“Shew Thy marvellous lovingkindness, O Thou that savest by Thy right hand them which put their trust in Thee from those that rise up against them.” (Psalms 17:7)
That is one of God’s character, lovingkindness. The Hebrew word means beautiful, good deed or favor and holy mercy. We could say that God’s salvation through Jesus is God’s lovingkindness. His salvation had nothing to do with anything we said, did or have in ourselves. We only surrendered our misery and defeated lives to Him. We had nothing to offer Him except a broken heart. There is nothing on this earth that doesn’t belong to Him already, even the creations of man come from His gift and talent given to man. “For by Him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by Him, and for Him: And He is before all things, and by Him all things consist.” (Colossians 1:16-17)
Lovingkindness is more than just kindness. It’s been translated as mercy in the English and other translations. While mercy is forgiving without punishment, it’s an act of kindness. And us mere mortals can be kind because it’s a fruit or growth of the Holy Spirit given to God’s children. “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, Meekness, temperance: against such there is no law.” (Galatians 5:22-23) In the King James translation it’s called gentleness. Of 45 different translations only four from the 1500s, two Aramaic, the Literal Emphasis Translations translated the Hebrew word to gentleness instead of kindness.
The Truth that it’s a product of the Holy Spirit is important for us. It means that although we try to be kind, we cannot without God and without the Holy Spirit. An unregenerated spirit cannot be kind. We can try and might mimic kindness, but it’s not human nature to be kind. Think about the workplace. It’s a dog-eat-dog world. You fight for yourself or get run over. Kindness is a display of weakness. And this applies to every industry.
I remember when after I retired from teaching, I was working at a resort in the office. The lady who was training me kept giving me wrong information. So everything I did was wrong and when the mistakes were found I had to go back and correct them which by that time was a month’s work. When I confronted her, she just smirked. Maybe she thought I would be replacing her, but that was not the case. Did I fail to mention she was a church going Christian? Kindness was not developed in her yet.
“ ...O Thou that savest by Thy right hand them which put their trust in Thee from those that rise up against them.” In my example, she literally was trying to ruin my reputation and person and get me fired. I didn’t need the job, but it was a perk getting a discount on our RV site. The job had to do with reading the individual electric meters. Well, you can imagine the uproar when people got their electric bills. And it all landed on my lap. But my God is faithful. The problem was corrected once I was given the correct instructions and everyone was happy, except maybe that lady.
Our Scripture says that God saves by His right hand. It represents all His authority and sovereignty which is His power, strength, protection, help, salvation, deliverance and blessing. He saves His children by His right hand even when we’re not aware we’re in danger from any kind of evil. That lady in my example failed to show me kindness, but God showed His marvelous lovingkindness and saved me from the evil intentions by His right hand.
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