I am convinced that there is no measure to God's mercy. It simply can neither be weighed, nor can it be measured in the same way you can do so with gold, or other commodities. People invest in commodities in the Futures Market. You might ask, "How can mercy be considered a commodity?" In the end, what I have found to be the case is this truth: God's mercy is the only futures market commodity worth investing in. It pays an eternal high rate of return on such a small investment.
I don't want to sound mercenary about something so sacred and solemn as the "mercy of God", ...but we do live our lives in measures of sorts. Let's, for instance, compare the context of our lives to the measures on a music staff. Five simple little lines running across a page are divided into "measures" within which are seated notes either on the line or in the spaces between the line. Each note, like a soul, has an identity and uniquely (sometimes undetectably) serves as a bridge (an interval) between harmony or discord. The length of time the note plays out is determined by its type (I.e. quarter note, half note, whole note) and the time signature placed at the beginning of the musical piece (i.e. 4/4 time, 2/4 time, 3/4 time or the waltz - 6/8 time, etc. etc.) And so you say, perhaps, "I'm not sure I like this comparison or analogy because that means it's all predetermined!" My response would be, "there is another mysterious aspect to the life of the note beyond its predetermined structural context. It is called the artist's interpretation. That my friends is analogous to the uniqueness of even twins and the unique soul even the most similar of notes have in both the context and the practice of the music of life.
As in the analogy, the reality of time and space more or less imprisons us to live in measures; and the music of life is made more beautiful if we do not advance ourselves too quickly on life's staff but in meted out measurements in accord with the time signature that is in our genetics and in the spirit-code that gives life to our genetics. However, our souls have poetic license to transcend the rigidity and even prudence of precision and engineering. That transcendence moves the articulation of the consortium of notes into what I might call the mysterious music of the spheres, the habitaculum deum, the empireum, the primum mobile. And so, we are like notes in a field reaching high to pick the fruit from the abundant harvest of God's unmeasured aqua de caeli e misericordiae. An anointing of the balm of mercy occurs giving a wet and priestly, unstrained and harmonious quality to our lives. It is a baptism of sorts echoing the crying babies voices gracing the walls of hallowed cathedrals, a child's first public recital. There is no discord in such as this.
So what is this "mercy?" What is its ingenious attribute? Ahhh...as Portia in the Merchant of Venice soliloquizes, "The quality of mercy is not strain'd, It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven upon the place beneath: it is twice blest; It blesseth him that gives and him that takes.."
Mercy is not strained because it cannot be strained, limited, filtered, or measured. It cannot be put to stress, but rather, it is free as was the manna from above. The manna in the desert fed all who would see its richness and nourishment and one could not save extra for tomorrow. The Scriptures tell us that tomorrow would provide its own. The transcendence is prompted by the articulation of the music or the mercy. As in the case of the articulation of mercy, a note in music, by virtue of the context of its existence on the score, is taken from the bonds of its score by the interpretive creativity of the artist. A transcendence from potential to actual takes place. In both cases with this kind of articulation, mercy and music have no limits to the point of transcending the ultimate barrier we call death. What seems measured on a musical score, or upon the page of life, remains unmeasured in the totality of the availability of this commodity for the "articulator" and "articulatee" of such. Like beautifully articulated music, this untrammeled and untethered commodity of mercy requires only our attention to it and its attributes of blessing. This attention will anoint even the worst in us with forgiveness medicine that is so much in demand in this present world of accusations and heated judgments.
Oh, there will be a time on the "staff of life," long past the denouement of the symphony of the soul, toward the end when it will be judgment and not mercy that will rain down in fully meted and measured amounts. Judgment will indeed weigh on a scale of a different sort and upon which our very souls will have a gravity in direct proportion to the amount of mercy we did not hoard, but rather, gave away without measure.
The lighter we will have been in life, even against our enemies, the more chance we will be much the match to balance judgment's density and weight. The more we share mercy received, the more immeasurable will be our retainable and sustainable share of it; and thus, mercy will outweigh that heavy rock of judgment headed our way when we meet our quota upon the staff of life. There will be no reprise or encore, I'm afraid. So then, invest in the immeasurable commodity of mercy. It makes both economic and musical sense.
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