October 2, 2012 (Psalm 4:1)

Author: Andrew Comiskey
October 02, 2012
‘Be merciful to me and hear my prayer’. (Ps. 4:1)

Our prayer must begin by remembering the mercy which is our freedom. We then extend that merciful cry toward the mess we are in.

We live in a day so eager to forgive sins that we forego the reality of sin altogether. As Pascal proclaimed: ‘Behold the fathers who take away the sin of the world’! I recently visited a priest to confess sin who claimed my sin wasn’t sin all! No burden of sin, no mercy. No need for Jesus. We cry peace when there is not peace, sheep and shepherds alike. All are greedy for gain, the false peace of a shame-free life. I praise God for good shame! It alerts me to the truth that I am not free to hold my head high until my sin is exchanged for the mercy that makes all things new.

‘For the least to the greatest, all are greedy for gain; priests and prophets alike, all practice deceit. They dress the wound of my people as if it were not serious. ‘Peace, peace’, they say, when there is no peace. Are they ashamed of their loathsome conduct? No, they have no shame at all; they do not even know how to blush. So they will fall upon among fallen; they will be brought down when I punish them’, declares the Lord. (Jer. 6: 13-15)

‘We beg mercy for the greed—the false peace that broods over Your church, O God. Grant us the grace to see things as they are: in desperate need of absolute agreement with the truth of sin, for the sake of absolute mercy. We pray for conviction upon both sheep and shepherds alike; we pray for the revival that must be founded on the confessional. In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, we confess our sins of cowardice and compromise. We have violated Your holy commands in regards to what we have done to our bodies and to other bodies. And in our compromise we have become cowards, unwilling to stand for what we know to be true for the dignity of all. We ask that You might have mercy on Maine, Maryland, Minnesota, and Washington; uphold marriage in these states, and in our nation, as the Supreme Court prepares to rule on ‘gay marriage.’
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