Mercy With Clean Hands

The Lord’s salvation is not made known by loose lives, but by a people taught to walk straight. In the law, Israel is forbidden to hide from a brother’s loss, to profit from uncleanness, and to forget that conduct has weight before God. In Jeremiah, the Rechabites stand as witnesses that obedience can be kept when a word is received with fear. Judah had the temple, the prophets, and many warnings, yet would not hear. As Justin says, “for I called you, and you hearkened not, and did evil before me, and did choose that wherein I delighted not.’ Such are the words of Scripture;”

Acts shows the same pattern in the Church: Timothy is received because he is well spoken of; Lydia opens her house; the jailer washes wounds the same night he believes; Paul and Silas sing in prison; Paul also refuses a secret release, so that the truth is not treated as though it were shameful. Faith is seen in deeds, in endurance, in an ordered and honorable life.

And what sort of life is this? Not mere strictness, but mercy joined to purity. Clement says the command about unequal yoking teaches us “not to wrong any one belonging to another race, and bring him under the yoke, when there is no other cause to allege than difference of race, which is no cause at all,…”. So the people of God must be careful in judgment, ready in hospitality, clean in body, honest in labor, and bold in praise. Then the Psalm is fulfilled among us, when we “show forth His salvation from day to day, His wonderful works among all people.”