How much we need His mercy

By Daniel Francis

I remember in my earlier youth (implying that I still have plenty of youth in me), I would pick and choose. I did it intentionally, and I know that some of us do it either intentionally or unintentionally. We pick and choose what about our faith we will follow and what we will choose to ignore as though God would not mind.

That’s pride taking over—pride which explains away why you can be half in and half out when we know at our core that this is not possible.

This way of picking and choosing reminds me of all the people whom I have met who say that they have a relationship with God, but they don’t go to church. They believe that this is an acceptable way to function, not realising that the comparison is like having a head but no body. God gave the Church to Peter for a reason because we need liturgy and communion together to help us grow closer to God. We cannot pick and choose.

Back to my folly in my youth. I thought I could brazenly pick and choose what I would fall in line with and what I would ignore. The things in the Catholic Church that I found too strict I would, figuratively speaking, put in a little box and bury in the backyard because I felt like I was doing enough.

The older I get, the more I realise how foolish I was being. As I work on my relationship with God, especially through learning from His teachings, I’ve come to see much of my ignorance. It’s an interesting experience when you stop making excuses to God for your sinful ways. Let me explain.

I moved from making excuses for my ways to owning up to them. That looked like going from, “Well, I’m going to sin anyway, so it is what it is,” to “God, I need your forgiveness and help to keep me disciplined and away from the sin that plagues me.”

These two scenarios differ vastly. In the first scenario, pride wouldn’t allow me to own up to my lack of discipline. That same pride also positioned me away from God.

In the second scenario, I own up to my weaknesses, and I immediately turn to God, asking for His guidance and forgiveness. In the second scenario, I understand how much I need His mercy, and I do not let sin or my pride be a barrier to going to Him.

I imagine growing in faith is much like growing in knowledge up the educational ladder. The more you learn and the more qualifications you have, the more you understand the great depth of knowledge there is out there to learn and how little you know.

In faith, the more we learn about God and faith and the deeper we get into it, the greater the realisation of our own ignorance and how much we need God and His mercy to truly move forward. Thankfully, His mercy and love are infinite.

As Lent comes to an end in this Holy Week, this feels like the necessary moment to ask for God’s mercy. We must acknowledge that we cannot truly exist in faith without Him and the liturgy. This means we can’t pick and choose when it comes to faith. This also means that when we falter, we do not allow pride to take over and, as a result, make excuses, but see our shortcomings and go to God for mercy and forgiveness because clearly, we need His mercy.

Daniel Francis, author of The Millennial Mind, The Millennial Experience, and How to Write and Self-Publish Your Book, is an entrepreneur passionate about leadership and storytelling. As a leadership development coach at Rebit Limited, he has spent the last four years equipping individuals to thrive personally and professionally.

He also leads One Momentum Publishing, a hybrid publishing company through which he has guided hundreds of authors on their journey from idea to published book.

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