tafao, discusses how vital the lost art of spiritual formation is to our lives. Learn how sometimes the question isn't "What is the answer to this?" as it is "Who is God for you in this moment?" Today we are joined by Stacey Tafao. She is the Pastor of Spiritual Formation and Community at Fellowship Church in Knoxville, TN. Stacey joined us previously and told us her story for the episode A Life Reframed: Redeeming our Wounds. Stacey references A Long Obedience in the Same Direction by Eugene H. Peterson. Stacey references the work of Larry Crabb. Stacey references A Severe Mercy by Sheldon Vanauken Stacey mentions graftedlife.org https://www.graftedlife.org/Stacey references The Road Back to You by Ian Morgan Cron Connect with StaceyEmail Rick at rickdunn61@gmail.com or find him on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram. Email Lauren at laurengmorgan@gmail.com or find her on Instagram.

PETE KELLEY, Lead Pastor / Sixth Sunday of Summertide / Genesis 11.1-9

Trudi continues the series, with look at the severe mercy and grace which Jonah experiences.

This media has been made available by Mosaic Boston Church. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston, or donate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com.Today, we are continuing in our series, Graduate Level Grace, and we are walking through chapter by chapter through Genesis 37-50. Today, we're in Genesis 43, and we are studying the life of Joseph. The constant theme that keeps coming up is that salvation is by grace. It's not something that we earn. It's not a process that we initiate by our good works, our own efforts to conjure up righteousness before God. It's something that God initiates, that God blesses us with. He bestows us with His grace to get us into right relationship with him. As we go forward in the Christian life, he continues to give us more and more of it to carry out his work faithfully. Today, we're going to keep in touch into the theme of grace again, and talk further how Joseph points us to Christ in his engagement with his brothers. Again, these are long chapters. I'm going to read Genesis 43, the whole chapter. It's verses one through 34.Pastor Jan has not been reading at the beginning and doing more longer quotations, walking through the text. I'm going to read it now, and just go in and out of the text quickly throughout the sermon. So if you do have a Bible, open up to Genesis 43:1-34 and follow along, and we'll have it on the screen as well. Furthermore, we are going to partake in communion today. This is something that we, as a church, practice the first Sunday of every month. I'll preach the word, we'll respond, and then we will partake in communion and I'll explain the steps along the way once we get there. I'm going to read Genesis 43 verses 1-34, and the sermons is about the mercy of God. Genesis 43:1-34. Now, the famine was severe in the land and when they had eaten the grain that they had brought from Egypt, their father said to them, "Go again, buy us a little food."But Judah said to him, "The man solemnly warned us, saying, 'You shall not see my face unless your brother is with you. 'If you'll send our brother with us, we will go down and buy you food. But if you'll not send him, we'll not go down, for the man said to us, 'You shall not see my face, unless your brother is with you.'" Israel said, "Why did you treat me so badly as to tell that man that you had another brother?" They replied, "The man questioned us carefully about ourselves and our kindred, saying, 'Is your father still alive? Do you have another brother?' What we told him was an answer to these questions. Could we in any way know that he would say, 'Bring your brother down'?"And Judah said to Israel his father "Send the boy with me, and we'll rise and go, that we may live and not die, both we and you and also our little ones. I will be a pledge of his safety. For my hand you shall require him. If I do not bring him back to you and set him before you, then let me bear the blame forever. If we had not delayed, we would now have returned twice." Then their father Israel said to them, "If it must be so, then do this: take some of the choice fruits of the land in your bags, and carry a present down to the man, a little balm and a little honey, gum, myrrh, pistachio nuts and almonds. Take back with you the money that was returned in the mouth of your sacks. Perhaps it wasn't oversight. Take also your brother and arise, go again to the man. May God Almighty grant you mercy before the man, and may he send back your other brother and Benjamin. And as for me, if I am bereaved of my children, I am bereaved."So the men took this present, and they took double the money with them, and Benjamin. They arose and went down to Egypt and stood before Joseph. When Joseph saw Benjamin with them, he said to the steward of his house, "Bring the men into the house and slaughter an animal and make ready for the men, for the men are to dine with me at noon." The man did as Joseph told him and brought the men to Joseph's house. And the men were afraid because they were brought to Joseph's house, and they said, "It is because of the money which was replaced in our sacks the first time, that we were brought in, so that he may assault us and fall upon us to make us servants and seize our donkeys."So they went up to the steward of Joseph's house and spoke with him at the door of the house, and said, "Oh, my Lord, we came down the first time to buy food. And when we came to the lodging place we opened our sacks, and there was each man's money in the mouth of his sack and money in full weight. So we have brought it again with us, and we have brought other money down with us to buy food. We do not know who put our money in our sacks." He replied, "Peace to you. Do not be afraid. Your God and the God of your father has put treasure in your sacks for you. I received your money." Then he brought Simeon out to them. And when the man had brought the men into Joseph's house and given them water, and they had washed their feet and when he had given their donkeys fodder, they prepared the present for Joseph coming at noon, for they heard that they should eat bread there.When Joseph came home, they brought into the house to him the present that they had with them and bowed down to him to the ground. And he inquired about their welfare and said, "Is your father well, the old man of whom you spoke? Is he still alive?" They said, "You're serving our father as well. He's still alive." And they bowed their heads and prostrated themselves and he lifted up his eyes and saw his brother Benjamin, his mother's son, and said, "Is this your youngest brother of whom you spoke to me? God be gracious to you, my son." Then Joseph hurried out, for his compassion grew warm for his brother, and he saw a place to weep. And he entered his chamber and wept there. Then he washed his face and came out.And controlling himself he said, "Serve the food." They served him by himself, and then by themselves, and the Egyptians who ate with him by themselves, because the Egyptians could not eat with the Hebrews, for that is an abomination to the Egyptians. And they sat before him, the firstborn according to his birthright and the youngest according to his youth. And the men looked at one another in amazement. Portions were taken to them from Joseph's table, but Benjamin's portion was five times as much as any of theirs. And they drank and were Mary with him. This is the word of the Lord. Let us pray.Heavenly Father, we praise you that your word says the grass withers and the flower fades, but the word of the Lord remains forever. We thank you, Lord, for this ancient book that is so much more than a book. We thank you, Lord, for this story of the life of Jacob and his sons, Judah, Joseph. We thank you Lord that this story is not just a story, not just a piece of history. It's something that your spirit turn alive in our hearts that can use to sanctify us, to grow us, to mold us, to grow our dependence on you and see our need for you in greater forms. We pray, Lord, for the blessing of your word. Bless the word as I preach it, but it'd go out in power and force. Let each one of here convicted to trust you through the hardship of day-to-day life, convicted of their need to look for your work in their lives, more closely, convicted of their need to cling to your word in all trials and circumstances. Lord, I pray these things in Jesus' holy name. Amen.Well, today, we are talking about Genesis 43. And yesterday, I sent out an email. We sent out a weekly email before the sermons go out, and I ask you to think about if you were God, how would you tell him to work on you? And if you're a believer, I'm wanting you to think about how would you want God to grow you, to shape you. I know that for me, even though I know God, Christ calls us to take up our cross daily and follow in his footsteps. I think my plan for myself would involve lots of isolation. My wife would be there, my kids would be there, but sometimes I'd be able to escape and get full freedom from them. There'd be a babysitter for me and my wife when we want to spend time together. And then, there'd be a lot of opportunity to grow by watching soccer, to grow by exercising about three hours a day, to grow by just processing things, facts, knowledge, the word of God in isolation without really engaging other people.So, what is it for you? If you had the choice as a believer, how would you like God to grow you? What do you think is best? I think a lot of us, we don't really go, we know it's not really mature to think like that. But oftentimes, when God follows his classic means, shown to us in scripture, we resist and we think we could do it better. And if you're a nonbeliever, you say, "God, show me. Woo me. I want you to talk to me in this specific way." And what is that for you if you're a nonbeliever here today? Because this is a chapter where in Genesis 43, and God is dealing with Jacob and his sons... Who's Jacob? Jacob is the son of Isaac, the son of Abraham and God. This is the first book of the Bible, the book of the beginnings of the creation, the book of the beginnings of the family of God, and God's work in creation.God creates the world, all things are good. Adam and Eve walk in perfect unity and peace and perfect knowledge of him. There's no sin, there's no tension, there's no conflict, there's no brokenness in the world. And Genesis 2 comes, and Adam and Eve sinned. Genesis 3 talks about how there's going to be thorns and thistles to life. The creation is impacted by man's sin. And really, Genesis 3-12, it's a story of the spread of the sin of mankind, in the hearts of man and in relationships and in the creation. So God calls Abraham, and he says, "Abraham, I'm going to bless you. I'm going to make you into great people." He's a man. I think he's 75 years old when he calls him, and he doesn't have a child. He says, "I'm going to make you a great people, and I'm going to bless you. I'm going to make you the father of many kings, the father of many nations."So his son, Isaac, receives that promise. His son Jacob receives that promise. And what we're finding out in this series is that Jacob, though he had some good moments in his youth where he showed true faith in the Lord, he is a bit of a bonehead and his sons are worse than him. They are adulterers, his 12 sons. They've committed incest, they are prideful, they're slanderous. They're all fighting inwardly. They're competing with each other. And furthermore, at one point, 20 years ago, they put the Father Jacob's prize son, the son that he had with his favorite wife, they left him in a pit for dead. What they don't know is that God preserved his life, and put him through a process to bring him to the right hand of Pharaoh. So God's dealing with this broken family while the lingering promise that they're going to be a blessing to the earth stands, so God has to work.These people are not perfect. God's people are never perfect. But what we see is that these people probably aren't saved, these people probably don't know God, and it's kind of offensive that God would choose to work through these people. This is kind of a stance that, "God is doing something new. Why would he save the world from the slavery to sin through such a broken family?" It's a statement that religion that says, "I do right. I earn favor before God is wrong." It's a statement that salvation is initiated by God, not by any individual man as he tries to approach God. It's a statement that God uses broken people. And how can he use broken people? It's because he gives grace to them. We're talking about this family and their brokenness, but we're talking about how God is dealing with them.Again, think about how would you like God to deal with you? But in this chapter, compare that with how God is working on these people as a model of the family of faith. Last week, we discussed a lot of this already. In chapter 42, Genesis, we discussed how God has been working on them through the hardship of famine. When the famine hits the land for about a year, they're forced to look for a source of food. We discussed how God has been dealing with them through the hardship of sojourning, of temporarily turning to foreign land for help and relief. It's the hardship of being a refugee or a migrant worker looking for the best for their family. You're engaging with hard travel, engaging foreign officials, engaging with bureaucracy stacked against them. There's a language barrier and there's stereotypes that they're engaging with.We discussed how God has dealt with this family through the pain of unjust imprisonment. We saw that after three days in prison, they go to Egypt, there's the famine, you're one of the famine. They run out of food, they go to Egypt, and they approach the Egyptian ruler and they receive food, but he places them unjustly in a jail for three days. They don't know that it's their brother Joseph and he's trying to chip away, get a sense of have these men repented, "Are they right before God? Are their hearts still the same as when they put them in the pit?" And they go unjustly to prison, they're sent unjustly to prison, and in Genesis 42:21, they exclaim, "In truth, we are guilty concerning our brother." For them, this is the first time probably in 20 years since abandoning Joseph, leaving him for dead, telling their father that he is gone to the point that he thinks he's dead, this is the first time that their guilty conscience is probably coming alive.And furthermore or less, we talked about how actually the awakened conscience was actually a grace of God, a gift of God. As the men process all the hardship that happened to them in the chapter last week and the things that I just list listed out, they ask in verse 28, "What is this that God has done to us?" God is doing something. He's dealing with Jacob and his sons, but the process is slow. So in this chapter, God continues the work of bringing these men into his family. As we process how God chose to work on this family, we should ask him to show us how he is... If we're not walking with him calling us back, or those walking with him, we should be asking him to show us how he is continuing to stay near us, to refine us.What the New Testament shows us is that the Christian life is like that. We are a piece of gold in the refiner's fire. So we're saved, but then God is exposing us to trials to burn out the impurities that we... Until we grow to the fullness of Christ likeness, God is going to be refining us. So ask Lord, "How are you working in me to save me, to grow me?" And a key verse, "How does he do that?" The key verse in the chapter and one of the key verses in the book, all the Book of Genesis is verse 14. And this is Jacob saying, "May God Almighty grant you mercy before the man." This is the first occurrence of mercy in all of Genesis and all of the Bible. The chapter is all about God's mercy to guilty, fearful, hopeless, lost sinners.The condition of these men as they are contemplating having to go back to Egypt, when they approach Joseph at his house. This chapter is all about the mercy that God offers to guilty sinners like you and me. It's by the mercy of God that God is using life circumstances, and the Egyptian ruler, who Jacob and his sons don't know to be Joseph, to refine these men, to draw them into saving an intimate relationship. And what we see in this chapter is that God dispatches different kinds of mercy. You kind of see it. Last week we touched on it, and this week there's a little bit. Joseph to them, the Egyptian ruler, he deals with the brothers in kind of a bad cop, good cop method. At some moments, God, through Joseph, dishes out tender mercy to the men. And just through pure kindness, gentleness, there's some moments he dishes out severe mercy by inflicting tough circumstances upon them.We're going to learn about different kinds of mercy. How does God try to draw us in, draw non-believers in through mercy? How does God grow and refine Christians through mercy? I'm going to point out three different kinds of mercy. God calls his children home and grows them through severe mercy, common mercy, and tender mercy. And know, the term mercy and grace, and then how they relate to love as you grow in the faith, they're kind of hard terms used because you can't really use them by fully separating them from the other, particularly grace and mercy. Know that I use the term mercy in this outline because I think the key verse talks about God's mercy to the men in this process of going back to Egypt. But I could have equally used the term grace. So to say that God gives mercy to someone has a connotation that God gives leniency when it is not required of him.To say that God gives grace, it means that God gives favor when it is not merited by the recipient and that they're intertwined. Because when God is extending leniency, he is extending favor or grace. When God is extending grace or unmerited favor, he's extending leniency. But this, today, I want to step away from the title of the sermons here and talk about mercy as it relates to grace. God calls his children home and grows them through severe mercy. In verses 1-14, we see that God calls his children home, and I use the term, by extending severe mercy. This is a term that I first became acquainted with in the book, A Severe Mercy by an author Sheldon Vanauken. I probably butchered that. To say that God calls his children home and grows them through severe mercy, put most broadly, it's to say that God calls his children home and grows them by exposing them to severe situations.God purposes that his children face severe, hard, difficult, challenging situations in order to draw them in. In the book, Vanauken, he talks about how God used the death of his wife of a couple of decades. He thinks to actually save him, because ultimately he saw all of his engagement with Christianity was really tied to this desire to build this perfect marriage with his wife. He never really wanted God for God's sake. God had to strip, he says, and he talks about how his engagement through personal letters with CS Lewis helped him. He saw that through taking his wife, he could finally treasure a relationship with God. And that was a severe mercy. Because if that's what it took to get him into a right relationship with God, to see his need for God, to treasure relationship with God that's offered through Christ, then it's a mercy.It's a confusing term, a severe mercy. But when you chew on it, it can really help you understand how God works. To face the severe mercy is severe because it's hard and difficult to face such circumstances. To face the severe mercy is an experience of God's mercy. Because though the severe mercy may be severe and difficult to face or endure, the experience altogether is so much better than what a sinner deserves. So severe mercy, it leads to a person to have a greater understanding of who God is and it leads one to see their limitations of their own power. Furthermore, it leads one to see the boundless limits of God's infinite power, and it's hard to swallow. By exposing people as children to hardship, God is actually being very gentle or merciful to them. How is this true? The whole narrative of scripture says that God is a holy God, and that from the beginning, man was to walk in a holy manner before him.And if he did not, the penalty would be death. Eternal expulsion from the loving presence of God. For the just punishment of sin against an infinite holy God is infinite wrath and eternal punishment. Romans 3:23 says that all have fallen, all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. Because nobody has met the mark perfect holiness before God, any moment where God withholds or delays the carrying out of his wrath, it's a blessing, a severely merciful act where he is shown leniency. So even as Christians or people approaching the faith, when life is really difficult or hard for any person because it's not anything close to facing the just wrath of God, such a moment is an act of severe mercy extended to them by God. So in this, I'm going to step into the text verses 1-14. I'm going to talk about different forms of severe mercy that God extends, that he exposes his followers too.He uses it to save people, he uses it to grow people, and he is merciful in doing so again. Because the lessons that they learn are so much more important than the idols that they're clinging to, that he's stripping away. In this chapter, we find Jacob's brothers a long while after their initial experience of guilt in the last chapter. Remember, in verse 21, they said, "In truth, we are guilty concerning our brother, this is the last chapter, in that we saw the distress of his soul, they're talking about Joseph in the pit, when he begged us and we did not listen. That is why this distress has come upon us." They exclaimed this and felt their conscience stirred. But now that they're back home, away from Egypt, away from the tension of the moment, away from the threat of imprisonment, away from this man who has authority over them, things have gone back to normal.Maybe the famine will end, they think. Maybe they won't have to go back to Egypt, if that happens. Perhaps, they can forget their past sins. Maybe they can push those ideas of God that crept up in their mind and his authority over their lives, off their consciences forever. They've made an idol. They've gone back home and they've made an idol out of the facade of a peaceful status quo on the surface of their lives, while there's guilt for sin on their conscience they've not dealt with. If this is their thinking, whether the text shows us, is that God has another plan in mind. If you're wrestling with guilt or fighting to suppress guilt, God has another plan in mind for you. He's relentless in his pursuit of them. And in these verses, we see the three forms of severe mercy.First, he exposes them to famine. More broadly, he exposes them to the pressures of living in a fallen world. Genesis 43:1-2. Now, the famine was severe in the land. And when they had eaten the grain that they had bought brought from Egypt, their father said to them, "Go again, buy us a little food." So God exposes them to continued famine. This is probably close to the end of year two of famine based on what other chapters tell us. And famine, honestly, as a modern American, I can't fathom this. Apparently, 49 million people in 46 countries are experiencing severe food crisis or famine in the present day. And that's according to a quick Google search, an organization called Action Against Hunger. Famine occurs when drought and her infestation and her plant disease and her war continuously plague a huge region of land for months or years at a time.It's a severe hardship that, when faced, lingers on your mind all day every day until there is relief. Hardship that adds uncertainty to all matters of life, to every minute, every hour, every week. It kills you physically and it kills you psychologically, and there's nothing you can do to stop it. You're powerless to put an end to it. All you're left to do is know how to respond to it and engage with it and survive through it. Obviously, today, we praise God. We have a lot of knowledge, materials, technology, pesticides, and means of food preservation to try to confront famine, but it clearly arises in many lands today. But the point is, back then, they did not. Jacob and his family, this family called to bless the world and become numerous nation of people of kingdoms, they're facing famine. They are almost at the point of not surviving.So the famine, it exerts pressure on them, they have to deal with it and they're powerless. But famine, it's something that the greatest schemes of men, greatest schemes of America, of science and technology cannot control. There are other forms of natural disasters, severe forms of mercy that we face, drought, hurricanes, tsunamis, tornadoes, earthquakes, volcano eruptions, biological and airborne microorganisms. I was reminded of this while I'm reading this, studying this, writing this yesterday. I got multiple notifications on my phone and on my computer from Apple talking about the fine particulates that are floating around, the bad air quality because of the wildfires in Canada. We can't control the weather and the shifting of the earth and microorganisms and fine particulates. And our increased ability to track a lot of these things, it seems to cause more paranoia and anxiety than actually helps us at times.So God speaks to us again and again through pressures of famine still, but pressures of a fallen sin, fallen world through weather, through disease, through political, international turmoil that we cannot control. 9/11, floods, hurricane Katrina, hurricane Harvey in Houston several years back, COVID, heated elections, Russia-Ukraine, the threat of personal sickness and death at any minute, struggles with conception still plaguing the world. Miscarriage, race, gender, class battles, the Lord... These things have entered the world because of sin and we have to face them. What is God telling us in all of it? We are not in control. He is sovereign. He is in control to be brought to this knowledge, to love this knowledge, to find peace in this knowledge. It's a mercy, a grace of God. He's in control. He's in charge. We know he is good. Look at how he redeemed the travesty of the cross of Jesus Christ.So all of natural history, world history align with the words of St. Paul in Romans 8:18-22, I'm just going to read 22. For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now, Jacob and his sons face it. We still face it. It impacts our lives and our decisions. So I ask you, what is God telling you through the Earth's groaning? It's going to keep happening until Jesus comes back to make all things new. Paul has to think about it. How has God used natural circumstances or pressures of a fallen world to make you think or act in life? What have you learned from them? What do you think you can learn right now? Second, God extends mercy to Jacob and his brothers to draw them into fellowship with him by exposing them to the pressure of broken people.Verse three. But Judah said to him, "The man, the Egyptian ruler, solemnly warned us saying, 'You shall not see my face unless your brother is with you.'" So the will of a relatively random governor in Egypt, according to the brothers as they don't know it is Joseph, he's forcing them in a certain direction. He's adding pressures and limitations to their freedom. They have to deal with the fact that one brother, Simeon, is still imprisoned by him there. And specifically in this chapter, they're pressured to send Benjamin to Egypt upon his command simply to have food for their families to survive. Like Jacob, we still face these unwanted pressures from other people and these are appointed by the severe mercy of God. We can try to create vacuums to avoid such people. We can seek out echo chambers of those who are like-minded. It's easier than ever.We can seek spouses with the exact same interests, companies and departments, literally through search algorithms on apps online. We can find neighbors, churches, work departments that are the perfect fit. But people are inevitable, they're broken, they're sinful. We can't escape them, we can't cancel them, and that's by God's design. The tendency when we engage people and they inflict their presence and authority on our lives, whether we seek it or not, is that we think we can change them. When we're first confronted with hard people, we say to ourselves, "That's okay. Give me a little time, I'll change you." But with time, we see that we can't. This is the husband and the wife almost on a day-to-day basis. This is parents trying to change their children, grow their children, save their children on their time. Children trying to change their parents.This is the boss trying to change the employee, the employee trying to change the boss. No matter how many phone apps, forms of counseling or technology we have that can teach us how to change people, we have to realize that we can't. Only God can. Only God can change someone from the inside out, change them at the heart level such that their behavior, their presence, their communication changes. We need to just approach these moments, this lack of power with humility. We can fight it, we can keep pressing on and nagging on the people of our lives to change them, or we can ask God what is he trying to do through this, the presence of these people.What is that you trying to do through the engagements of them? We have to allow our lives to be shaped by the necessity of engaging people. So ask God, how are you changing me? How are you calling me home to you to crave your presence, your sinless presence, your loving presence more? How are you refining me through other people? This is a severe mercy of God that we have to engage people. Third, God extends severe mercy to Jacob and his brothers to draw them into fellowship with him by exposing them to undesirable circumstances. Verse 6, Jacob says, "Why did you treat me so badly as to tell the man that you had another brother?" So Jacob, the neglectful father, comes off as an angry old curmudgeon, as a victim of the folly of his sons as he processes the situation. He's just whining. Honestly, my first engagement with this was laughing as I read it because I was just sitting and whining with my wife in the minutes before I'd started to study this.And I just want to say, "Men, we think that our wives and children are blessed when we sit down and tell them how we have it right, everyone else in our life has it wrong, and that we are victim of our circumstances." We need to stop. We need to be models of faith and steadfast faithfulness to God. There's no way to avoid difficult circumstances. Jacob and his sons had no control over the fact of the famine and the extension of the famine, and they had no control over the fact that Egypt had all the grain in that period. Similarly, in our lives, there's seasons, moments, trials that just fall into our lap. Things that we didn't invite into our households, our churches, our neighborhoods, our schools, our local state and national governments, financial downturns, wars that we have to engage, that we have no interest in engaging but we have to.We can get depressed, we can get paralyzed, we can busy ourselves to avoid the fact that these tensions and these situations exist. We can distract ourselves with relationships, devices, and shows, adrenaline rushes. We can try to ignore them by engaging in drink, smoke, other chemicals, or we can face the fact that circumstances are part of life. We're called to face them in faith, and find the faithful narrow way forward that brings glory to God. As we do that in the process, the Lord is teaching us, shaping us, saving many all along. These moments, these undesired circumstances shouldn't always be viewed as hindrances, but as opportunities for us to see God's wisdom at work in our lives, to see his power moving in our life. So in some, I've talked about the severe mercy of God as he exposes us to it through the effects of living in a sinful world through people, through random undesired circumstances.And know, the message that I want you to take is not just expect hardship to be a part of your life, but not become a stoic. It's not a, "Pick-up your bootstraps. This is life, just face it. Everybody has to deal with it. Find a way to cope." No, it's find a way to see God's hand through it all. Ask him to grow your wisdom, your insight to engage such moments in a way that pleases him. Ask him to show you what he's teaching you. Ask him how he wants you to respond, one day at a time, without getting overcome with anxiety, thinking about how hard it will be in the future. I like the framing of, "You need to see that as you think about severe mercies, a lot of these external circumstances forcing their pressure on onto your life. You need to see that what makes you you, and the Lord is not just the things that you have done but the things that also have happened to you.God's using it all in his grand plan and glorious plan to save you, to shape you, prepare you for his work. We've seen him do such work in the life of Joseph as we meditated upon his experience in the pit. We meditated upon facing false accusations of adultery. We meditated upon him being forced to be in an Egyptian jail for several years. We've seen how God prepared him to handle this moment with grace and mercy. So the same thing that he did with Joseph, the same thing he's doing with you and you need to trust him as he does it. See here, the text says that God is shaping these men through severe mercy. I just want to take time to look at Judah and Jacob to show you that transformation is actually happening. Let's look at Judah. Judah, who we know from our study in Genesis 38, was a very hard and stubborn man.He slept with his deceased son's wife when he thought she was a prostitute. This Judah is changing by God's severe mercy and becoming the family leader in this chapter. In the text, at the beginning when after Jacob resists sending the brothers back with Benjamin, Judah honestly, respectfully, directly speaks to his father. He still honors him, but he stands on truth before him. In verse 8, to convince his father, he takes a wise strategy. He repeats to his father, "Send the boy with me, and we will rise and go, that we may live and not die." Jacob said when he first sent the sons to Egypt, he said, "Go to Egypt to get grain, so that we may live and not die." He's using Jacob's words to convince him. And then he adds an element so that both we and you and also our little ones may be saved, may stay alive.Judah's not thinking of himself as we saw him do. Primarily, he's thinking of others. So further, Judah, the biggest thing that he does is he pledges his life to Jacob. He commits to taking personal responsibility if Benjamin does not return. This is in comparison to the author that Ruben makes in the last chapter in verse 7. Ruben says to Jacob, this harsh approach, "Kill my two sons if I go to Egypt with Benjamin and don't return with him." We see Jacob's wisdom. We see him taking responsibility. And this foreshadows, a little side note, the precedence that the tribe of Judah eventually takes among the other tribes of the nation of Israel. It points to the time that Jesus Christ, a descendant of Judah, the line of the tribe of Judah's scripture calls him, takes responsibility for the sins of the lost sons of God by going to the cross, offering himself in their place.Judah changes but we see an incredible change in Jacob through the severe mercy of God, through the providential appointment of hardship. Jacob, again, he is a whiny curmudgeon at the start of the chapter, blaming everyone else for the situation that they're in. He's still showing extreme preference for his son Benjamin over the other 10, but there's great change taking place as the chapter goes forward. This is noted most clearly by the fact that, for most of the story today, Jacob's story is that God does save him. Jacob does have faith in God. And God, at that point, he passes his promises of the covenant from Abraham and Isaac to him, and God gives him a covenant named Israel. But Jacob, even after a profound experience in earlier chapters of Genesis, he goes back to his old ways. So the story, the narrative throughout Genesis primarily calls him Jacob over and over again.In chapter 42, he's Jacob. In this chapter, he moves from the old angry man to the new man Israel. He starts off complaining, but then he takes charge as these situations force him to. He provides decisive and wise leadership in granting the brother's permission to bring Benjamin, and giving them instructions to pack gifts, local delicacies that they don't have in Egypt to earn the favor of the ruler, to double the money that they bring back after the Egyptians did not keep their money last time. He takes practical matters. He thinks responsibly. But the most notable change that we see in Jacob as he faces the severe mercy of God is that he has revival in his faith. In verse 14, he's brought to the point where he knows he's powerless to change the situation, and he says, "May God Almighty grant you mercy before the man, and may send back your other brother and Benjamin. And as for me, if I'm bereaved of my children, I'm bereaved."Jacob, now Israel, he appeals to the covenant name of God of Genesis, El Shaddai, Genesis 17 particularly, the mighty God. This God, he's trusted in before, he will trust in again. Furthermore, in this verse, he appeals to the mercy of God for the success of the journey for Egypt. He knows only God can give them favorable outcome here. Lastly, what's most profound, he entrusts Benjamin's safety and the desire for the return of Benjamin's brother Joseph to God, right? He's been grieving the loss of Joseph, basically not functioning, not engaging the other brothers for 20 years, all the while preserving Benjamin's life at all costs and just ignoring those other brothers. And Jacob relinquish his grip on the matter. He goes as far as showing peace over the fact that if it's the Lord's will to bereave him of his children, then so be it.You got to remember, he did not forget that God said that He's carrying this promise to be the father of many nations, like that was passed down from Abraham and Isaac. He says, "God, I trust you. You have the power to fulfill your promises even when there seems to be no hope." So I elaborate on Judas' transformation, Jacob's transformation to illustrate how God uses severe mercy, hard circumstances to change them, to save them, to grow them in the faith. We can spend all of our life begrudgingly facing the appointed personal, familial, cultural, global circumstances that we're born into or approach them with faith. We can see how they deepen our dependence on God, make us better men and women, grow our vision and appreciation for the daily mercies and graces of God, and increase the fruit of the spirit within us. We're becoming more like Christ as we engage them faithfully.Some may ask, why does God act like this? Why does he have a point to choose to use severe mercy? This is my second point, and it's really short. If God calls his children home and grows them through severe mercy, common mercy, why does he use severe mercy? Because he is offering common mercy constantly, and we don't receive it. Matthew 5:45 says, "For he makes the sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust." God is actually trying to tell us through the basic mercies, basic graces of daily life that he is God and he is in control, and we owe him our worship and faithfulness. Through the rising of the sun, every day on all people, through the sending of rains, through daily health, through the beauty of nature, through the provision of daily bread, through the joyful spirit and faith that children have as they wake up and just expect God to provide through the majesty of just the creative world, he's talking to us and it's not enough for us.We are stubborn. We are selfish. We choose to say that that is not enough. We place ourselves in the position of God, and we don't accept his means of communicating that. That's the mistake that Adam and Eve made in the garden. They think that God is keeping something from them in just the basic provision of life in the garden. So we commit the same sin and we don't receive common mercy, which I'm also basically saying is the same thing, historically-referred to as common grace. But praise God, he doesn't stop at common mercy. He doesn't stop at severe mercy to draw us in. He gives us tender mercy, and this is my third point. God calls his children home through severe mercy, common mercy, tender mercy.The use of tender mercy, it's a little redundant. I could have just said mercy. But to drive home in the point and emphasize how good it is, I went forward with tender mercy. He said that he speaks to us through tender mercy, expose us to tender mercy. He treats us and speaks to us with very loving treatment. He engages our fears and guilt uniquely. He mercifully and graciously condescends to speak to us at a level that we understand, in his process of calling us to him and refining us once we're in the family. This is what verses 15-34 really show us. God calls the brothers back by tender mercy. Verse 18 says, "And the men were afraid because they were brought to Joseph's house." So they bring the goods, they bring the money, they bring Benjamin back to Egypt, and they're told by a servant to go to his house.Can you imagine these tent dwellers, these back country men when they're about to go to the house, the property of this powerful Egyptian ruler, essentially a billionaire of their day? They're rolling up on their donkeys, not even camels, to palace with dozens of camels. It's like driving a rusty old pickup truck to a mansion with multiple Teslas and model cars. And they're weary from facing God's severe mercy, the famine, the travel. The anxiety of how they will be received by the ruler after they return, as they know that the ruler did not receive the money the first time, it would've been paralyzing them. Just not knowing, "Is this ruler just going to come down and arrest us and make us his slave?" Their worst fear would probably be over the fact, "That as we engage this man, are we going to be brought to that point where we feel guilty again for throwing Joseph into the pit?"Again, they don't know that Joseph is the ruler. But they know that through engagement with this man, they were brought back to this thing that they just want to depress. But God brings these men back to Egypt as part of the process to draw him in. And how are they received? It's with kindness, with love. Remember, Jacob/Israel's prayer in verse 14, May God Almighty grant you mercy before him. Jacob's prayers come true. It's answered. The ruler and his servant receive them with tender mercy. They arise in Egypt, guilty, fearful. What does the servant say to them? He says, "Peace," shalom in Hebrew, "Peace to you. Do not be afraid. Your God and the God of your father has put treasure in your sacks for you." This is after they say hello and confess that they went home with the money. It says, "Don't worry about it."As the text continues, the servant brings him out, Simeon. He's released as promised, upon their return in their last chapter, and he's in good shape. Then though they're foreigners, they are brought into the private residence of a ruler. Further, the text says they're given water, their feet are washed, their donkeys aren't stolen but are given fodder from the royal feed, and they're invited to a feast. When they approach Joseph at the feast, they bow down to him. And what does he do? He inquires of their welfare, asks them how they are doing, and I'm sure it would've been a little bit of a sugarcoated answer of, "Oh, we're great." Like not acknowledging the fact that they're in turmoil for the months and weeks as this moment approached. But he inquires about their welfare, asks about their father. The ruler further goes to greet the younger brother that he didn't meet during the last visit, Benjamin, and blesses him saying, "God be gracious to you, my son."Altogether, God, after providentially offering common mercy throughout their lives, after offering a lot of severe mercy recently, God has arranged for them to taste his tender mercy as part of the process to draw him in, to fellowship with him. In a situation where Joseph, the ruler, could have brought down justice for the situation with the money as things appeared. For his sin, their sin against him 20 years ago, he treats him with mercy. He treats him with love and kindness. One of the most notable things about the merciful treatment that God has arranged for the brothers is that he goes above and beyond to show the brothers that he's speaking to them through these mercies in ways that are uniquely designed for them. Verse 33 says, And they sat before him, the firstborn according to his birthright and the youngest according to his youth. And the men looked at one another in amazement. God, through Joseph, announces this moment in such a way that the brothers should know that they're talking to him.Just think, there's 11 brothers sitting down. And in this moment, they're arranged from oldest to youngest. If you think about how many ways that the ruler could have arranged them, it's equal to 11 factorial. Yes, I'm making you think about middle school math right now. 11 factorial ways that he could have arranged these men. That's 39,916,800 ways that the ruler could have seeded them, and one of them is the perfect way and he does it. God is clearly speaking to them. And do they see it? Further, in verse 34, the text mentions that the ruler gives Benjamin, the brother of Joseph, five times the portion of food. God's trying to communicate to them that he is God. He knows what they did, and he is mercifully dealing with their sin toward Joseph right now by bringing attention to Benjamin. In this specific communication to the brothers, God is just calling them home.He wants them to cry out mercy as they see that he is God. And they need his mercy for their sin, for their rebellion against his authority over their life, for their specific sins, and particularly, the sin against Joseph. Through tender mercy and the generalness of the ruler's reception, through the specific details of the seating arrangement and serving, God's talking to them. He's trying to stir their minds to acknowledge him as God. But what is their response? Verse 33 says, They looked at one another in amazement. They looked around at each other as if the way they were seated was a coincidence. They looked at each other and said, "Well, forgot about it," and set their minds to the feast before them. Verse 34 says, after Benjamin was given a huge portion, they just enjoyed themselves and had a nice meal like at any other banquet. With their youngest brother, nobody would ever have given the youngest brother this kind of portion. He gets five times more than them in this patriarchal society.And furthermore, at the start of the next chapter, the brothers after this experience where God is just talking to them, offering them mercy, showing them gentleness, tender mercy, they're just content to wake up and go home. They're not inclined to think about everything that's happening. Their reception of the mercy of God, it's dull. They're not moved. It gives them no more than a smile and the satisfaction of a good day and full belly gives them. Isn't that very similar to the reaction that the world has toward God and his mercy? Isn't that very similar to the reaction that you have toward it, on some days? If you're a believer, you can't be a believer without truly cherishing this moment, at one point. But it grows dry and worn out. That's because we're not seeing how God is moving through everything to save us, grow us, shape us.You see, Joseph's brothers, they have an excuse. The ruler didn't reveal himself as Joseph. They don't know that's him, but we know who the ruler is. We know who the governor is. We know who the king of kings, the Lord of Lord is, over all of the earth and over us all as individuals. It's the Lord Jesus Christ. It's written on our heart, our conscience, and it's written in the creation. We long for God's perfect and just rule and reign and the comfort of his presence, when the storms and trials, the rulers and people and circumstances of the broken world impress their unjust influence on our lives and decision making. We long for his unique and tender love toward us as we face these hardships. We know that for all of history, all the time, God has supremely shown his love to man.He has communicated his desire to extend love and grace to each of us in a million unique different ways. Most clearly, he has mercifully and graciously shown his love for us. In coming to deal with our greatest need as parched, guilty, dead sinners. He took on flesh, went from heaven to earth and walked the earth. He came to deal with our greatest need, our thirst for him. God broke the barrier by sending a son to take on flesh, bear the hardship and temptations of this world perfectly as we could not, and to go to the cross in our place. We know that God chosen his love for us and, that while we are still sinners, Christ died for us. How much more clearly could God in all of his glory condescend to speak to us in our greatest need to communicate his love to us? And yet we're often reluctant to receive it.We're reluctant to see our need to entrust our lives to him. Joseph and his brothers had an excuse, but we don't. So Colossians 2:9-10, it says, we're in him the whole fullness of the deity dwells bodily. And you have been filled in him who is the head of all rule and authority. We have no excuse. God is showing his mercy, communicating his love and desire to be in relationship with us over and over again, and we need to receive it. Christ, he broke the divide between heaven and earth. His crowning act of glory with all of his authority was to lay side as glory and die for us. That's really what Joseph is doing. Joseph could be using his authority to squash these sinners to just pour out wrath, but he doesn't. God, Christ did all of this in order that we might live and dine at the same table with him, with a portion due to the firstborn and rule with him and his eternal kingdom.That's what Joseph was doing. That's what Christ offers to us. So I ask you today to close, how is God extending severe mercy to you? How is he extending common mercy? How can you see it better? How is he extending tender mercy, specifically speaking to you, in ways that speak to your greatest fears, your greatest sense, your areas of guilt, your questions of the truth? As you see that, just bow and humble submission to him. Genesis 43 says, you're doubtful, sinful, guilty people like Jacob's family and us with a bad record of bad conscience. There is one power. One of great power and great honor who loves you, who wants to bless you and deliver you from the guilt of your sin and circumstances. He's doing so much to get you to see that. Try to see it. Come into his family, his love, his grace, his mercy. It's sufficient. Let us pray.Heavenly Father, we praise you that Christ has come and he came out of love. He initiated the process that procured our salvation. It's not anything that we can do, but it's all that he has done. And Lord, we praise you that you do not leave us in the condition that we're in. When you save us, you give us your righteousness, but you appoint seasons and trials and circumstances and engagement with the fallen world to grow us. We get to see your hand of redemption at work in us and through us every day. Lord, we praise you that we know we have a savior who has lived perfectly, died in our place, roses from the dead, and ascended to your right hand of authority just like Joseph was at the right hand of Pharaoh. And he is working for our good, for our preservation, for our growth in the faith. We pray all these things in Jesus' name. Amen.Now, we're going to transition to a time in the service of communion. This is something that we do as believers to commemorate the fact that by offering his body, pouring out his blood for us on the cross, Jesus invites us to live and dine guilt free at his table. For whom is holy communion—it's for repentant Christians, repentant children of God. If you're not a Christian, not sure where you stand before God, we ask you to withhold from partaking and meditate on the gospel, meditate upon the sermon, the message of today. But if you have decided today to receive Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, you're welcome to partake. And if are a Christian, we emphasize that this is for repentant believers. If you have unreconciled sin in your life that you have not brought to the Lord, if you have it on your conscience to approach other brothers and sisters where there is sin, we ask you to with withhold.So if you haven't received a cup with a little wafer and the elements, please raise your hand. As I pray, one of the ushers will give you one. Heavenly Father, we praise you for your grace and mercy. Jesus, we thank you for procuring salvation for us. You suffered, Lord, and triumphed for us. Today, we remember your suffering. Holy Spirit, I pray that you prepare our hearts now to focus on the attention of the cross of Jesus Christ dying for us, the primary act of showing your tender mercy toward us. We pray this in Jesus' name. Amen. Take off the bottom layer. I think all of our cups now have the bread on the bottom. Take the bread out and follow along with me. On the night that Jesus was betrayed, he took the bread and after eating it, he said, "This is my body broken for you. Take, eat, and do this in remembrance of me."He then proceeded to take the cup, and he said, "This cup is the cup of the new covenant of my blood, which is poured out for the sins of many. Take, drink, and do this in remembrance of me." Let's pray. Lord God, we glorify you. We pray, Lord, Holy Spirit, help us in glorifying God as we meditate upon the wisdom of his ways, the ability to redeem and use the brokenness of this world, the broken moments of our life, the broken moments of our personality, and redeem them and use them to be a blessing to others. Help us, Lord, as we worship. Help us to cast off all of our burdens and anxieties and stresses for situations, relationships that we cannot control to you. Help us to focus on you on the greatness of your power, your majesty, holiness, righteousness, truth, perfect plans, and sovereignty. Help us to sing with all that we have because you are worthy of all worship and glory and honor in all seasons. We pray this all in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

This media has been made available by Mosaic Boston Church. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston, or donate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com.Today, we are continuing in our series, Graduate Level Grace, and we are walking through chapter by chapter through Genesis 37-50. Today, we're in Genesis 43, and we are studying the life of Joseph. The constant theme that keeps coming up is that salvation is by grace. It's not something that we earn. It's not a process that we initiate by our good works, our own efforts to conjure up righteousness before God. It's something that God initiates, that God blesses us with. He bestows us with His grace to get us into right relationship with him. As we go forward in the Christian life, he continues to give us more and more of it to carry out his work faithfully. Today, we're going to keep in touch into the theme of grace again, and talk further how Joseph points us to Christ in his engagement with his brothers. Again, these are long chapters. I'm going to read Genesis 43, the whole chapter. It's verses one through 34.Pastor Jan has not been reading at the beginning and doing more longer quotations, walking through the text. I'm going to read it now, and just go in and out of the text quickly throughout the sermon. So if you do have a Bible, open up to Genesis 43:1-34 and follow along, and we'll have it on the screen as well. Furthermore, we are going to partake in communion today. This is something that we, as a church, practice the first Sunday of every month. I'll preach the word, we'll respond, and then we will partake in communion and I'll explain the steps along the way once we get there. I'm going to read Genesis 43 verses 1-34, and the sermons is about the mercy of God. Genesis 43:1-34. Now, the famine was severe in the land and when they had eaten the grain that they had brought from Egypt, their father said to them, "Go again, buy us a little food."But Judah said to him, "The man solemnly warned us, saying, 'You shall not see my face unless your brother is with you. 'If you'll send our brother with us, we will go down and buy you food. But if you'll not send him, we'll not go down, for the man said to us, 'You shall not see my face, unless your brother is with you.'" Israel said, "Why did you treat me so badly as to tell that man that you had another brother?" They replied, "The man questioned us carefully about ourselves and our kindred, saying, 'Is your father still alive? Do you have another brother?' What we told him was an answer to these questions. Could we in any way know that he would say, 'Bring your brother down'?"And Judah said to Israel his father "Send the boy with me, and we'll rise and go, that we may live and not die, both we and you and also our little ones. I will be a pledge of his safety. For my hand you shall require him. If I do not bring him back to you and set him before you, then let me bear the blame forever. If we had not delayed, we would now have returned twice." Then their father Israel said to them, "If it must be so, then do this: take some of the choice fruits of the land in your bags, and carry a present down to the man, a little balm and a little honey, gum, myrrh, pistachio nuts and almonds. Take back with you the money that was returned in the mouth of your sacks. Perhaps it wasn't oversight. Take also your brother and arise, go again to the man. May God Almighty grant you mercy before the man, and may he send back your other brother and Benjamin. And as for me, if I am bereaved of my children, I am bereaved."So the men took this present, and they took double the money with them, and Benjamin. They arose and went down to Egypt and stood before Joseph. When Joseph saw Benjamin with them, he said to the steward of his house, "Bring the men into the house and slaughter an animal and make ready for the men, for the men are to dine with me at noon." The man did as Joseph told him and brought the men to Joseph's house. And the men were afraid because they were brought to Joseph's house, and they said, "It is because of the money which was replaced in our sacks the first time, that we were brought in, so that he may assault us and fall upon us to make us servants and seize our donkeys."So they went up to the steward of Joseph's house and spoke with him at the door of the house, and said, "Oh, my Lord, we came down the first time to buy food. And when we came to the lodging place we opened our sacks, and there was each man's money in the mouth of his sack and money in full weight. So we have brought it again with us, and we have brought other money down with us to buy food. We do not know who put our money in our sacks." He replied, "Peace to you. Do not be afraid. Your God and the God of your father has put treasure in your sacks for you. I received your money." Then he brought Simeon out to them. And when the man had brought the men into Joseph's house and given them water, and they had washed their feet and when he had given their donkeys fodder, they prepared the present for Joseph coming at noon, for they heard that they should eat bread there.When Joseph came home, they brought into the house to him the present that they had with them and bowed down to him to the ground. And he inquired about their welfare and said, "Is your father well, the old man of whom you spoke? Is he still alive?" They said, "You're serving our father as well. He's still alive." And they bowed their heads and prostrated themselves and he lifted up his eyes and saw his brother Benjamin, his mother's son, and said, "Is this your youngest brother of whom you spoke to me? God be gracious to you, my son." Then Joseph hurried out, for his compassion grew warm for his brother, and he saw a place to weep. And he entered his chamber and wept there. Then he washed his face and came out.And controlling himself he said, "Serve the food." They served him by himself, and then by themselves, and the Egyptians who ate with him by themselves, because the Egyptians could not eat with the Hebrews, for that is an abomination to the Egyptians. And they sat before him, the firstborn according to his birthright and the youngest according to his youth. And the men looked at one another in amazement. Portions were taken to them from Joseph's table, but Benjamin's portion was five times as much as any of theirs. And they drank and were Mary with him. This is the word of the Lord. Let us pray.Heavenly Father, we praise you that your word says the grass withers and the flower fades, but the word of the Lord remains forever. We thank you, Lord, for this ancient book that is so much more than a book. We thank you, Lord, for this story of the life of Jacob and his sons, Judah, Joseph. We thank you Lord that this story is not just a story, not just a piece of history. It's something that your spirit turn alive in our hearts that can use to sanctify us, to grow us, to mold us, to grow our dependence on you and see our need for you in greater forms. We pray, Lord, for the blessing of your word. Bless the word as I preach it, but it'd go out in power and force. Let each one of here convicted to trust you through the hardship of day-to-day life, convicted of their need to look for your work in their lives, more closely, convicted of their need to cling to your word in all trials and circumstances. Lord, I pray these things in Jesus' holy name. Amen.Well, today, we are talking about Genesis 43. And yesterday, I sent out an email. We sent out a weekly email before the sermons go out, and I ask you to think about if you were God, how would you tell him to work on you? And if you're a believer, I'm wanting you to think about how would you want God to grow you, to shape you. I know that for me, even though I know God, Christ calls us to take up our cross daily and follow in his footsteps. I think my plan for myself would involve lots of isolation. My wife would be there, my kids would be there, but sometimes I'd be able to escape and get full freedom from them. There'd be a babysitter for me and my wife when we want to spend time together. And then, there'd be a lot of opportunity to grow by watching soccer, to grow by exercising about three hours a day, to grow by just processing things, facts, knowledge, the word of God in isolation without really engaging other people.So, what is it for you? If you had the choice as a believer, how would you like God to grow you? What do you think is best? I think a lot of us, we don't really go, we know it's not really mature to think like that. But oftentimes, when God follows his classic means, shown to us in scripture, we resist and we think we could do it better. And if you're a nonbeliever, you say, "God, show me. Woo me. I want you to talk to me in this specific way." And what is that for you if you're a nonbeliever here today? Because this is a chapter where in Genesis 43, and God is dealing with Jacob and his sons... Who's Jacob? Jacob is the son of Isaac, the son of Abraham and God. This is the first book of the Bible, the book of the beginnings of the creation, the book of the beginnings of the family of God, and God's work in creation.God creates the world, all things are good. Adam and Eve walk in perfect unity and peace and perfect knowledge of him. There's no sin, there's no tension, there's no conflict, there's no brokenness in the world. And Genesis 2 comes, and Adam and Eve sinned. Genesis 3 talks about how there's going to be thorns and thistles to life. The creation is impacted by man's sin. And really, Genesis 3-12, it's a story of the spread of the sin of mankind, in the hearts of man and in relationships and in the creation. So God calls Abraham, and he says, "Abraham, I'm going to bless you. I'm going to make you into great people." He's a man. I think he's 75 years old when he calls him, and he doesn't have a child. He says, "I'm going to make you a great people, and I'm going to bless you. I'm going to make you the father of many kings, the father of many nations."So his son, Isaac, receives that promise. His son Jacob receives that promise. And what we're finding out in this series is that Jacob, though he had some good moments in his youth where he showed true faith in the Lord, he is a bit of a bonehead and his sons are worse than him. They are adulterers, his 12 sons. They've committed incest, they are prideful, they're slanderous. They're all fighting inwardly. They're competing with each other. And furthermore, at one point, 20 years ago, they put the Father Jacob's prize son, the son that he had with his favorite wife, they left him in a pit for dead. What they don't know is that God preserved his life, and put him through a process to bring him to the right hand of Pharaoh. So God's dealing with this broken family while the lingering promise that they're going to be a blessing to the earth stands, so God has to work.These people are not perfect. God's people are never perfect. But what we see is that these people probably aren't saved, these people probably don't know God, and it's kind of offensive that God would choose to work through these people. This is kind of a stance that, "God is doing something new. Why would he save the world from the slavery to sin through such a broken family?" It's a statement that religion that says, "I do right. I earn favor before God is wrong." It's a statement that salvation is initiated by God, not by any individual man as he tries to approach God. It's a statement that God uses broken people. And how can he use broken people? It's because he gives grace to them. We're talking about this family and their brokenness, but we're talking about how God is dealing with them.Again, think about how would you like God to deal with you? But in this chapter, compare that with how God is working on these people as a model of the family of faith. Last week, we discussed a lot of this already. In chapter 42, Genesis, we discussed how God has been working on them through the hardship of famine. When the famine hits the land for about a year, they're forced to look for a source of food. We discussed how God has been dealing with them through the hardship of sojourning, of temporarily turning to foreign land for help and relief. It's the hardship of being a refugee or a migrant worker looking for the best for their family. You're engaging with hard travel, engaging foreign officials, engaging with bureaucracy stacked against them. There's a language barrier and there's stereotypes that they're engaging with.We discussed how God has dealt with this family through the pain of unjust imprisonment. We saw that after three days in prison, they go to Egypt, there's the famine, you're one of the famine. They run out of food, they go to Egypt, and they approach the Egyptian ruler and they receive food, but he places them unjustly in a jail for three days. They don't know that it's their brother Joseph and he's trying to chip away, get a sense of have these men repented, "Are they right before God? Are their hearts still the same as when they put them in the pit?" And they go unjustly to prison, they're sent unjustly to prison, and in Genesis 42:21, they exclaim, "In truth, we are guilty concerning our brother." For them, this is the first time probably in 20 years since abandoning Joseph, leaving him for dead, telling their father that he is gone to the point that he thinks he's dead, this is the first time that their guilty conscience is probably coming alive.And furthermore or less, we talked about how actually the awakened conscience was actually a grace of God, a gift of God. As the men process all the hardship that happened to them in the chapter last week and the things that I just list listed out, they ask in verse 28, "What is this that God has done to us?" God is doing something. He's dealing with Jacob and his sons, but the process is slow. So in this chapter, God continues the work of bringing these men into his family. As we process how God chose to work on this family, we should ask him to show us how he is... If we're not walking with him calling us back, or those walking with him, we should be asking him to show us how he is continuing to stay near us, to refine us.What the New Testament shows us is that the Christian life is like that. We are a piece of gold in the refiner's fire. So we're saved, but then God is exposing us to trials to burn out the impurities that we... Until we grow to the fullness of Christ likeness, God is going to be refining us. So ask Lord, "How are you working in me to save me, to grow me?" And a key verse, "How does he do that?" The key verse in the chapter and one of the key verses in the book, all the Book of Genesis is verse 14. And this is Jacob saying, "May God Almighty grant you mercy before the man." This is the first occurrence of mercy in all of Genesis and all of the Bible. The chapter is all about God's mercy to guilty, fearful, hopeless, lost sinners.The condition of these men as they are contemplating having to go back to Egypt, when they approach Joseph at his house. This chapter is all about the mercy that God offers to guilty sinners like you and me. It's by the mercy of God that God is using life circumstances, and the Egyptian ruler, who Jacob and his sons don't know to be Joseph, to refine these men, to draw them into saving an intimate relationship. And what we see in this chapter is that God dispatches different kinds of mercy. You kind of see it. Last week we touched on it, and this week there's a little bit. Joseph to them, the Egyptian ruler, he deals with the brothers in kind of a bad cop, good cop method. At some moments, God, through Joseph, dishes out tender mercy to the men. And just through pure kindness, gentleness, there's some moments he dishes out severe mercy by inflicting tough circumstances upon them.We're going to learn about different kinds of mercy. How does God try to draw us in, draw non-believers in through mercy? How does God grow and refine Christians through mercy? I'm going to point out three different kinds of mercy. God calls his children home and grows them through severe mercy, common mercy, and tender mercy. And know, the term mercy and grace, and then how they relate to love as you grow in the faith, they're kind of hard terms used because you can't really use them by fully separating them from the other, particularly grace and mercy. Know that I use the term mercy in this outline because I think the key verse talks about God's mercy to the men in this process of going back to Egypt. But I could have equally used the term grace. So to say that God gives mercy to someone has a connotation that God gives leniency when it is not required of him.To say that God gives grace, it means that God gives favor when it is not merited by the recipient and that they're intertwined. Because when God is extending leniency, he is extending favor or grace. When God is extending grace or unmerited favor, he's extending leniency. But this, today, I want to step away from the title of the sermons here and talk about mercy as it relates to grace. God calls his children home and grows them through severe mercy. In verses 1-14, we see that God calls his children home, and I use the term, by extending severe mercy. This is a term that I first became acquainted with in the book, A Severe Mercy by an author Sheldon Vanauken. I probably butchered that. To say that God calls his children home and grows them through severe mercy, put most broadly, it's to say that God calls his children home and grows them by exposing them to severe situations.God purposes that his children face severe, hard, difficult, challenging situations in order to draw them in. In the book, Vanauken, he talks about how God used the death of his wife of a couple of decades. He thinks to actually save him, because ultimately he saw all of his engagement with Christianity was really tied to this desire to build this perfect marriage with his wife. He never really wanted God for God's sake. God had to strip, he says, and he talks about how his engagement through personal letters with CS Lewis helped him. He saw that through taking his wife, he could finally treasure a relationship with God. And that was a severe mercy. Because if that's what it took to get him into a right relationship with God, to see his need for God, to treasure relationship with God that's offered through Christ, then it's a mercy.It's a confusing term, a severe mercy. But when you chew on it, it can really help you understand how God works. To face the severe mercy is severe because it's hard and difficult to face such circumstances. To face the severe mercy is an experience of God's mercy. Because though the severe mercy may be severe and difficult to face or endure, the experience altogether is so much better than what a sinner deserves. So severe mercy, it leads to a person to have a greater understanding of who God is and it leads one to see their limitations of their own power. Furthermore, it leads one to see the boundless limits of God's infinite power, and it's hard to swallow. By exposing people as children to hardship, God is actually being very gentle or merciful to them. How is this true? The whole narrative of scripture says that God is a holy God, and that from the beginning, man was to walk in a holy manner before him.And if he did not, the penalty would be death. Eternal expulsion from the loving presence of God. For the just punishment of sin against an infinite holy God is infinite wrath and eternal punishment. Romans 3:23 says that all have fallen, all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. Because nobody has met the mark perfect holiness before God, any moment where God withholds or delays the carrying out of his wrath, it's a blessing, a severely merciful act where he is shown leniency. So even as Christians or people approaching the faith, when life is really difficult or hard for any person because it's not anything close to facing the just wrath of God, such a moment is an act of severe mercy extended to them by God. So in this, I'm going to step into the text verses 1-14. I'm going to talk about different forms of severe mercy that God extends, that he exposes his followers too.He uses it to save people, he uses it to grow people, and he is merciful in doing so again. Because the lessons that they learn are so much more important than the idols that they're clinging to, that he's stripping away. In this chapter, we find Jacob's brothers a long while after their initial experience of guilt in the last chapter. Remember, in verse 21, they said, "In truth, we are guilty concerning our brother, this is the last chapter, in that we saw the distress of his soul, they're talking about Joseph in the pit, when he begged us and we did not listen. That is why this distress has come upon us." They exclaimed this and felt their conscience stirred. But now that they're back home, away from Egypt, away from the tension of the moment, away from the threat of imprisonment, away from this man who has authority over them, things have gone back to normal.Maybe the famine will end, they think. Maybe they won't have to go back to Egypt, if that happens. Perhaps, they can forget their past sins. Maybe they can push those ideas of God that crept up in their mind and his authority over their lives, off their consciences forever. They've made an idol. They've gone back home and they've made an idol out of the facade of a peaceful status quo on the surface of their lives, while there's guilt for sin on their conscience they've not dealt with. If this is their thinking, whether the text shows us, is that God has another plan in mind. If you're wrestling with guilt or fighting to suppress guilt, God has another plan in mind for you. He's relentless in his pursuit of them. And in these verses, we see the three forms of severe mercy.First, he exposes them to famine. More broadly, he exposes them to the pressures of living in a fallen world. Genesis 43:1-2. Now, the famine was severe in the land. And when they had eaten the grain that they had bought brought from Egypt, their father said to them, "Go again, buy us a little food." So God exposes them to continued famine. This is probably close to the end of year two of famine based on what other chapters tell us. And famine, honestly, as a modern American, I can't fathom this. Apparently, 49 million people in 46 countries are experiencing severe food crisis or famine in the present day. And that's according to a quick Google search, an organization called Action Against Hunger. Famine occurs when drought and her infestation and her plant disease and her war continuously plague a huge region of land for months or years at a time.It's a severe hardship that, when faced, lingers on your mind all day every day until there is relief. Hardship that adds uncertainty to all matters of life, to every minute, every hour, every week. It kills you physically and it kills you psychologically, and there's nothing you can do to stop it. You're powerless to put an end to it. All you're left to do is know how to respond to it and engage with it and survive through it. Obviously, today, we praise God. We have a lot of knowledge, materials, technology, pesticides, and means of food preservation to try to confront famine, but it clearly arises in many lands today. But the point is, back then, they did not. Jacob and his family, this family called to bless the world and become numerous nation of people of kingdoms, they're facing famine. They are almost at the point of not surviving.So the famine, it exerts pressure on them, they have to deal with it and they're powerless. But famine, it's something that the greatest schemes of men, greatest schemes of America, of science and technology cannot control. There are other forms of natural disasters, severe forms of mercy that we face, drought, hurricanes, tsunamis, tornadoes, earthquakes, volcano eruptions, biological and airborne microorganisms. I was reminded of this while I'm reading this, studying this, writing this yesterday. I got multiple notifications on my phone and on my computer from Apple talking about the fine particulates that are floating around, the bad air quality because of the wildfires in Canada. We can't control the weather and the shifting of the earth and microorganisms and fine particulates. And our increased ability to track a lot of these things, it seems to cause more paranoia and anxiety than actually helps us at times.So God speaks to us again and again through pressures of famine still, but pressures of a fallen sin, fallen world through weather, through disease, through political, international turmoil that we cannot control. 9/11, floods, hurricane Katrina, hurricane Harvey in Houston several years back, COVID, heated elections, Russia-Ukraine, the threat of personal sickness and death at any minute, struggles with conception still plaguing the world. Miscarriage, race, gender, class battles, the Lord... These things have entered the world because of sin and we have to face them. What is God telling us in all of it? We are not in control. He is sovereign. He is in control to be brought to this knowledge, to love this knowledge, to find peace in this knowledge. It's a mercy, a grace of God. He's in control. He's in charge. We know he is good. Look at how he redeemed the travesty of the cross of Jesus Christ.So all of natural history, world history align with the words of St. Paul in Romans 8:18-22, I'm just going to read 22. For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now, Jacob and his sons face it. We still face it. It impacts our lives and our decisions. So I ask you, what is God telling you through the Earth's groaning? It's going to keep happening until Jesus comes back to make all things new. Paul has to think about it. How has God used natural circumstances or pressures of a fallen world to make you think or act in life? What have you learned from them? What do you think you can learn right now? Second, God extends mercy to Jacob and his brothers to draw them into fellowship with him by exposing them to the pressure of broken people.Verse three. But Judah said to him, "The man, the Egyptian ruler, solemnly warned us saying, 'You shall not see my face unless your brother is with you.'" So the will of a relatively random governor in Egypt, according to the brothers as they don't know it is Joseph, he's forcing them in a certain direction. He's adding pressures and limitations to their freedom. They have to deal with the fact that one brother, Simeon, is still imprisoned by him there. And specifically in this chapter, they're pressured to send Benjamin to Egypt upon his command simply to have food for their families to survive. Like Jacob, we still face these unwanted pressures from other people and these are appointed by the severe mercy of God. We can try to create vacuums to avoid such people. We can seek out echo chambers of those who are like-minded. It's easier than ever.We can seek spouses with the exact same interests, companies and departments, literally through search algorithms on apps online. We can find neighbors, churches, work departments that are the perfect fit. But people are inevitable, they're broken, they're sinful. We can't escape them, we can't cancel them, and that's by God's design. The tendency when we engage people and they inflict their presence and authority on our lives, whether we seek it or not, is that we think we can change them. When we're first confronted with hard people, we say to ourselves, "That's okay. Give me a little time, I'll change you." But with time, we see that we can't. This is the husband and the wife almost on a day-to-day basis. This is parents trying to change their children, grow their children, save their children on their time. Children trying to change their parents.This is the boss trying to change the employee, the employee trying to change the boss. No matter how many phone apps, forms of counseling or technology we have that can teach us how to change people, we have to realize that we can't. Only God can. Only God can change someone from the inside out, change them at the heart level such that their behavior, their presence, their communication changes. We need to just approach these moments, this lack of power with humility. We can fight it, we can keep pressing on and nagging on the people of our lives to change them, or we can ask God what is he trying to do through this, the presence of these people.What is that you trying to do through the engagements of them? We have to allow our lives to be shaped by the necessity of engaging people. So ask God, how are you changing me? How are you calling me home to you to crave your presence, your sinless presence, your loving presence more? How are you refining me through other people? This is a severe mercy of God that we have to engage people. Third, God extends severe mercy to Jacob and his brothers to draw them into fellowship with him by exposing them to undesirable circumstances. Verse 6, Jacob says, "Why did you treat me so badly as to tell the man that you had another brother?" So Jacob, the neglectful father, comes off as an angry old curmudgeon, as a victim of the folly of his sons as he processes the situation. He's just whining. Honestly, my first engagement with this was laughing as I read it because I was just sitting and whining with my wife in the minutes before I'd started to study this.And I just want to say, "Men, we think that our wives and children are blessed when we sit down and tell them how we have it right, everyone else in our life has it wrong, and that we are victim of our circumstances." We need to stop. We need to be models of faith and steadfast faithfulness to God. There's no way to avoid difficult circumstances. Jacob and his sons had no control over the fact of the famine and the extension of the famine, and they had no control over the fact that Egypt had all the grain in that period. Similarly, in our lives, there's seasons, moments, trials that just fall into our lap. Things that we didn't invite into our households, our churches, our neighborhoods, our schools, our local state and national governments, financial downturns, wars that we have to engage, that we have no interest in engaging but we have to.We can get depressed, we can get paralyzed, we can busy ourselves to avoid the fact that these tensions and these situations exist. We can distract ourselves with relationships, devices, and shows, adrenaline rushes. We can try to ignore them by engaging in drink, smoke, other chemicals, or we can face the fact that circumstances are part of life. We're called to face them in faith, and find the faithful narrow way forward that brings glory to God. As we do that in the process, the Lord is teaching us, shaping us, saving many all along. These moments, these undesired circumstances shouldn't always be viewed as hindrances, but as opportunities for us to see God's wisdom at work in our lives, to see his power moving in our life. So in some, I've talked about the severe mercy of God as he exposes us to it through the effects of living in a sinful world through people, through random undesired circumstances.And know, the message that I want you to take is not just expect hardship to be a part of your life, but not become a stoic. It's not a, "Pick-up your bootstraps. This is life, just face it. Everybody has to deal with it. Find a way to cope." No, it's find a way to see God's hand through it all. Ask him to grow your wisdom, your insight to engage such moments in a way that pleases him. Ask him to show you what he's teaching you. Ask him how he wants you to respond, one day at a time, without getting overcome with anxiety, thinking about how hard it will be in the future. I like the framing of, "You need to see that as you think about severe mercies, a lot of these external circumstances forcing their pressure on onto your life. You need to see that what makes you you, and the Lord is not just the things that you have done but the things that also have happened to you.God's using it all in his grand plan and glorious plan to save you, to shape you, prepare you for his work. We've seen him do such work in the life of Joseph as we meditated upon his experience in the pit. We meditated upon facing false accusations of adultery. We meditated upon him being forced to be in an Egyptian jail for several years. We've seen how God prepared him to handle this moment with grace and mercy. So the same thing that he did with Joseph, the same thing he's doing with you and you need to trust him as he does it. See here, the text says that God is shaping these men through severe mercy. I just want to take time to look at Judah and Jacob to show you that transformation is actually happening. Let's look at Judah. Judah, who we know from our study in Genesis 38, was a very hard and stubborn man.He slept with his deceased son's wife when he thought she was a prostitute. This Judah is changing by God's severe mercy and becoming the family leader in this chapter. In the text, at the beginning when after Jacob resists sending the brothers back with Benjamin, Judah honestly, respectfully, directly speaks to his father. He still honors him, but he stands on truth before him. In verse 8, to convince his father, he takes a wise strategy. He repeats to his father, "Send the boy with me, and we will rise and go, that we may live and not die." Jacob said when he first sent the sons to Egypt, he said, "Go to Egypt to get grain, so that we may live and not die." He's using Jacob's words to convince him. And then he adds an element so that both we and you and also our little ones may be saved, may stay alive.Judah's not thinking of himself as we saw him do. Primarily, he's thinking of others. So further, Judah, the biggest thing that he does is he pledges his life to Jacob. He commits to taking personal responsibility if Benjamin does not return. This is in comparison to the author that Ruben makes in the last chapter in verse 7. Ruben says to Jacob, this harsh approach, "Kill my two sons if I go to Egypt with Benjamin and don't return with him." We see Jacob's wisdom. We see him taking responsibility. And this foreshadows, a little side note, the precedence that the tribe of Judah eventually takes among the other tribes of the nation of Israel. It points to the time that Jesus Christ, a descendant of Judah, the line of the tribe of Judah's scripture calls him, takes responsibility for the sins of the lost sons of God by going to the cross, offering himself in their place.Judah changes but we see an incredible change in Jacob through the severe mercy of God, through the providential appointment of hardship. Jacob, again, he is a whiny curmudgeon at the start of the chapter, blaming everyone else for the situation that they're in. He's still showing extreme preference for his son Benjamin over the other 10, but there's great change taking place as the chapter goes forward. This is noted most clearly by the fact that, for most of the story today, Jacob's story is that God does save him. Jacob does have faith in God. And God, at that point, he passes his promises of the covenant from Abraham and Isaac to him, and God gives him a covenant named Israel. But Jacob, even after a profound experience in earlier chapters of Genesis, he goes back to his old ways. So the story, the narrative throughout Genesis primarily calls him Jacob over and over again.In chapter 42, he's Jacob. In this chapter, he moves from the old angry man to the new man Israel. He starts off complaining, but then he takes charge as these situations force him to. He provides decisive and wise leadership in granting the brother's permission to bring Benjamin, and giving them instructions to pack gifts, local delicacies that they don't have in Egypt to earn the favor of the ruler, to double the money that they bring back after the Egyptians did not keep their money last time. He takes practical matters. He thinks responsibly. But the most notable change that we see in Jacob as he faces the severe mercy of God is that he has revival in his faith. In verse 14, he's brought to the point where he knows he's powerless to change the situation, and he says, "May God Almighty grant you mercy before the man, and may send back your other brother and Benjamin. And as for me, if I'm bereaved of my children, I'm bereaved."Jacob, now Israel, he appeals to the covenant name of God of Genesis, El Shaddai, Genesis 17 particularly, the mighty God. This God, he's trusted in before, he will trust in again. Furthermore, in this verse, he appeals to the mercy of God for the success of the journey for Egypt. He knows only God can give them favorable outcome here. Lastly, what's most profound, he entrusts Benjamin's safety and the desire for the return of Benjamin's brother Joseph to God, right? He's been grieving the loss of Joseph, basically not functioning, not engaging the other brothers for 20 years, all the while preserving Benjamin's life at all costs and just ignoring those other brothers. And Jacob relinquish his grip on the matter. He goes as far as showing peace over the fact that if it's the Lord's will to bereave him of his children, then so be it.You got to remember, he did not forget that God said that He's carrying this promise to be the father of many nations, like that was passed down from Abraham and Isaac. He says, "God, I trust you. You have the power to fulfill your promises even when there seems to be no hope." So I elaborate on Judas' transformation, Jacob's transformation to illustrate how God uses severe mercy, hard circumstances to change them, to save them, to grow them in the faith. We can spend all of our life begrudgingly facing the appointed personal, familial, cultural, global circumstances that we're born into or approach them with faith. We can see how they deepen our dependence on God, make us better men and women, grow our vision and appreciation for the daily mercies and graces of God, and increase the fruit of the spirit within us. We're becoming more like Christ as we engage them faithfully.Some may ask, why does God act like this? Why does he have a point to choose to use severe mercy? This is my second point, and it's really short. If God calls his children home and grows them through severe mercy, common mercy, why does he use severe mercy? Because he is offering common mercy constantly, and we don't receive it. Matthew 5:45 says, "For he makes the sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust." God is actually trying to tell us through the basic mercies, basic graces of daily life that he is God and he is in control, and we owe him our worship and faithfulness. Through the rising of the sun, every day on all people, through the sending of rains, through daily health, through the beauty of nature, through the provision of daily bread, through the joyful spirit and faith that children have as they wake up and just expect God to provide through the majesty of just the creative world, he's talking to us and it's not enough for us.We are stubborn. We are selfish. We choose to say that that is not enough. We place ourselves in the position of God, and we don't accept his means of communicating that. That's the mistake that Adam and Eve made in the garden. They think that God is keeping something from them in just the basic provision of life in the garden. So we commit the same sin and we don't receive common mercy, which I'm also basically saying is the same thing, historically-referred to as common grace. But praise God, he doesn't stop at common mercy. He doesn't stop at severe mercy to draw us in. He gives us tender mercy, and this is my third point. God calls his children home through severe mercy, common mercy, tender mercy.The use of tender mercy, it's a little redundant. I could have just said mercy. But to drive home in the point and emphasize how good it is, I went forward with tender mercy. He said that he speaks to us through tender mercy, expose us to tender mercy. He treats us and speaks to us with very loving treatment. He engages our fears and guilt uniquely. He mercifully and graciously condescends to speak to us at a level that we understand, in his process of calling us to him and refining us once we're in the family. This is what verses 15-34 really show us. God calls the brothers back by tender mercy. Verse 18 says, "And the men were afraid because they were brought to Joseph's house." So they bring the goods, they bring the money, they bring Benjamin back to Egypt, and they're told by a servant to go to his house.Can you imagine these tent dwellers, these back country men when they're about to go to the house, the property of this powerful Egyptian ruler, essentially a billionaire of their day? They're rolling up on their donkeys, not even camels, to palace with dozens of camels. It's like driving a rusty old pickup truck to a mansion with multiple Teslas and model cars. And they're weary from facing God's severe mercy, the famine, the travel. The anxiety of how they will be received by the ruler after they return, as they know that the ruler did not receive the money the first time, it would've been paralyzing them. Just not knowing, "Is this ruler just going to come down and arrest us and make us his slave?" Their worst fear would probably be over the fact, "That as we engage this man, are we going to be brought to that point where we feel guilty again for throwing Joseph into the pit?"Again, they don't know that Joseph is the ruler. But they know that through engagement with this man, they were brought back to this thing that they just want to depress. But God brings these men back to Egypt as part of the process to draw him in. And how are they received? It's with kindness, with love. Remember, Jacob/Israel's prayer in verse 14, May God Almighty grant you mercy before him. Jacob's prayers come true. It's answered. The ruler and his servant receive them with tender mercy. They arise in Egypt, guilty, fearful. What does the servant say to them? He says, "Peace," shalom in Hebrew, "Peace to you. Do not be afraid. Your God and the God of your father has put treasure in your sacks for you." This is after they say hello and confess that they went home with the money. It says, "Don't worry about it."As the text continues, the servant brings him out, Simeon. He's released as promised, upon their return in their last chapter, and he's in good shape. Then though they're foreigners, they are brought into the private residence of a ruler. Further, the text says they're given water, their feet are washed, their donkeys aren't stolen but are given fodder from the royal feed, and they're invited to a feast. When they approach Joseph at the feast, they bow down to him. And what does he do? He inquires of their welfare, asks them how they are doing, and I'm sure it would've been a little bit of a sugarcoated answer of, "Oh, we're great." Like not acknowledging the fact that they're in turmoil for the months and weeks as this moment approached. But he inquires about their welfare, asks about their father. The ruler further goes to greet the younger brother that he didn't meet during the last visit, Benjamin, and blesses him saying, "God be gracious to you, my son."Altogether, God, after providentially offering common mercy throughout their lives, after offering a lot of severe mercy recently, God has arranged for them to taste his tender mercy as part of the process to draw him in, to fellowship with him. In a situation where Joseph, the ruler, could have brought down justice for the situation with the money as things appeared. For his sin, their sin against him 20 years ago, he treats him with mercy. He treats him with love and kindness. One of the most notable things about the merciful treatment that God has arranged for the brothers is that he goes above and beyond to show the brothers that he's speaking to them through these mercies in ways that are uniquely designed for them. Verse 33 says, And they sat before him, the firstborn according to his birthright and the youngest according to his youth. And the men looked at one another in amazement. God, through Joseph, announces this moment in such a way that the brothers should know that they're talking to him.Just think, there's 11 brothers sitting down. And in this moment, they're arranged from oldest to youngest. If you think about how many ways that the ruler could have arranged them, it's equal to 11 factorial. Yes, I'm making you think about middle school math right now. 11 factorial ways that he could have arranged these men. That's 39,916,800 ways that the ruler could have seeded them, and one of them is the perfect way and he does it. God is clearly speaking to them. And do they see it? Further, in verse 34, the text mentions that the ruler gives Benjamin, the brother of Joseph, five times the portion of food. God's trying to communicate to them that he is God. He knows what they did, and he is mercifully dealing with their sin toward Joseph right now by bringing attention to Benjamin. In this specific communication to the brothers, God is just calling them home.He wants them to cry out mercy as they see that he is God. And they need his mercy for their sin, for their rebellion against his authority over their life, for their specific sins, and particularly, the sin against Joseph. Through tender mercy and the generalness of the ruler's reception, through the specific details of the seating arrangement and serving, God's talking to them. He's trying to stir their minds to acknowledge him as God. But what is their response? Verse 33 says, They looked at one another in amazement. They looked around at each other as if the way they were seated was a coincidence. They looked at each other and said, "Well, forgot about it," and set their minds to the feast before them. Verse 34 says, after Benjamin was given a huge portion, they just enjoyed themselves and had a nice meal like at any other banquet. With their youngest brother, nobody would ever have given the youngest brother this kind of portion. He gets five times more than them in this patriarchal society.And furthermore, at the start of the next chapter, the brothers after this experience where God is just talking to them, offering them mercy, showing them gentleness, tender mercy, they're just content to wake up and go home. They're not inclined to think about everything that's happening. Their reception of the mercy of God, it's dull. They're not moved. It gives them no more than a smile and the satisfaction of a good day and full belly gives them. Isn't that very similar to the reaction that the world has toward God and his mercy? Isn't that very similar to the reaction that you have toward it, on some days? If you're a believer, you can't be a believer without truly cherishing this moment, at one point. But it grows dry and worn out. That's because we're not seeing how God is moving through everything to save us, grow us, shape us.You see, Joseph's brothers, they have an excuse. The ruler didn't reveal himself as Joseph. They don't know that's him, but we know who the ruler is. We know who the governor is. We know who the king of kings, the Lord of Lord is, over all of the earth and over us all as individuals. It's the Lord Jesus Christ. It's written on our heart, our conscience, and it's written in the creation. We long for God's perfect and just rule and reign and the comfort of his presence, when the storms and trials, the rulers and people and circumstances of the broken world impress their unjust influence on our lives and decision making. We long for his unique and tender love toward us as we face these hardships. We know that for all of history, all the time, God has supremely shown his love to man.He has communicated his desire to extend love and grace to each of us in a million unique different ways. Most clearly, he has mercifully and graciously shown his love for us. In coming to deal with our greatest need as parched, guilty, dead sinners. He took on flesh, went from heaven to earth and walked the earth. He came to deal with our greatest need, our thirst for him. God broke the barrier by sending a son to take on flesh, bear the hardship and temptations of this world perfectly as we could not, and to go to the cross in our place. We know that God chosen his love for us and, that while we are still sinners, Christ died for us. How much more clearly could God in all of his glory condescend to speak to us in our greatest need to communicate his love to us? And yet we're often reluctant to receive it.We're reluctant to see our need to entrust our lives to him. Joseph and his brothers had an excuse, but we don't. So Colossians 2:9-10, it says, we're in him the whole fullness of the deity dwells bodily. And you have been filled in him who is the head of all rule and authority. We have no excuse. God is showing his mercy, communicating his love and desire to be in relationship with us over and over again, and we need to receive it. Christ, he broke the divide between heaven and earth. His crowning act of glory with all of his authority was to lay side as glory and die for us. That's really what Joseph is doing. Joseph could be using his authority to squash these sinners to just pour out wrath, but he doesn't. God, Christ did all of this in order that we might live and dine at the same table with him, with a portion due to the firstborn and rule with him and his eternal kingdom.That's what Joseph was doing. That's what Christ offers to us. So I ask you today to close, how is God extending severe mercy to you? How is he extending common mercy? How can you see it better? How is he extending tender mercy, specifically speaking to you, in ways that speak to your greatest fears, your greatest sense, your areas of guilt, your questions of the truth? As you see that, just bow and humble submission to him. Genesis 43 says, you're doubtful, sinful, guilty people like Jacob's family and us with a bad record of bad conscience. There is one power. One of great power and great honor who loves you, who wants to bless you and deliver you from the guilt of your sin and circumstances. He's doing so much to get you to see that. Try to see it. Come into his family, his love, his grace, his mercy. It's sufficient. Let us pray.Heavenly Father, we praise you that Christ has come and he came out of love. He initiated the process that procured our salvation. It's not anything that we can do, but it's all that he has done. And Lord, we praise you that you do not leave us in the condition that we're in. When you save us, you give us your righteousness, but you appoint seasons and trials and circumstances and engagement with the fallen world to grow us. We get to see your hand of redemption at work in us and through us every day. Lord, we praise you that we know we have a savior who has lived perfectly, died in our place, roses from the dead, and ascended to your right hand of authority just like Joseph was at the right hand of Pharaoh. And he is working for our good, for our preservation, for our growth in the faith. We pray all these things in Jesus' name. Amen.Now, we're going to transition to a time in the service of communion. This is something that we do as believers to commemorate the fact that by offering his body, pouring out his blood for us on the cross, Jesus invites us to live and dine guilt free at his table. For whom is holy communion—it's for repentant Christians, repentant children of God. If you're not a Christian, not sure where you stand before God, we ask you to withhold from partaking and meditate on the gospel, meditate upon the sermon, the message of today. But if you have decided today to receive Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, you're welcome to partake. And if are a Christian, we emphasize that this is for repentant believers. If you have unreconciled sin in your life that you have not brought to the Lord, if you have it on your conscience to approach other brothers and sisters where there is sin, we ask you to with withhold.So if you haven't received a cup with a little wafer and the elements, please raise your hand. As I pray, one of the ushers will give you one. Heavenly Father, we praise you for your grace and mercy. Jesus, we thank you for procuring salvation for us. You suffered, Lord, and triumphed for us. Today, we remember your suffering. Holy Spirit, I pray that you prepare our hearts now to focus on the attention of the cross of Jesus Christ dying for us, the primary act of showing your tender mercy toward us. We pray this in Jesus' name. Amen. Take off the bottom layer. I think all of our cups now have the bread on the bottom. Take the bread out and follow along with me. On the night that Jesus was betrayed, he took the bread and after eating it, he said, "This is my body broken for you. Take, eat, and do this in remembrance of me."He then proceeded to take the cup, and he said, "This cup is the cup of the new covenant of my blood, which is poured out for the sins of many. Take, drink, and do this in remembrance of me." Let's pray. Lord God, we glorify you. We pray, Lord, Holy Spirit, help us in glorifying God as we meditate upon the wisdom of his ways, the ability to redeem and use the brokenness of this world, the broken moments of our life, the broken moments of our personality, and redeem them and use them to be a blessing to others. Help us, Lord, as we worship. Help us to cast off all of our burdens and anxieties and stresses for situations, relationships that we cannot control to you. Help us to focus on you on the greatness of your power, your majesty, holiness, righteousness, truth, perfect plans, and sovereignty. Help us to sing with all that we have because you are worthy of all worship and glory and honor in all seasons. We pray this all in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

This month Andrew and Matt have been discussing Sheldon Vanauken's book, "A Severe Mercy". In this episode, Andrew interviews Will Vaus, who wrote a biography about the author.

Matt and Andrew wrap up their discussion of "A Severe Mercy".

Andrew and Matt continue their discussion of "A Severe Mercy". In the previous episode, they spoke about the "Pagan love" between Van and Davy, and in this episode they examine how "Divine Love" enters into their relationship.

While David is taking the month off to write his book about "The Four Loves", Andrew and Matt discuss "A Severe Mercy" by Sheldon Vanauken. In this episode, they focus on the earlier part of the story and the "Pagan love" between Sheldon and his wife, Davy.