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Hosea 6

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1 "Come, and let us return to Yahweh; for he has torn us to pieces, and he will heal us; he has injured us, and he will bind up our wounds.

2 After two days he will revive us. On the third day he will raise us up, and we will live before him.

3 Let us acknowledge Yahweh. Let us press on to know Yahweh. As surely as the sun rises, Yahweh will appear. He will come to us like the rain, like the spring rain that waters the earth."

4 "Ephraim, what shall I do to you? Judah, what shall I do to you? For your love is like a morning cloud, and like the dew that disappears early.

5 Therefore I have cut them to pieces with the prophets; I killed them with the words of my mouth. Your judgments are like a flash of lightning.

6 For I desire mercy, and not sacrifice; and the knowledge of God more than burnt offerings.

7 But they, like Adam, have broken the covenant. They were unfaithful to me, there.

8 Gilead is a city of those who work iniquity; it is stained with blood.

9 As gangs of robbers wait to ambush a man, so the company of priests murder in the way toward Shechem, committing shameful crimes.

10 In the house of Israel I have seen a horrible thing. There is prostitution in Ephraim. Israel is defiled.

11 "Also, Judah, there is a harvest appointed for you, when I restore the fortunes of my people.

   

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Mercy

  
‘Brother Juniper and the Beggar,’ by Spanish Baroque painter Bartolomé Esteban Murillo. Juniper, one of the original followers of St. Francis of Assissi, was renowned for his generosity. When told he could no longer give away his clothes, he instead simply told the needy, like the beggar in the painting, that he couldn’t give them his clothes, but wouldn’t stop them from taking them.

In regular language, "mercy" means being caring and compassionate toward people in poor states. That's a position we are all in relative to the Lord, all the time. Without Him we would be unable to choose what is good; without Him we would be unable to formulate a reasonable thought. Without Him, in fact, we would instantly cease to exist; we have life only because He constantly gives us life. So we are, quite literally, at His mercy. Fortunately, the Lord is caring and compassionate to a degree we cannot fathom. He is the source of all caring and all compassion, and of love itself. His mercy toward us never lessens, never abates, never ends; His whole purpose is to bring each of us, individually, to heaven. The meaning of "mercy" in the Bible is closely tied to this idea: it represents love in a general sense, and the desire for good that comes from love. It can also represent the desire for good and the ideas that describe it when those thoughts and desires are inspired by love of the Lord.