His Mercy Endures Forever
A Thanksgiving Message by
the Rt. Rev. Peter Buss Jr.
O
ne of the things I love about the Psalms is that they are spoken by a person,
not unlike ourselves. Someone experiencing the ups and downs of life
took the time to turn to the Lord with poetic words of praise or supplication.
Psalm 136 is a perfect example. A human being set out to offer thanksgiving
to the Lord, and did so with a repeated refrain: “His mercy endures forever.” In
fact so dominant is this theme that it is repeated 26 times.
What is the mercy of the Lord, and why should it evoke similar gratitude
in our hearts?
Consider a 10-year-old boy who, in a state of anger, calls one of his
classmates a name. We can easily imagine the response of that other child,
and, if we happened to be the adult in that situation, the need to intervene with
words of reprimand.
Does it change the situation if you know some things about that person?
What if you knew he didn’t get enough sleep the night before, couldn’t find the
right clothes to wear and because he took so long, didn’t get
a lot of breakfast. We might also know that he has a bit of a
headache, and his pet hamster died the day before. None of
that makes the name-calling okay, but it might make you
a little more understanding and forgiving if you knew all
this.
A thought for today is that the Lord knows all those
extenuating circumstances for all of us, and takes them
into account in every wrong thing we do. He looks on us
with compassion. He does not think less of us for the bad
things we do. Instead He tries to lead us to see how to make
better choices the next time.
Regarding the Lord’s attitude toward us, we read: “The Lord’s mercy
remains constantly with every individual person; for the Lord wishes to save
all the people there are.” (Arcana Coelestia 8307) Another teaching says that
“love itself is converted into mercy and becomes mercy when anyone in need
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