How Revelation Reveals God’s Mercy

Posted on Apr 23, 2020 Topic : Inspirational/Devotional, Men's Christian Living, Prophecy, Women's Christian Living
Posted by : Ed Hindson, Mark Hitchcock, Tim LaHaye

To fully trust or appreciate God, one must understand that He is a merciful God, full of compassion and love for His creation. Those who reject the free gift of salvation from His Son, or who take note only of His acts of judgment, can never truly understand God. For centuries the Hebrew prophets used God’s own description of Himself to Moses to teach the people about His merciful nature.

The Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abound-ing in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin…(Exodus 34:6-7 nkjv).

Anyone familiar with the Bible will realize that God wants man to know Him as merciful. David, who probably knew God better than most other writers of Scripture, used that term to describe Him hundreds of times in the Psalms. In fact, in Psalm 136 alone, David states “His mercy endures forever” 26 times!

Nowhere is that mercy seen more clearly than in the book of Revelation. That statement may come as a bit of a shock to those who may be familiar with some of Revelation’s more horrendous passages that describe the various judgments that are to be unleashed upon the earth during the seven-year Tribulation. It is during this period that God will pour out His wrath upon those who refuse to believe in Him and who instead turn to the Antichrist and even Satan himself in worship. Yet simultaneously, the mercy of God will also be made abundantly clear.

God is fully aware that the decision we make concerning Him and His Son will determine our eternal destiny. And He also knows that it is His love and mercy that ultimately attract us to Him. During the time of the Great Tribulation, God will demonstrate His incredible mercy through a number of specific acts. Prior to the beginning of the Tribulation, Jesus will first rapture all believers up to heaven to His Father’s house in order to protect them from the wrath to come—thus keeping the promise He made in John 14:1-3:

Let not your heart be troubled; you believe in God, believe also in Me. In My Father’s house are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself; that where I am, there you may be also.

In Revelation 3:10, God reinforces the point that He will protect those who have accepted Jesus as their Lord and Savior from the trials of the Tribulation:

Because you have kept My command to persevere, I also will keep you from the hour of trial which shall come upon the whole world, to test those who dwell on the earth.

Beginning in Revelation 4, as an illustration, the apostle John himself is “raptured” from the earth before the Tribulation begins and is able to view its sobering events from the safety of heaven.

Not only will God protect His church from the impending judgments as a result of the rapture, He has devised six remarkable ways to demonstrate His mercy to the men and women who suddenly find themselves left behind. God will intervene supernaturally in the affairs of the world in an attempt to make His message of salvation plain to all.