Mercy and the Everlasting Gospel_01: A Chief Characteristic of God

"And I saw another angel fly in the midst of heaven, having the everlasting gospel to preach unto them that dwell on the earth, and to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and  people, Saying with a loud voice, Fear God, and give glory to him; for the hour of his judgment is come: and worship him that made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and the fountains of waters." Revelation 14:6-7.

The everlasting gospel is a message warning of the judgement that is currently taking place. On account of the fact that we are living in the time of judgement, the angel instructs all men to fear God and to give glory to Him. To worship Him who created the universe. The instruction from heaven for men to fear God and to give Him glory to Him is an instruction on how one should live in order to make it past that judgement.  (The subject of the judgment is a study on its own), but just a brief idea to consider about the Judgement spoken of in Revelation 14:

In light of the fact that we are living in the time of judgement, the angel instructs man on how to live: to fear God and give glory to Him.

One will take a very brief look at what that means. In the gospel, men are called to reveal the character of God in their lives, to give glory to God.

In Exodus 33:18, Moses says to God “I beseech thee, show me your glory.”, God responds to Moses by telling him that “I will make all my goodness pass before thee, and I will proclaim the name of the Lord.”(v.19) What we can grasp from this is that when God was to make His goodness pass before Moses, and proclaim His name before Him, God would be showing Moses His glory. That is to say that God’s glory, His goodness and His name are the same.   

In the next chapter God eventually does show Moses His glory. We read these words:

“And the LORD descended in the cloud, and stood with him there, and proclaimed the name of the LORD.  And the LORD passed by before him, and proclaimed, The LORD, The LORD God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abundant in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, and that will by no means clear [the guilty]; visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, and upon the children's children, unto the third and to the fourth [generation].” Exodus  34:5-7

When God passed by before Moses, in making His goodness pass before Moses and proclaiming “the name of the LORD”, God was showing Moses His glory. In doing this, God declares certain attributes about Himself that make up His character; the fact that He is merciful, gracious, longsuffering/patient and just etc… all of these attributes define Gods character. Thus we may understand that Gods glory, that which makes up His goodness and His name, is none other than the very character of God

So to put these thoughts together, in the everlasting gospel (Revelation 14:6-7), when the angel is calling men to fear God, and give glory to Him because they are living in the time of judgement, the angel is saying to man that if we are to pass the judgement, we are to have the character that is like that of God. God’s glory, His character, must be manifest in the lives of those who desire to be able to stand through God’s judgement and review of their lives. This character of God can be revealed through no other means than obedience to His commandments, the great standard of righteousness, for when "the heavens declare his righteousness... all the people see his glory." Psalms 97:6

 I can summarise this part by pointing to the fact that this can only be experienced through the indwelling of Christ in the heart  by the presence of His Spirit, through total surrender to Him. "Christ in you, the hope of glory" (Colossians 1:27) .Without Jesus finding a dwelling place in the heart, we have no hope of glory.

We want to then consider one aspect of the character of God in this series, the one which He mentions first: the attribute of mercy. God, in proclaiming His name says of Himself that He is “the LORD God, merciful…” Mercy is the first and among the chief characteristics of God. As a part of what it means to give glory to God, and for God’s character to be manifest in our own, it is thus vital to understand Gods mercy. For God to fully reveal His character to the universe, His mercy must also be plainly manifest.

Questions one may ponder: What is the role/ importance of mercy? How does mercy relate to one’s salvation? What is mercy? What does it look like in practice? Why is God merciful? Why must we manifest mercy? How is God merciful? How are we to be merciful…? How does mercy and justice relate? Mercy and the great controversy? These are some of the ideas to be discussed.