Devotional 38: God is Gracious

The graciousness of God is often linked in Scripture to the mercy of God. While God’s mercy gives us time to repent because we don’t immediately get what we deserve, God’s graciousness speaks out to encourage us to ask for forgiveness and help that we do not deserve.

A gracious person is “favorable, kind, benevolent, and disposed to forgive offenses and impart unmerited blessings” (Noah Webster 1828).  Whether received from God or man “gracious words are like a honeycomb, sweetness to the soul and health to the body” (Proverbs 16:24).   Gracious words come from pure thoughts as Proverbs 15:26 indicates, “The thoughts of the wicked are an abomination to the LORD, but gracious words are pure.”  Therefore, from holiness and purity, almighty God speaks gracious words to rebellious sinners.   Listen to how God graciously calls out to the children of Israel through His prophet Joel:

The LORD utters his voice before his army, for his camp is exceedingly great; he who executes his word is powerful. For the day of the LORD is great and very awesome; who can endure it? “Yet even now,” declares the LORD, “return to me with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning; and rend your hearts and not your garments.” Return to the LORD your God, for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love; and he relents over disaster. Who knows whether he will not turn and relent, and leave a blessing behind him, a grain offering and a drink offering for the LORD your God? Joel 2:11-14

The prophet Isaiah makes much of God’s graciousness when we but cry out to Him. If we feel far from God because of our sin, we should pay attention to this truth:

Therefore the LORD longs to be gracious to you, and therefore He waits on high to have compassion on you. For the LORD is a God of justice; How blessed are all those who long for Him. O people in Zion, inhabitant in Jerusalem, you will weep no longer. He will surely be gracious to you at the sound of your cry; when He hears it, He will answer you. Although the Lord has given you bread of privation and water of oppression, He, your Teacher will no longer hide Himself, but your eyes will behold your Teacher.  Your ears will hear a word behind you, “This is the way, walk in it,” whenever you turn from the right or to the left.  (Isaiah 30:18-21 NASB).

The Psalmists plead for God’s graciousness over and over again.  Psalm 4:1 is but one such example, “Answer me when I call, O God of my righteousness! You have given me relief when I was in distress. Be gracious to me and hear my prayer” (see further:  Psalm 9:13-14, 25:15-18, 26:11, 27:7, 31:9, 41:4, 41:10, 56:1, 67:1, 86:3, 86:15, 119:58, and 119:132)!  Can you remember the times you have implored God for grace?  Do you need to appeal to His graciousness in a present life situation that you are encountering?  If so, call upon Him soon, because He is gracious.

God also wants us to be gracious.  Is there someone to whom you should be gracious today?  Surely their will be as Colossians 4:6 admonishes us, “Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer each person.”  God will graciously give you grace for every challenge of life as you call upon Him!

With Prayer, Mark            © January, 2012

Scripture quoted: ESV (except otherwise noted)
– Emphasis added

Verses for our meditation:  God Is Gracious

Exodus 33:19,  And he said, “I will make all my goodness pass before you and will proclaim before you my name ‘The LORD.’ And I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy.”

Exodus 34:5-8,  The LORD descended in the cloud and stood with him there, and proclaimed the name of the LORD. The LORD passed before him and proclaimed, “The LORD, the LORD, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children’s children, to the third and the fourth generation.” And Moses quickly bowed his head toward the earth and worshiped.

Numbers 6:22-27,  The LORD spoke to Moses, saying, “Speak to Aaron and his sons, saying, Thus you shall bless the people of Israel: you shall say to them, The LORD bless you and keep you; the LORD make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you; the LORD lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace. “So shall they put my name upon the people of Israel, and I will bless them.”

2 Chronicles 30:6-9,  So couriers went throughout all Israel and Judah with letters from the king and his princes, as the king had commanded, saying, “O people of Israel, return to the LORD, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, that he may turn again to the remnant of you who have escaped from the hand of the kings of Assyria.   Do not be like your fathers and your brothers, who were faithless to the LORD God of their fathers, so that he made them a desolation, as you see. Do not now be stiff-necked as your fathers were, but yield yourselves to the LORD and come to his sanctuary, which he has consecrated forever, and serve the LORD your God, that his fierce anger may turn away from you.  For if you return to the LORD, your brothers and your children will find compassion with their captors and return to this land. For the LORD your God is gracious and merciful and will not turn away his face from you, if you return to him.”

Nehemiah 9:17,  [The Children of Israel] refused to obey and were not mindful of the wonders that you [God] performed among them, but they stiffened their neck and appointed a leader to return to their slavery in Egypt. But you are a God ready to forgive, gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and did not forsake them.

Psalm 9:13-14, Be gracious to me, O LORD! See my affliction from those who hate me, O you who lift me up from the gates of death, that I may recount all your praises, that in the gates of the daughter of Zion I may rejoice in your salvation.

Psalm 25:15-18, My eyes are ever toward the LORD, for he will pluck my feet out of the net. Turn to me and be gracious to me, for I am lonely and afflicted. The troubles of my heart are enlarged; bring me out of my distresses. Consider my affliction and my trouble, and forgive all my sins.

Psalm 86:15,  But you, O Lord, are a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness.

  Psalm 111

Praise the LORD!
I will give thanks to the LORD with my whole heart,
in the company of the upright, in the congregation.
Great are the works of the LORD,
studied by all who delight in them.
Full of splendor and majesty is his work,
and his righteousness endures forever.
He has caused his wondrous works to be remembered;
the LORD is gracious and merciful.
He provides food for those who fear him;
he remembers his covenant forever.
He has shown his people the power of his works,
in giving them the inheritance of the nations.
The works of his hands are faithful and just;
all his precepts are trustworthy;
they are established forever and ever,
to be performed with faithfulness and uprightness.
He sent redemption to his people;
he has commanded his covenant forever.
Holy and awesome is his name!
The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom;
all those who practice it have a good understanding.
His praise endures forever!

1 Peter 2:18-21,  Servants, be subject to your masters with all respect, not only to the good and gentle but also to the unjust. For this is a gracious thing, when, mindful of God, one endures sorrows while suffering unjustly. For what credit is it if, when you sin and are beaten for it, you endure? But if when you do good and suffer for it you endure, this is a gracious thing in the sight of God. For to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you might follow in his steps.