How Much Mercy?

Thank you, Josh. Josh is right. I love this church tremendously.

It has served Alison and I so well over the years.

We've been here a long time now and just so

thankful to get to be up here today. But you know,

a week on the jobs, so honored and humbled to

be able to pastor this church and give back. It's

community that's done so much for me and for my family.

And it's funny. One thing that had been reminded to

me over the course of the definitely over the years,

but again during the elder process was but I sometimes

forget to smile enough in public. And so then I

decided I was going to do first Timothy chapter one,

and I kind of laughed to Alison. I said, man,

the brand new pastor that never smiles is going to

sit up here and tell everyone how much of sinners

we all are. But I hope if I'm effective today

that while there will certainly be some discussions about conviction,

that the overwhelming takeaway will be just the mercy and

superiority of the Lord and just how much he loves

us to always come after us. So Happy Father's Day.

It is Father's Day. I'm sure you all have brunch

plans after this, but stay with me. It will be

uplifting and it will be a great joy. And I'm

so thankful to get to get to bring the Word

with you today. So let's read One Timothy chapter one,

verses twelve through seventeen. If you could turn there. I

thank him who has given me strength, Christ Jesus, our Lord,

because he judged me faithful, appointing me to his service.

Though formerly I was a blasphemer, persecutor, and insolent opponent.

But I received mercy because I had acted ignorantly and unbelief,

and the grace of our Lord overflowed from me with

the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus. The

saying is trustworthy and deserving a full acceptance that Christ

Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom

I am the foremost. But I received mercy for this reason,

that in me, as the foremost Jesus, Christ might display

his perfect patience as an example to those who were

to believe in him for eternal life. To the King

of ages, immortal invisible, the only God be glory and

the honor and glory forever and ever. Amen. So the

title of this sermon is how much mercy. We're going

to look at that in three parts by asking three questions,

why mercy, how much mercy do we need? And how

much mercy do we receive? Well, look at why mercy?

How much mercy do we need, and how much mercy

do we receive. Let's start first by taking a closer

look at what Paul is really saying here. In the

preceding text, Paul is warning Timothy and the church in

ephesis about false teachings, promising false hopes, and just all

kinds of poor instruction going on. And so Paul warns

Timothy and to kind of get back to center, get

back grounded. He makes his case for the sufficiency of

the Gospel, and he uses to illustrate his point a

great tool, which is to use his own testimony. Let's

look closer at verse thirteen. But I received mercy because

I had acted ignorantly in unbelief. So what's Paul getting

out here? Is he saying that being a blasphemer, persecutor

an insolent opponent, all very bad things somehow earns him

mercy by no means, He's saying that I, Paul, was

a prideful opponent to Christ. Christ reconciled me to him,

and by his grace alone, used me to display his

perfect patience to those who believe in Him, and I, Paul,

am a living testimony to that. But why mercy? We

asked ourselves these three questions in three parts. First is

why mercy? Why did Paul receive mercy? And why do

we receive this mercy? Why did Jesus need to be

crucified for us? Paul is expressing the deep conviction of

his own sin and acknowledging the need for a savior,

need for Christ to save him. And make take about

two things. That same sin dwells with all of us.

That's one and two we need Christ to save us.

People sometimes do worse things than us, but we all

have that capability within us. Notice also that Paul didn't

say I was the foremost of sinners. He said of

whom I am the foremost. We, like Paul, are still

sinners in need of a savior. Paul's warning Timothy early

in this letter about false teachings and finding hope in

the wrong places. As I mentioned, he's making an argument

in this text about the sufficiency of the Gospel that

the Gospel is sufficient, but we need that same reminder

about the sufficiency of the Gospel in our lives today.

Our society today puts an enormous emphasis on self sufficiency.

Everywhere we turn. That are people, publications, posts that try

to convince us that we are enough to overcome our

problems on our own, that we alone possess the strength

to overcome life challenges, and if someone or something offends us,

then we just cast them off. It's no surprise, then,

that our society suffers tremendously from loneliness and despair. If

we describe to the subscribe excuse me to that ideology

that we are sufficient and true and right all on

our own, and that anything suggesting the contrary should be

cut out, we all get into discouragement and loneliness. Loneliness

real fast. When the Lord tells us we're enough, we

rely on our own flesh to save ourselves, and then

we inevitably fail or fall short. It's just not surprised

that the result is to spare Living our life unaware

of the mercy of our need of mercy is like

building a house on sand. It does not stand the

test of time. But our God is an everlasting rock,

a firm foundation. We're in desperate need of a savior

to navigate this broken world, and we have that savior.

We cannot do it on our own. Nobody is so

bad that they can't have mercy, and nobody is so

good that they've earned a right to have mercy. So

why we asked this question, why mercy? Why do we

receive his mercy? We need it because we were dead

in our sin, and we receive it because we put

our faith in Him alone to save us from it.

Because God loved us enough to send his son to

die on across and not by anything we've done. And

I think that's an important thing to frame as we

go on into this text, why we need his mercy?

We're broken people doing broken things, putting trust in Christ

to save us from our sin. And the point Paul

is making in what I hope to reinforce today is

that we're in sinners and very serious but also ongoing

need of a savior. And our savior provides a profound,

victorious mercy for those that believe in Him for eternal life.

So we are sinners in need of a savior of mercy.

How much mercy do we need. Our second question, how

much mercy do we need? And how deep is that need?

Paul says in verse fifteen. Starting in verse fifteen, the

saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance. That Christ

Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom

I am the foremost, but I received mercy for this reason,

that in me, as the foremost Jesus, Christ might display

his perfect patience as an example to those who were

to believe in him for eternal life. You look at

Paul describing himself as the foremost of sinners, and it

might be tempting to brush this off as theatrics or

hyperbole from Paul here, and it most certainly is not.

First off, it's important to note to take Paul at

his word here he says that it is trustworthy and

deserving a full acceptance. I think that makes it pretty

clear that he feels himself to be that way. Prior

to being saved, Paul was a bad dude, persecuting Christians

and being an insolent, prideful opponent to the Gospel certainly

qualifies him to think of himself as the foremost of sinners.

But what if we start to have that same level

of conviction about our own sin. How would we describe

the depth of our own sin. We have all surely

thought something to the effective that I'm a sinner, but

at least I haven't done that, or I'm a sinner,

but it's not like I murdered anybody. I mean, what's

the big deal. We all have that same sin in

our heart. Maybe we haven't done some things as bad

as others, but we have. If we're giving up to

our own sin, we have that capability, and kind of

as an illustration. I love, excuse me. I love the outdoors.

And one of my favorite things to do is to

saltwater fish in the Base System. And my favorite way

to do that is to go into and the Bass

system has these flats that are incredibly vast and wide,

and you can sometimes not even see the shore on

the other side, but you can get out of the

boat and you can walk or wade and fish, and

the water is never more than waiste deep. And so

jump overboard, hop out, and just walk across this vast

flat and can navigate it on my own. No problem.

Catching fish on my own, that's maybe a problem, But

walking across it navigating it, that's no problem. But many

of us think of our sin as if we're jumping

overboard into that shallow water. But it's really a deep

gulf that we're leaping into when we jump out. Our

sin is not shallow water. It's more like the depth

of the Marianna's trench. As we get closer and close

to the Lord, we get more and more aware of

that depth. How often do we acknowledge that our sins

are vast and far as far reaching, but can convince

ourselves the implications of our sin are waist deep at most.

We're tempted in our flesh and often course by the

world to treat our sin as something that is not

a big deal, or that is easily navigable on our own,

or something that can be hidden and stowed away. Our

sin has consequences. We don't sin in a vacuum. It's

against the Most High God and against others, and it

affects the ones that we love. Our pride damages our relationships,

Our greed clouds our financial stewardship, Our covetousness destroys our joy.

The list could go on. The more we realize the

depth of our need, he transforms us for our good

and his glory. Dave Harvey wrote a book on marriage

called When Sinners Say I Do? That is heavily influenced.

Parts of it heavily influenced by this text and on Timothy,

and towards the beginning of the book, he writes, if

like Paul, I recognize the enormity of my sin, seeing

myself as the worst of sinners, then I understand I

have been forgiven much. That's when biblical reality begins to

make sense. I start to see God as he truly is.

His vastness becomes bigger than my problems. His goodness comes

to me even though I'm not good, and his wisdom

and power are visible in the perfect ways. He works

to transform me from the inside out. And that's a

good word. So with that in mind, knowing how vast

but also how deep our sin can be, how much

mercy do we need? We're asking our question how much

mercy do we need when we hop overboard? How much

mercy are we going to need to pull us out

of that depth. We can't underestimate the depth of our sin.

We cannot take sin lightly, and we can't give residence

to sin. It's like those stories when you hear in

the news sometimes every so often about someone that has

been keeping a wild animal as a pet in their

home and then they inevitably get out and attack their owner,

and then we all, if you're like me, we have

kind of that unavoidable response, like, man, that's really sad,

but like probably don't keep a pet wild animal in

your house. Don't get comfortable with sin in your house

and in your life, in your soul. If you keep

a pet sin, it will attack you and it will

destroy you in the same way. Also, don't hide it.

It's like a blemish or a wound, and you're hiding

it with your shirt sleeve and you're acting like it's

not there. It will grow in fester, and then it

becomes a big problem, and then it is unavoidable. So

bring it to the Lord. If we're harboring sin, kill it.

If we are hiding it. Bring it to the best

physician we could ever find. Expose it to the light,

bring it in confession to the Lord and to your

brothers and sisters in Christ, and welcome accountability and fighting

it together. And I promise you it will be received. Sins,

deceitful and it's patient. It lies in wait. It might

feel like it provides promise or comfort or a big

one upbreak from things that are hard. It's not, and

it won't identify it for what it is, evil death

causing relationship to shrawing sin. Realize it now and how

significant it is. It's better to get rid of a

caged animal while it's still in its cage, then hope

that it doesn't get loose, because it will get loose.

If we harbor and insulate Sin thinking we don't need

his mercy to overcome it, we will eventually find out

how much mercy we're gonna need. The legendary Spurs basketball

coach Greg Popovich, I'm sorry, it's definitely too soon to

talk about the Spurs. I'm sorry, but the analogy just

works so well, so I'm sorry. I hate to bring

it up, but the legendary coach Greg Popovic always encouraged

his players to have an appropriate fear of their opponents,

and I always love that. His point is that if

you don't respect your opponent, your opponent is sure to

sneak up on you. Sin is a formidable foe. Treat

it with that appropriate fear to put it into maybe

some more biblical terms. Charles Spurgeon wrote, too many think

lightly of sin, and therefore think lightly of the Savior.

He who has stood before is God, convicted and condemned,

with the rope about his neck. Is the man to

weep for joy when he is pardoned, to hate the

evil which has been forgiven him, and to live to

the honor of the Redeemer whose blood he has been cleansed.

To put it more simply, not acknowledging or realizing the

depth of our sin from which we've been saved is

selling short the depth of christ mercy. When we, as

Christians say things like I'm a sinner in need of

a savior, let us not allow that to become a

perfunctory or cursory statement, like some sort of boiler play

disclaim language. It has weight, it's blood bought, and it's

a fight against an opponent that we cannot defeat on

our own. Paul is keenly aware of his sin, and

he's deeply convicted by it, but it does not in there,

Praise God, it does not in there. He then gives

his testimony to the magnitude of the mercy he has received,

the Christ's perfect patience is displayed through him and his

work and his ministry. In one Corinthians fifteen, Paul writes,

for I am the least of the apostles, unworthy to

be called an apostle, because I persecuted the Church of God.

But the grace of excuse me. But by the grace

of God I am what I am, and His grace

toward me was not in vain. On the contrary, I

worked harder than any of them, though it was not

I but the grace of God that is with me.

Now these are some big statements from Paul, the author

of a lot of the New Testaments, saying he's unworthy

to be called and impossible, but in the next breath

declaring that he, by God's grace, outworked all of the others.

One takeaway here is that sin is big, but grace

is bigger. Sin is big, but there's a larger, more

joyful work, a bigger praise, a big robust praise and

worship to the one that saved us from that enormous sin.

The closer we get to Christ, the more we realize

the magnitude of sin. The more we realize and are

convicted by the true depth of our own sin. The

better we unders excuse me, the more we realize and

are convicted by the true death of our own sin.

The more we understand what we've been saved from, and

the more we understand how profound and undeserving our salvation is.

The more we grow in our worship of Christ, our Lord.

So we ask why mercy and how much mercy do

we need? And then now we'll ask how much mercy

do we then receive? As we examine our sin and

think of ourselves as the worst of sinners, it might

be easy to overcorrect into the ditch and start feeling

way down and burdened by our sin into despair. But

as vast and deep as our sin is, his grace

and mercy are infinitely more. Paul and his testimony, describes

himself as an insolent opponent. The Greek word paul uses

to describe an insolent opponent basically translates to someone that

is dangerously and excessively prideful. Before becoming a Christian, I

was a fearful, prideful and self righteous man. Behind me,

I left a wake of people that I'd offended it

best and deeply hurt and wounded at worse. Jesus says

in Matthew five. You have heard that it was said

to those of will you shall not murder, and whoever

murders will be liable to judgment. But I say to

you that everyone who is angry with his brother will

be liable to judgment. Whoever insults his brother will be

liable to the council, and whoever says you fool, will

be liable to the hell of fire. No, I've never

murdered anyone, but just like Jesus is describing here, I've

done it with my words and my thoughts a thousand

times over. I've lived my life thinking my own strength

and my own morality were sufficient, and when they weren't,

hit me like a mack truck. It's a pretty desperate feeling.

But praise the Lord, he humbled me and saved me

from being dead in that and plenty of other sins.

He provided a perfect patience with me that I desperately

needed and I certainly did not deserve. But that's a

battle that I still fight every day. But I don't

fight it alone. Praise God, I don't have to fight

it alone, because I'd be right back where I started

in addition to the Holy Spirit, I have brothers and

sisters in Christ that help hold me accountable and helped

me to stay downwinded myself. I trust in the Lord

and his word to know how much grace I've been afforded,

and how selfish and broken it is to withhold grace

from someone else, someone made in His image. There are

some wounds that, by God's grace, I've been able to

help prepare, but there's some that I haven't and some

that I can't anymore. And I feel the weight and

saying of those sins often, I feel them deeply. But

the blood of Christ overflows like I've fountain, and washes

all those sins away. Praise God, and that calls me

to worship. It encourages me to work really, really hard

unto Him, and He gives me a zeal and a

boldness to share that good news with everyone I can.

You might be here today and you're already well aware

of your sin, but you might be here today and

convicted by sin in a new way, and that way

of shame and guilt can feel almost like we've fallen

into the depths of a deep well, as as if

there's no pulling us out of a certain sin. But

don't despair. Do not despair. We've asked ourselves, how much

mercy do we receive? Hard to put that fully into words.

But it's enough to wash away those sins white as snow,

enough to take the broken pieces of our hearts and

put them back together and make them whole again. It's

enough to seek us out and find us at any depth.

And as far as the east is from the west,

so far does he remove our transgressions from us. You

might be here today as a Christian, or you might

be joining us this morning and you're not a Christian,

and you might be thinking, there is no way that

he covers that sin. Or you might say there's no

way anyone can pull me out of this sin. I'm

too far gone. But for those that put their faith

in Him for eternal life, he can, He has, and

he will. There is no depth he won't dive to,

no height to which he won't climb. There's no sexual sin,

financial mismanagement or ruin, broken family, addiction, broken relationship, nothing,

nothing will keep the Lord from coming after his own

in every corner of the world. So don't despair. There's

a big sin, but there is a bigger savior and

a bigger mercy. Paul's testimony is a beautiful one. He

warned Timothy shared the Gospel through his own testimony, and

then in the following text charges Timothy to get to work,

to share the Gospel, to share this sufficient of the Gospel. Paul,

of course, goes on after being saved, to author most

of the New Testament, a lot of the New Testament.

It's safe to say, though, that none of us are

going to be authors of any of the New Testament.

But the discipleship work of the faithful Christian in San Antonio,

Texas in twenty twenty six is significant and profound, even

if it's ordinary. The tears you've shed, the scars and

wounds that you've carried from waging for against sin, he

knows them, and they're not in vain, and he's using them.

So Christians, let us be an instrument of his grace.

Share your testimony, seek out and be encouraged by others testimonies.

Just as Paul sends out and entrusts Timothy with a

recharge on the sufficiency of the Gospel through his own testimony,

so to you refresh others by sharing your testimony and

receiving the encouragement of theirs. We'll close with this, If

we inspect our hearts earnestly and honestly today, it hopefully

elicits some deep thoughts and convictions. When we begin to

recognize ourselves as the foremost of sinners, we realize the

enormity of our salvation and can rest knowing His mercy

covers it all. It's mercy we don't deserve, but we

receive freely through faith in Him, mercy that is in

tremendous need, but is an infinite supply. We ask ourselves

why mercy, in part because apart from Him we are

a rudderless ship, completely lost at sea, and asks how

much mercy do we need? Like a lost sheep wandering

in the cold dark knight, completely cornered by wolves. We

need a mighty, merciful rescuer capable of defeating a formidable adversary.

So then, how much do we then receive? More than

we can ever fathom or comprehend, beyond where the enemy

could ever lead us or find us, From the highest

peak to the lowest valley, from end to end, and

everywhere in between. It overflows, It fills our hearts and

it never ever fails. And knowing that transforms our hearts

from the inside out, it encourages us toward a heart filled,

zealous and joyful worship of the One who saves. To

share the deep diving, chain breaking, life saving and giving

wonderful good news of the Gospel with everyone we can,

and let us have that mark the spirit of our

souls as we go out and share that with everyone

we can. Amen, Let's pray