Yā ʿibādī. My servants. Allah addresses transgressors and STILL calls them His. He calls them His before He commands them to repent. The address is the mercy.

There is a story the Salaf transmitted about this verse. A man came to Ibn ʿAbbās and said: I killed a man. Is there tawbah for me? Ibn ʿAbbās said: yes. Another came: I killed a hundred men. Ibn ʿAbbās said: yes. Another came: I killed someone, and what I am about to tell you is even worse: I asked the man for his Islamic creed before I killed him, and he refused to die except as a believer, and I killed him anyway. Ibn ʿAbbās wept and said: this verse is for you. Look at the breadth. The murderer of the believer. The verse still opens for him on condition of tawbah. There is no sin Allah excludes from this verse's reach. The condition is the turning. The promise is the wiping. Now look at your own life. Whatever shame you have been carrying, whatever you have been hiding from yourself, whatever you have categorized as unforgivable, this verse names you as MY servant and asks you to come back. The door has not closed. It will close only at your death or the Hour, whichever comes first. So tonight, run back. Make tawbah for the specific sin that has been weighing on you. Read 39:53 aloud as Allah's direct address to you. Believe the promise. Walk through. Yā Allāh, You who called us Your servants even after we transgressed, accept our return as a wider mercy than our sin. Forgive all of it, every drop of it, by the verse You revealed for despairers. Āmīn.