The Maryville times. (Maryville, Tenn.) 1884-1944, 1895-11-21


ito !; not that they love the others
less, but here is an appeal to mercy.
When our worst enemy is in our
power bere(t of all power to harm us.
What is that something within us
that pleads for him7 1t is mercy. 1t is
this benifcent God-given principle
that our text bids us love.
Lo0ing mercy is not winkins at
guilt. 1t is mercy to the child to
punish for wrong doing Lofty and
enduring character in the child can
never be developed by fond indul-
gence. 1t is merciful to the criminal
to say in the name Of justice, you
shall do no more crime against society.
The severest discipline may often be
the highest form Of mercy.
Loving mercy, is putting the very
best Interpretation possible on the
lives and conduct of cur fellow men,
never presses the hardest construction
of word or deed. 1t is not that SO
called worldly wisdom that shrewdly
suspects every man, but it seeks for
the image of God in every form of
human clay.
Loving me,cy, opens our hearts to
all condition Of humanity. We see
in our selves part of the vilest as
we'll as the noblest of Gods creatures.
1t breaks down the superficial casts OF
worldly society, and "draws the line"
t on no one, 70 exclude them from our
love and help and recognizes ever,
the Brotherhood of God and the
brotherhood of man" 1t prompts us
to give more Of loving service than
we receive. The world is largely
what Gods people make it.
Loving mercy is no weak sentiment.
Silent and irrisitable as Omnipotence,
it works in the human heart revolu
tionizing the world Alexander, Cesar
and Bonapart, made the world trem-
Bile under crash of conflict, and tread
of victorious armies, until Napoleon
in the delirium Of conquest, cried
Il "God is on the side Of the heaviest
: batteries" A horned lie, God said
through his son "Blessed are the
n merciful for they shall obtain mercy"
:, Napoleon saw his error and said as he
t stood crushed and hopeless on the
e rocks of St Helena in the bitterness
of his awful desolotion "Jesus Christ
, the, Nazarene Carpenter, founded his
!. Empire on love for humanity and
n after 1900 years his subjects, count
: less in number, would gladly lay down
e their lives for him.
i The gospel is message Of Mercy.
j. What pictures OF mercy Christ shows
}. us! Look at the good Samaritan,
;. pouring oil and wine into the wounds
Of the poor traveller, sustaining him
upon his beast up the rocky way to
the Inn. The good shepherd out in
the night and storm searching the
Y bleak mountain for the poor lost sheep
2 and the old father running to meet the
1. ragged prodical!
e Shall we not show mercy in
e thought, o for Charity that "think-
v eth no evil" in word remember
no script, circulates like scandal.
Boys flying kitss haul In their white winged
& birds;
e You can't do that way when you are flying
words.
10 Thoughts unsxpressed sometimes fall back
,r dead,
But God himself can't kill them whom they
- are said.
e What an embodiment of mercy is
Christi Became poor that we might
# be rich:' clothed himself in the utter
8 weakness of infant flesh to have mer-
IS cy on our weakness, homeless wan
d derer, hungering and thirsting that he
d might have mercy on our poverty and
a woe drank the cup to the bitter dregs
!. in dark Gethsemane to taste the an
guish Of the damned that he might
d have mercy for the sinner, received
e in his trial and crucihvion the concen.
9 trated spite, malice and sin, Of the
e ages that his mercy might take in all
h humanity. In that dark hour Of
II crucial torture every fiber quivering
q with supreme agony, jerred, hooted
= and Knocked, Christ looked down on
" that sea OF upturned faces fiendish in
&c their awful sin, then up to God and
n cried "Father forgive them for they
ut know not what they do" What an
,e Omnipotant mercy Is this! Shall we
/, not love mercyf Olhow paltry insig-
nihcant and hateful appeareth all
3 these little srites and jealousies in our
to natures; cast them out o Fod we can
a not hold the mand look on Christ