Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy. - Matthew 5:7

Citizens of the heavenly kingdom reflect the character of their king. We are merciful, not because we are so naturally, but because we have been recipients of a great and costly mercy in the person and through the work of Jesus Christ. If we would grow in being merciful, the surest way to do so is by often considering and reflecting on our condition without Christ and on the mercy that saves us and transforms us.  May this prayer from The Valley of Vision help us to feed upon the mercies of Christ.

God of the publican,

Be merciful to me a sinner;

                this I am by nature and practice,

                this thy word proclaims me to be,

                this I hope I feel myself to be;

Yet thou hast not left me to despair,

                for there is no ‘peradventure’ in thy grace;

I have all the assurance I need

                that with thee is plenteous redemption.

In spite of the number and heinousness of my sins

                thou hast given me a token for good;

The golden scepter is held out,

                and thou hast said ‘Touch it and live’.

May I encourage myself by a sense of thy all-sufficiency,

                                                by faith in thy promises,

                                                by views of the experience of others.

To that dear refuge in which so many have sheltered from every storm may I repair,

In that fountain always freely open for sin, may I be cleansed from every defilement.

Sin is that abominable thing which thy soul hates,

                and this alone separates thee and me.

Thou canst not contradict the essential perfections of thy nature;

Thou canst not make me happy with thyself,

                till thou hast made me holy like thyself.

O holy God, make me such a creature as thou canst take pleasure in,

                and such a being that I can take pleasure in thee.

May I consent to and delight in thy law after the inner man,

                never complain over the strictness of thy demands,

                                but mourn over my want of conformity to them;

                never to question thy commandments,

                                but esteem them to be right.

By thy Spirit within me may my practice spring from principle, and my dispositions be conformable with duty.