Let me briefly summarise our whole argument before continuing so as to avoid confusion.

• We have seen from Psalm 16 that what drives the psalmist on every day is his ability to see the beauty of God (We will consider Psalm 27 later).
• We have seen this to be true of the Lord Jesus as well.
• We have seen that one of the things believers and unbelievers struggle with is that sin has a type of beauty in the eye of a sinner that stuns and attracts into its deadly trap.
• We have seen that in order to escape this trap, believers need to come, like the psalmist to see the stunning, attracting beauty of God.
• We have seen that this beauty attracts only those who are able to see it. Believers see this beauty through the eyes of faith. We considered this in Hebrews 11.
• To be able to see through the eyes of faith is to see in such a way that your life is radically affected and you are motivated in Christian service.
• We then began to consider the beauty that these eyes are looking upon. Because we had to begin somewhere, we started on the beauty of the mercy of God. You could really expand this argument to include any or all of God’s perfections. If we did that, my line of thought would be difficult to trace.
• We then considered what it was for God to experience a surge of mercy. We saw that there is a difference between a person who performs a merciful action as a matter of routine and a person who passionately plunges into an act of mercy at the risk of his own life.
• To complete this point, there are still a few steps to take, and here I would like to begin the next point: Consider the immeasurable quality of God’s experience of existence.

One of the most galling scourges of human life is that of apathy—being bored, disinterested, having no appetite, zeal or passion. For God, existence as a Person is a thrilling experience. You may idolise great celebrities, astronauts, fighter pilots, extreme sports people, racing drivers, or any other kind of person who lives a truly exhilarating lifestyle. You wonder in your mind, “What must it be like to be him, or her?” Consider the most thrilling, exciting, electrifying, radical lifestyle you can conceive of in your mind. Consider the greatest exhilaration you can imagine and wish you could just experience that.