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My wife has recently been preparing curriculum for our upcoming Vacation Bible School and has been trying to find stories in the Bible with which our kids might not yet be overly familiar. This past week, she has asked me a zillion times "did you learn such and such story in Sunday School?" Some stories are always included in standard Sunday School Curriculum, like "David and Goliath" or "Daniel and the Lion's Den." She wanted to focus this year on some new material.

One scriptural story that is not a Sunday School standard but one that I think ought to be familiar to us all is the story of our text of a man named Mephibosheth receiving mercy at the hand of King David. I greatly like this story and enjoy preaching from it. Everybody should meet Mephibosheth at one time or another. If you’ve never had the privilege, let me begin today by introducing you.

“Mephibosheth” means “out of my mouth proceeds reproach.” It is not a positive name and there is a reason for that. Mephibosheth had about five years of his life -- the first five -- where everything was great and then his world completely fell apart.

Mephibosheth was King Saul’s grandson, the son of Jonathon. He was born to a prince and for the first five years lived in the finest mansions and wore the royal robes and had anything a young Hebrew boy could ask for. But his grandfather had through disobedience become a god reject and so judgment was about to be passed upon the house of Saul and David was about to reign as king in his place. The pain of the judgment would be felt most by Mephibosheth. Saul had died for judgment, but Mephibosheth would live in it.

The Bible says in the 4th chapter of 2 Samuel that it happened as Mephibosheth was five years of age that his grandfather, Saul, and daddy, Jonathon, were both killed in battle on the same day. Knowing that the custom was for the enemy to come and kill the heirs to the throne after they had killed a king, Mephibosheth’s nanny panicked when she heard the tragic news and, picking up Mephibosheth, began to run with him to try to find a safe place. She carried him about her shoulders and in her haste to flee, tripped slamming the young child’s feet into the ground and shattering the young bones of his ankles and lower legs. The damage was permanent and Mephibosheth became lame in his feet and a cripple; unable to walk or work and destined to depend upon others for help. In a few fateful moments of a tragic day, Mephibosheth had ceased being a princely heir with the world on a string to becoming a social outcast living in poverty and obscurity and loneliness. Such is life sometimes, especially when you are reaping the judgment of generational sins within a family. Sin destroys much more than just one life but always affects generations to come!

David becomes king and years go by. Mephibosheth grows up into a man while living in the region known as Lo-debar, which means “pasture less places” or “wilderness.” During this time, all of Saul’s remaining sons -- Mephibosheth’s uncles -- are put to death for the crimes of Saul, leaving Mephibosheth as the only remaining relative of Saul’s lineage. It is likely that as the years passed, Mephibosheth lived in dread of the king finding out where he was, lest Saul’s curse and judgment bring even more pain into his life. And so we find a Biblical portrait of a once princely child whose world has evaporated through a curse inherited from his grandfather and through no fault of his own is now penniless, in a miserable place, crippled and a beggar, and living under a cloud of impending doom and hiding in seclusion from the judgment that must eventually come.

The Bible doesn’t say, but I think if you and I had known Mephibosheth during this time, that we would have found him to be a very negative person and not much of a delight to be around. He was a man who from the age of five years of age had only known pain and suffering and who seemingly had nothing to offer the society of his day. He was someone who had once had the promise of everything but had lost it all do the swift changes of the winds of judgment. I believe that practical experience had taught him to expect the worse scenario that he could possibly imagine.

And so it is to this scene and setting that we read in our text in the 9th chapter of 2 Samuel. King David comes across years later the old servant of King Saul’s house, a man named Ziba, and when put to the direct question, “is there any of King Saul’s lineage still living?” the servant has to tell the truth to the king: “there is one, a cripple named Mephibosheth -- Jonathon’s son -- in Lo Debar.” The king calls for some of his soldiers to send to the house and fetch Mephibosheth to stand before the king.

I want you to realize that Mephibosheth does not know David nor his intent at this time. All Mephibosheth knows is that David has had all of his uncles killed years before to pay for the sins of Saul. And he knows that King Saul, his grandfather, hated David. And he knows that he is the last living lineage of the evil Saul. And so to him it seems that the fateful day has arrived when there is a knock at the door and it is opened to reveal soldiers from the king requesting Mephibosheth’s immediate presence in the very courtroom! Life had scarred Mephibosheth deeply by this time and he immediately feared the worst. To him, this was it -- a life of misery caused by his grandfather’s sins was about to be ended with the same judgment. With dread filling his heart and mind, Mephibosheth allowed the soldiers to pick him up and seat him on a donkey and thus began the long ride to face the king. I can imagine the thoughts running through Mephibosheth’s mind as the donkey trotted along and the soldiers quietly joined him: he couldn’t run and besides it wouldn’t do any good would it? Any hope for the best had ended when he was five years old, forcing him into this miserable existence. Perhaps it would be just as well to die before having to live out such a miserable lifestyle as an old man.

Finally the ride was over and as we read in our text, Mephibosheth was carried in before the king. With his heart pounding, Mephibosheth fell out on the floor to pay homage and surrender to King David, expecting the worse. And the scripture records the exchange as thus:

I think that it took several moments for what David had just pronounced to sink in and register with Mephibosheth. Fear has a way of dulling our hearing and understanding and such was the case with Mephibosheth. He had come expecting judgment and punishment and more pain and more suffering -- by this time he was used to it because it was all that he had ever received for being who he was! But -- but this time -- what did the king say? “Do not fear?” “I will show you, kindness -- kindness? -- for the sake of your father Jonathan?” He’s laying on the ground expecting the blows to begin and it’s sort of hard to register such words, “kindness?”; you will restore the land of Saul to me? And -- what was that? -- I will now live under the king’s care? At the royal table? Me? A cripple? With the prestigious? With the honored guests as a constant representative of the great nation of Israel? Me? The outcast? The beggar? No more Lo-debar? No more wilderness?

As the magnitude of what the king had just pronounced finally began to sink in, Mephibosheth pushed himself from the ground enough to be suspicious. It was almost too good to be true -- in fact, it was way too good to be true. With only the suspicion and negativity that years of suffering can muster, Mephibosheth asked:

It’s almost as if he is asking, “what’s the catch?” “What do I have to offer the king?” “Do you realize how decrepit and destitute and what a miserable human being that I am, oh king?” “Is this some sort of trick where you cruelly offer false hope to the condemned before they die?” “Is this where you play emotional mind games with someone who has suffered way too much?” Such is Mephibosheth’s attitude at this point: “I’m just a dead dog, what does the king have to do with me?” He had learned by experience that nothing comes in life without a catch; without a cost; that nothing quickly reverses itself suddenly without work and without more than meets the eye. Mephibosheth’s question here was like the modern day equivalent of “what do you think that I have that you want?” “Where is the fine print and what does it say?”

It sounded too good to be true, but true it was! David wasn’t kidding. In a flash, Mephibosheth had gone from the bottom to the top. From begging in the wilderness to dining at the royal table daily! The dread that had been a life-long companion disappeared in an instant as servants snapped to attention and brought a royal change of raiment. The sadness and questioning suspicion disappeared as Mephibosheth was carried into a royal chamber and shown his new quarters. Bewilderment changed to awe and excitement as he was brought into the feast hall and placed at the seat of honor with the highest and most important people of the kingdom and began to smell the luscious dishes that were being carried in. He kept pinching himself to make sure that it wasn’t a dream, and it wasn’t a dream -- it would be the way that he would live his life for the remainder of his years. Rather than judgment, mercy had been extended!

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I have brought to you the story of the mercy given Mephibosheth by King David because it is a wonderful illustration of the mercy given to you and I by God. Like Mephibosheth, humanity began as a prince with God and with possession of all of the riches and promises that glory had to offer. But because of our grandfather‘s, Adam’s, sin we have been born into a situation that is a miserable existence far from the palace and blessings of God. Because of the fall in the Garden of Eden, we bear the curse and the blight and the pain and the scars and the brunt of sin. We were born into less than perfect circumstances and had to come of age in spiritual wildernesses. All of us here today have wounds and scars from old hurts and failures. All of us bear the marks of sin upon our soul. All of us have entered the house of God -- His throne room, if you will -- with the attitude of futility that life experiences gained living under Adam’s curse has taught us. The scriptures teach:

If you really are truthful with yourself, you will admit that you are no ornament of honor for a Righteous King’s palace. We all have fallen short of God’s perfection. Living in a world of sin has taken its toil. The judgment of Adam has reached far into our existence.

And like Mephibosheth, the king looks for and sends for us in our lowly state. And if we fully realize how great He is, we approach Him with a fear and a self-consciousness knowing that we can never measure up to His standard. After all, this is no ordinary, earthly king, but the King of Kings who created David and was his Lord. And so when we first hear of the call of God to come and repent and to come and bow before Him in His presence, the first reaction is dread and the expectation of the worst! When we have the Spirit of God begin to draw us toward that meeting, we tend to have a negative view of it. And, sadly, some give in to the urge to flee and in their sinful, crippled state try to avoid the moment of truth not realizing that they will eventually have to pay homage to the king either on this side of eternity or on the other.

But if you will come now and surrender your life before this king, like Mephibosheth, you would be shocked with what you hear! This is a King rich in mercy. Judgment only comes to those who refuse to heed His call to come. If you will come before Him and surrender everything to Him now you will find true as the Psalmist wrote that:

How great is our God of mercy that He should show kindness to dead dogs such as you and I?! We come deserving death and punishment because, unlike Mephibosheth, we have added our own actions and own sins to the charges of our spiritual grandfather. And yet when we come and ask forgiveness, we -- like Mephibosheth -- receive forgiveness and kindness rather than judgment and pain. I have talked to people who -- after they heard the promise of God to forgive their sins and to wash them away in the waters of baptism -- scoffed at the Word of God saying, “it just sounds too good to be true!” “That would be too quick and too easy to think that years of pain and heartache could end in a moment of time in the blink of an eye!” But, Mephibosheth, it may sound too good to be true, but true it is! Clean your ears out, shake your head, pinch yourself a few times today if you must, but you’d better come to the realization that God is greater than you can even imagine. There is not a past nor crime that you have committed that He will not forgive. There is not a scar too deep or too diminishing to keep you from receiving the offer of mercy of this King!

I know you don’t deserve it and I know you have nothing to offer for it, but -- like Mephibosheth -- when you respond to the call of the King with sweet surrender, you will find not only the reversal of curse towards blessings, but you will have restored to you even things that you did not know were lost. As a five year old child, Mephibosheth did not realize the inheritance that he lost that horrible tragic day, but here it is being restored to him years later!

When you surrender to God’s call, you will not only be blessed in your present circumstances but there are joys and things restored to you that you did not even know you were missing! There is a peace that comes that you did not even know could be there! There is a victory and smile and a reason for living that you had not even heard could exist in your life. There are blessings and promises and anointings and experiences that you are now privy to in God’s house that you did not even think possible for anyone to own -- nevertheless to have them given freely to you! Like Mephibosheth, when we surrender to the call of the King, our misgivings and dread is quickly replaced with an awe and excitement as the decrees of blessing go forth. Simply put: the blessings that we receive in a short time in simply living for the King of Kings far outweigh and outdo and reverse the years of want!

And then there is that table of grace -- that place where God takes those who thought that they were damaged and injured by judgment to the point that they were undesirable and yet they are given a seat of honor and prestige to feast and dine on His goodness and His Word and His revelations and His power! To Mephibosheth’s way of thinking, he was no great ornament for such a blessed place, but I must point out that the king’s table was a great cover up of Mephibosheth’s inadequacies. Seated there at the feast table, Mephibosheth looked no different than the finest of the princes and leaders and exalted guests! Such is the way of God that He is able to take people that this world has labeled losers and outcasts and worthless and through His offer of grace and mercy turn them into showpieces of the splendor of His kingdom! Such were some of you, but now seated at the table of mercy, you have found that this world’s pronouncement of your worth was greatly lacking and you have realized a place of honor and prestige and self-fulfillment only possible at the feast of the King of Kings!

Do you see why I love the story of Mephibosheth so much? It was recorded in the Old Testament because it so ably mirrors our own case in God’s kingdom. That’s why Peter wrote the truth when he said in our other text:

Look around and you can see the mercy that was extended to Mephibosheth still being extended today! A people who were nobodies have suddenly become partakers of a heavenly kingship! A people who were nobodies and scarred by sin have suddenly become a chosen race and a royal priesthood! When you answered the King’s call, you were brought out of darkness into His marvelous light. And it has all come about because when He called you responded and “now you have received mercy!”

If you are here today and you have not experienced the life changing power of God’s mercy and love to the degree that we are discussing today, then you should know that it is a lie from the pits of hell that you are worthless because of your past. You can end your life no longer the victim, but rather the victor! Heed the King’s call today! Come and receive mercy as Mephibosheth received! It’s not too good to be true! It’s too good to be missed! He is no respecter of persons and what He did for us, He will do for you! Let your fears be calmed and your anxieties calmed, because you are in the throne room of the King of mercy today!

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The greatest part of the story of Mephibosheth is to grasp why such mercy was granted by King David. While Mephibosheth was on the floor still trying to fathom what the king had pronounced, King David had said:

“for the sake of your father Jonathan.” King David granted privilege and mercy to Mephibosheth because he saw in him the features and resemblance of Jonathan, whom David greatly loved. In other words, Mephibosheth was granted mercy for the sake of another, the one who came between the sins of Saul and his present circumstance.

Such is why you and I are given such mercy! Because another has come between us and Adam and His name was Jesus Christ! The scriptures say about Jesus:

Jesus is the image of the invisible God and the firstborn of all creation. What does that mean? It means -- and catch this, now -- that Jesus is the only fleshly image and likeness that God has ever had. Jesus wasn’t born physically until Mary conceived and gave birth in the Bethlehem night, but when God created man and woman in the beginning, we find that He created them “in His own image.” How could a physical man be created in the image of an invisible Spirit being? God created Adam in the image of the flesh that He would one day become, the son born to Mary, Jesus Christ!

What that means is that when we look at our lives, we see failures and shortcomings and handicaps and scars and faults. But when God looks at us, He sees past all of that and sees within us the resemblance of Jesus Christ! And so mercy is granted to us -- like it was to Mephibosheth -- for the sake of another! It is not our own worth that has caused us to receive such love from the King of Kings, but rather our resemblance to the One in whose image we were created!

It’s time that we stop listening to the lie of sin that says that we are too far handicapped because of our past and our sins and our failures to receive God’s love and mercy! Mephibosheth, a lifetime of suffering and judgment and even your crippled feet has not been able to erase the features of the beloved Jonathon from your countenance! And so it is with us: we come to God with scars and the marks of spiritual poverty, but even the worse lifestyle and the worst mistakes are not powerful enough to keep God from seeing within us the image of Jesus Christ! We are still worth saving and worth much because of whose image we bear! Sin cannot erase the marking of mercy in your life! Thank God that it is not by our own merit that we are received or rejected, rather because of the value of whose image we were created within! You are valuable to God, thanks to Jesus Christ, and the more alike to Him we become, the more mercy and blessing we receive! How powerful a portrait of God’s mercy is the story of Mephibosheth!

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But I would be remiss if I closed today without stepping beyond Mephibosheth’s circumstances in analogy. It is true that Mephibosheth’s story mirrors our own in our depravity and in being beckoned to the throne room and in receiving mercy. But where King David had to stop because he was only human, our God does not stop. The King of Glory’s mercy not only matches that received by Mephibosheth, but it exceeds and goes far beyond the mercy given by David. It would have been great to have been given mercy equaling what Mephibosheth received, but God can do far more than any earthly king. Let me close today by pointing out three ways that the mercy that we receive from God today far exceeds the mercy extended to Mephibosheth:

Despite the great blessings, Mephibosheth ended his life still a cripple. He ended his life still bearing the wounds of judgment. And he still later suffered and was taken advantage of others because of his handicap. David -- great and merciful king that he was -- could not heal Mephibosheth.

But we serve a King greater than King David! The Psalmist said:

We come into His presence limping or crawling because of our past wounds, but we leave healed and transformed by His healing touch! God cannot only heal physical diseases, but can heal broken hearts and mend broken dreams! It is a mercy beyond the story of Mephibosheth that we receive when we surrender to God Almighty because He heals us of sin’s mangling wounds! Furthermore:

Mephibosheth was honored to sit at David’s table, but his relationship with David never matched David’s love for his own sons. He was exalted but not that far! But with our King -- the great and merciful God -- when we surrender to Him and are born of the water and of the Spirit and take on His name in water baptism and receive His Spirit in the infilling of the Holy Ghost, there is an adoption process taking place. We are being “born again” into the kingdom of God. And not just as honored guests but we become as His offspring! We sing about it and what an awesome privilege that He calls us “friend” but even greater that He would call us “sons and daughters!” Not only does He give us mercy and blessing but He adopts us into His family and we are granted a relationship that far surpasses anything Mephibosheth ever received! Talking about mercy that goes far beyond Mephibosheth’s story!

And lastly by calling us sons and daughters:

Mephibosheth, you’ve receive much and no doubt you were awestruck to the day you died, but, Mephibosheth, David didn’t make you the heir to the throne and the kingdom! But as Paul wrote, we receive a mercy far greater than what Mephibosheth saw:

How great is our God that not only does He show us mercy but that He writes us into His will!? Reaping an eternity of ruling and reigning with Him? Given! An eternity of eternal life and blessing in a new heaven and a new earth? Granted! What a merciful God! It far exceeds what Mephibosheth received!

And so I close with this:

There is one other difference between Mephibosheth and you. Mephibosheth did not know about the great blessings and mercy and honor and change that would come about answering the king’s call before he responded. But today, you have heard about the blessings first. His command is simple: come surrender to me and live in my ways and in my kingdom and feed daily on my Word. He asks us to repent of our sins in surrender to Him and then to take on His name in baptism and receive His Spirit within us to become His child. It is a simple call with great rewards.

There is coming a great feast one day in heaven called the “marriage supper of the Lamb” and it will be filled with people who responded to the call of the King and received a mercy that was out of this world! How foolish it would be to know what He has for you and not respond with total surrender of your will to His! How foolish it would be to have been offered a great mercy -- even beyond that of which Mephibosheth received -- and not simply respond to the king’s call and come receive it! The King of Kings and Lord of Lord beckons today with a mercy even greater and beyond that of what Mephibosheth received. Come, and receive such mercy!