Focus: The Kindness of God

Text: 2Sam.9:3

"And the king said, Is there not yet any of the house of Saul, that I may SHEW the KINDNESS OF GOD unto him?"

I so much delight in the kindness of God. Every moment of my life I need a dose of divine kindness. We all do. My emphasis here is on the kindness of God, not the kindness of man.

Jonathan says to David, "And thou shalt not only while yet I live shew me the KINDNESS of the LORD, that I die not" - 1Sam.20:14. Jonathan is asking David to be to him the channel of the Lord's kindness.

Nehemiah, Joel and Jonah describe God's kindness as GREAT - Neh.9:17; Joel 2:13; Jon.4:2.

Solomon says God did show his father great mercy and also kept for him great kindness - 1Kgs.3:6.

The psalmist says the kindness of God is MARVELOUS, and he also describes it as MERCIFUL - Ps.31:21; 117:2.

Isaiah says that the kindness of God is EVERLASTING - Isa.54:8. God Himself promises never to deprive us for a moment of His kindness - Isa.54:10. Jonathan tells David to not only show him the kindness of God, but also to extend it to those of his bloodline - 1Sam.20:15. That is indeed extensive and generational kindness. He says, "But also thou shalt not CUT OFF thy kindness from my house for ever..."

Solomon talks of "the law of kindness" on the lips of the virtuous woman of Proverbs 31 (31:26).

David was looking for a member of Saul's family to show the kindness of God for Jonathan's sake. In Act.28:2, Luke reports that "the barbarous people shewed us NO LITTLE KINDNESS." God has called us into the business of showing kindness - kindness in no small measure.

David also believes in returning kindnesses or favors done to him in the past. He says, "I will shew kindness unto Hanun the son of Nahash, because his father shewed kindness to me" - 1Chron.19:2.

And I pray we do not become like king Joash who "REMEMBERED NOT the kindness which Jehoiada his father had done to him, but slew his son" - 2Chron.24:22.

Someone is in need of God's kindness through you. Those who have received the kindness of God must be willing to share and spread it. Let it go round. Freely we have received and freely we shall give. Amen.

by Bishop Moses E. Peter