Mercy has been defined as: "The act of treating an offender with less severity than he deserves."  If you have been a Christian for a considerable length of time, you know that most of us would rather have mercy, than justice, any day.  Justice really means that we should get what is coming to us.  Unless we have lived a sinless life, there are many punishments that we are entitled to experience.  However we realize that God has shown us mercy over and over again and we were able to avoid some of those punishments.  Although we cannot take advantage of God, his kindness is always waiting when we are repentant and desire His help in dealing with our problems.  That is why if I had a choice, I would select "Mercy over Justice" any day.

In the passage above, some of the Jewish Christians were discouraged and thinking of turning back from the promise of Christ. Life's difficulties were overwhelming them and they were trying to hold on in their own strength.  The writer of Hebrews lets them know that they have a High Priest in Jesus Christ who is interceding for them before God.  Accordingly, no matter what they had done or were going through, they could come boldly before the throne of Grace.  It was at that throne that they would obtain mercy.

 

Sometimes we fail to live up to God's standards and feel depressed and even ashamed.  We think that God is through with us, and He would not even hear us if we came to Him in prayer.  But when we understand God's mercy, we realize that we can come to Him not because of what we have done, but because of what Jesus has done on our behalf.  For that reason we can come boldly before God and have the assurance that He has an exceeding amount of mercy to bless our situation.  Were He an earthly judge, we would probably have a lot to fear when we came before Him.  But because of who He is, and who Jesus is, and who we are in Jesus, we don't have to worry about Him throwing the book at us.  Of course that would amount to justice.  But we don't always want justice, we want God's mercy!