‘It is not your sacrifice i desire, but your mercy.’ Jesus recites this

Hosea prophecy a couple of times to the religious leaders in his day.. And

mercy isn’t necessarily quite what we mean (it doesn’t have any implication

of deserved punishment in the Hebrew.) It just means love: committed,

unrelenting, care. Jesus life and teaching was unrelenting on this message:

It’s not sacrifice, nor the temple (statues!), nor righteous behaviour nor

any level of being right that he desires. It’s steadfast love. And it’s a

flipping challenging message to hear right now.