Mercy First
When God made Himself known to a newly freed, half-terrified nation in the wilderness, He did not begin with thunder—though thunder was His to command. He did not speak first of judgment—though He had every right to do so. The mountain still smoked from His power, but He did not lead with it. Instead, most interestingly, He began with mercy. It was an unexpected opening.
The One who slung the stars into place and stirred the oceans with His hands might have begun with something grander—power, holiness, or the iron clang of judgment. But He didn’t. When He passed by Moses on that windswept mountain and spoke His name aloud, the first note He chose was this: merciful.
“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…”
(Exodus 34:6–7, KJV)
There it is—the first self-portrait of God, rendered not by human hand but in His own words. No poetry softens it. No law encloses it. Just Him, speaking plainly, saying what He is. And what He wants us to know first, before the fire, before the tablets, before the commandments, is that He is merciful.
Not a cold idol atop a column.
Not a cosmic accountant tallying faults.
But a presence full of patience, kindness, and the ready will to forgive.
He doesn’t ration mercy like a merchant counting coins. He stores it up, tends it, waits to pour it out by the armful.
For thousands.
The word isn’t math. It’s music. His mercy runs longer than the line of our failures, wider than the reach of our prayers. His justice, by comparison, is brief, three or four generations.
Mercy is His Treasure
Even when He speaks of justice, “by no means clearing the guilty,” it trails behind. It arrives after the mercy, after the grace, after the long breath of forbearance. Justice matters. It must. But it is not the headline. It is not the first thing.
And all this, mind you, came just after Israel had bowed before a golden calf—while the inscription on their covenant with God was still fresh. If ever there were a moment for wrath, that was it.
But God didn’t lead with wrath.
He led with mercy.
He began again—with compassion.
He gave again, even when the giving cost.
A Lesson from My Father
When I was a boy, living with my family on an Air Force base in South Florida, my brothers and I were always into something. We believed every open field was a battlefield, every rooftop a frontier, and every fence a line meant to be crossed. We were good-hearted—but full of mischief and motion.
One warm evening, during the base’s annual softball championship, we found ourselves amid a packed crowd. Families lounged in lawn chairs. Kids darted through the legs of grown-ups, snow cones melting down their wrists. But we weren’t there for the game—not really. We were there for the thrill of being out after dark, on familiar ground, looking for trouble.
We knew those ballparks like we knew our own bedroom. We knew which fences had gaps, which sheds were rarely locked—and most importantly, where the lighting controls were kept. Behind centerfield, half-hidden by a chain-link fence, was a pole with a ladder. At the top was a metal box. On its side, a lever.
My older brother Rick, who always had more nerve than sense, turned to me with a glint in his eye. “I dare you,” he said. “I’ll give you a boost.”
At nine years old, a dare was as binding as an oath. And this one had electricity in it. Turning off the lights on a championship game? That was the stuff of legend. He lifted me up. I gripped the rung, gritty with rust, and waited.
“Right when the pitcher lets go,” Rick insisted.
I pulled the switch. And the field went black.
I dropped fast, landing hard on the damp grass. The crowd erupted in confusion. Bats clanged. Voices rose. Somewhere, an airman shouted. We bolted for our bikes and tore off into the night, our skinny legs pedaling like mad. Behind us, the stadium lights sputtered, trying to come back. A few unhappy airmen gave chase.
By the time we reached home, breathless and grinning, we ditched our bikes behind the garage and scattered. But of course, our mother knew something was up. She always did. She had radar.
The real fear came later, as we waited for the sound of our father’s boots on the porch. If he found out, and we were almost sure he would, there would be a reckoning. My father wasn’t cruel, but he believed in consequences. His justice came with a canvas Air Force belt and a long talk you wouldn’t forget.
Sure enough, by morning, he knew. We hadn’t confessed. No one had caught us outright. But he knew. And we knew he knew.
I braced for punishment, a brutal Saturday job or a long, shame-filled drive. But what came instead was quieter.
He gave us a lecture, yes—measured and grave. But then came mercy.
Not leniency, exactly. We still faced consequences. But they were tempered, shaped by love. What stayed with me wasn’t the discipline itself, but the kindness tucked inside it.
Mercy in the Shape of a Father
There’s a theory that children get their first picture of God from their fathers.
If that’s true, then this was one of mine:
That mercy doesn’t cancel justice—it carries it.
That wrongdoing doesn’t sever the relationship—it can deepen it.
That love can be both firm and kind.
I think of that night often. Not because we nearly sabotaged a championship (though that, too), but because it was the first time I saw that mercy has a place in judgment. That sometimes the better part of discipline is grace.
We live in a world short on mercy. From an early age, we learn the trade: do good, get good; fail, and pay. Grace breaks the pattern. It interrupts the economy of deserving.
But the God who spoke at Sinai planted His flag in mercy first. That was His choice.
And so, this is where we begin.
Before we speak of God’s power,
Before we tremble at His holiness,
Before we fall silent before His throne—
We must hear Him say—plain and clear, in His own voice: I am merciful.
He made sure we wouldn’t miss it.
