Mercy, Not Sacrifice - Illume in a Certain Light (Focus 1 of 4)

What’s the most unusual thing you’ve ever traded or exchanged? How did it work out?

See what this Spotlight (and series) is focused on.
Tap on the words "Focus 1" in the image below to read this Spotlight's summary.

Let's talk about lighting a match.
Listen to this clip when you’re ready to begin today’s Spotlight.

(And welcome, by the way! It’s great that you’re here!)

Illume aims to hold that kind of potential, too. That's part of the reason that Illume's logo has a match in it!



There are three distinct parts to the logo:

1. Worship - The matchstick (the vertical line) represents you, but all by yourself. A matchstick needs something to happen for it to become what it was truly meant to be. That's how Illume thinks of worship. In worship, you don't offer God anything—he offers you everything you need to be what he made you to be. 
2. Learn - The flame is what happens when God is making you something different than you once were—empowering you and pushing you beyond yourself as you learn to be proof of the light in a dark world. 
3. Serve - The halo (the circle) is what goes out from you to those around you as you, empowered by God and growing in his love, serve in your unique ways. 

This icon represents a life of discipleship (that is, what Jesus means when he says to someone, "Come, follow me.")

Read these words from Micah 6:6–8 together. (After you've read them, click on the word "mercy.")

Take special note that the idea that God desires "mercy, not sacrifice" is embedded in these verses, before moving on to the next section of the Spotlight. Jesus has these verses and (even more explicitly) Hosea 6:6 in mind when he says these words during his ministry. (More on that later.)

Listen to (and worship with) this song.
After pressing play to start the song, “May You Find a Light,” be comforted by the idea that God walks with all travelers. “Walk humbly with the Lord.”

Notice Jesus’ mercy as he calls his disciple Matthew.

Select someone to read through Matthew 9:9–13 (NIV) to set the stage.

As Jesus went on from there, he saw a man named Matthew sitting at the tax collector’s booth. “Follow me,” he told him, and Matthew got up and followed him. While Jesus was having dinner at Matthew’s house, many tax collectors and sinners came and ate with him and his disciples. When the Pharisees saw this, they asked his disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?” On hearing this, Jesus said, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. But go and learn what this means: ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice.’  For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”

Pray the following prayer together.

Jesus, 
We bow in wonder at the expanse of your embrace,
the breadth of your inclusion,
the surprise of your grace.

You seek and seek and seek.
Including those we write off as beyond hope:
the outcasts,
the public sinners,
the self-serving,
those who collaborate with evil and oppression…

Why are we surprised?
You desire mercy not sacrifice!
You are the Great Physician
coming to those most in need of healing.

Forgive us.
Forgive us for forgetting who you are.
Forgive us for forgetting our own sin
and isolation
and collaboration.
Forgive us for judging.
Forgive our self-righteousness.
Forgive us for limiting you
when we are so desperately in need of you.
We are “those most in need” as well!

Create in us clean hearts and renew your Holy Spirit within us.

Lord have mercy.
Lord have mercy on us all.
Amen.

(A prayer of confession based on the call of Matthew © 2017 Lisa Ann Moss Degrenia)

Walk through this interactive presentation in responding to mercy.

Define "mercy, not sacrifice."
All this leads back to this phrase in the story of the call of Matthew, "I desire mercy, not sacrifice."

As Jesus went on from there, he saw a man named Matthew sitting at the tax collector’s booth. “Follow me,” he told him, and Matthew got up and followed him. While Jesus was having dinner at Matthew’s house, many tax collectors and sinners came and ate with him and his disciples. When the Pharisees saw this, they asked his disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?” On hearing this, Jesus said, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. But go and learn what this means: ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice.’ For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”

1. Jesus is having dinner at Matthew's house. Why do you think the crowd that showed up felt like they wanted to be there?
2. Think about the people to whom Jesus was speaking. What did they think of themselves? 
3. Who is Jesus saying is sick - and what was making them sick? 
4. "I desire mercy, not sacrifice" is used, both here and in Hosea, as a critique of what someone was doing (or how they were doing it.) Think back to the match metaphor in Illume's logo. Where does this metaphor serve well in this conversation, and where might it lead toward an undesirable perspective?

Let's talk about how, as a church that owns a unique building, we can espouse this "mercy, not sacrifice" idea.

Pray through your requests—together—as a group.
After submitting your requests in the above form, take some time to share with your group whatever requests the group might have for this week.

Close with this song and bask in God's mercy.

Let's wrap things up by taking a look at what's Current at Illume.
Tap on the buttons in the frame below to see what’s currently happening at Illume—information on everything from current and upcoming online content to live events and opportunities to serve in the community can all be found here.