Joshua Strickler

Lent Week One: “Most Merciful God…”

This prayer begins our Lenten journey in a most appropriate place, with God. Beginning here has a good track record. It is the same place the Bible begins. So, we walk our Lenten journey not alone but with God.

As the Bible begins by noting, God is our creator (Genesis 1:1), and there are some assumptions here we must point out. As this is a Christian prayer from the Book of Common Prayer, we can know that we are going not to just any god, but to the God. The God of the Bible, who is set above all created things. And as God is the only uncreated being, there is nothing higher than God.

This is more than just an opening preamble, as if we were writing a letter. This is not a “Dear God” or a “Greetings God,” but a plea. We approach God with humility: “Most merciful God.” Interesting language, “merciful.” Not Glorious God, or Mighty God, or any of the other adjectives we can think of to describe God. It is also not a plea for God to be merciful. In this prayer, it is not an adjective but an identifier.

This identifier has a unique origin, not with humanity, but with God Himself. On Mount Sinai, when Moses asks to see God, God responds with a verbal description of Himself:

“The Lord passed before him and proclaimed, ‘The Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children’s children, to the third and the fourth generation.’” Exodus 34:6-7

God describes Himself as merciful, gracious, slow to anger, loving, and forgiving. The God we approach in this prayer is not vengeful or capricious. In contrast to all the other gods of the ancient world, who seemed to be reflections of humanity’s worst impulses, this God is different. This God is relational. This God wants His creation to approach Him. This God wants to dwell among His creation.

Look at the pattern in Scripture:

This is not a God who hides on Olympus. This is a God who actively seeks out His people. A God who desires relationship. A God who goes to the most extreme lengths to restore and initiate a relationship through the death and resurrection of Jesus.

As we noted on Ash Wednesday, Lent is a hopeful season, and this prayer in just its first three words shows us why. During Lent we come before a merciful God, walking with Him on the journey to the cross and the resurrection.

While we take these forty days to pause, reflect, repent, and prepare for the Easter celebration, we are not alone. We are doing this work by approaching a merciful, relational God. A God who promises to receive us, forgive us, and make us part of His family. A God who says to us, “Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light” (Matthew 11:28-30).

There is no better way to walk this Lenten journey than in the arms of this God.