The Wrath of God

THE WRATH OF GOD - John MacArthur

Now, sometimes when you talk about God being a God of wrath, certain people get disturbed. And they don't understand how God can be a God of anger and God can be a God of wrath and God can be a God of fury, a God of terror. But that's because they don't understand God.

 

 

Let's see if we can't help ourselves to a deeper understanding of His wrath in perspective with all of His other attributes.

 

God's attributes are balanced in His divine perfection. And they are perfectly balanced. If God did not have wrath and God did not have anger then He would not be God.

God is perfect in love, on the one hand, and He is equally perfect in hate, on the other hand.

 

Just as totally as He loves, so totally does He hate. As His love is unmixed, so is His hate unmixed.

 

Of Christ, it says in Hebrews 1:9, "Thou hast loved righteousness and hated iniquity." And there is that perfect balance in the nature of God. One of the tragedies of Christianity in our time is a failure to preach the hatred of God, the judgment of God. We're so sweet We're so sentimental.

 

 We're so kind of mushy in our Christianity. When is the last time you heard a new song on the wrath of God? Heard one lately? I haven't.

Does God hate anyone?

by Matt Slick

The universalists repeatedly say things like, "God loves us all so much that He will save us all"; or "He hates the sin, but loves the sinner"; or "God is love, and will not send anyone to hell."

 

Universalists teach that God is so full of love, that He simply cannot send anyone to eternal hell fire. It is against His infinite love. They want God to forgive all, even those who openly reject Him and die cursing God.

 

I must admit, it is nice to think of God's love being so infinitely great that all will ultimately be saved. Hell is a terrible place and I don't want anyone to go there. But it does not matter what I think. It matters what the Bible says.

God is love (1 John 4:8), but God also punishes the sinner and hates all who do iniquity. God is not one sided. He is not simply an infinitely loving God. He is also infinitely just. He must deal with sin. He must punish the sinner.

 

In the truth of God's word, we find that the Lord has provided one way by which we may be saved. That single way is through Jesus' sacrifice. For all who trust in Him, salvation will come. But to those who turn away, God's wrath abides upon them: "He who believes in the Son has eternal life; but he who does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him," (John 3:36).

Does God hate anyone?

Does God hate anyone? The answer is yes.

Psalm 5:5, "The boastful shall not stand before Thine eyes; Thou dost hate all who do iniquity,"

 

Psalm 11:5, "The Lord tests the righteous and the wicked, and the one who loves violence His soul hates."

 

Lev. 20:23, "Moreover, you shall not follow the customs of the nation which I shall drive out before you, for they did all these things, and therefore I have abhorred them."

 

Prov. 6:16-19, "There are six things which the Lord hates, yes, seven which are an abomination to Him: 17 Haughty eyes, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood, 18 A heart that devises wicked plans, feet that run rapidly to evil, 19 A false witness who utters lies, and one who spreads strife among brothers."

 

Hosea 9:15, "All their evil is at Gilgal; indeed, I came to hate them there! Because of the wickedness of their deeds I will drive them out of My house! I will love them no more; All their princes are rebels."

 

Are these verses hard to read? Do they make you feel uncomfortable? They should. God hates sin. But, He does not punish sin. He punishes the sinner. Sin cannot be tied up and thrown into a fire. It cannot be put in a box or glued to a stick. It is rebellion. It is rebellion in the heart. It is breaking God's Law. Sin occurs inside the heart and mind of people.

 

Therefore, God must punish the sinner. Why? Because He is both Holy and Just and the person who sins offends God. God's Holy and Just character will not allow Him to ignore this offense. Why?....

God's Attributes

 

1) Understanding Gods attributes as revealed in His Word is essential for your spiritual well being.

 

You must know God, not as you may conceive Him to be or wish Him to be, but as He has revealed Himself in the Bible. I’ve heard professing Christians say, "My God is not a God of judgment; He’s a God of love." That’s nice, but your God is not the God of the Bible! He is a figment of your own imagination! The God of the Bible is both a God of judgment and of love. Or, there are Christians who dodge a difficult chapter like Romans 9, where Paul says of God (Ro 9:18), "So then He has mercy on whom He desires, and He hardens whom He desires." They don’t want to conceive of God as having the sovereign right to save whom He chooses and to harden others in their sin. But to dodge what the Bible says about God is to make God in your own image, which is idolatry.

 

 

Two things will help you understand God’s attributes. First, read the Bible over and over, asking as you read, "What does this teach me about You, God?"
\ Second, read some good books on the attributes of God.
1. J. I. Packer’s classic, Knowing God [IVP] is a good place to start.
2. A. W. Pink’s The Attributes of God [Baker] is brief, but good.
3. A. W. Tozer’s The Knowledge of the Holy [Harper & Row] is a bit mystical, but worth reading.
4. Stephen Charnock’s The Existence and Attributes of God [Baker] is wordy, but a gold mine. He spends 146 pages on the goodness of God (2:209-355).
5.  Any good systematic theology
6.  (Charles Hodge, Louis Berkhof, Wayne Grudem, Robert Reymond, etc.) will have a section on God’s attributes.
7. There are also some excellent easy-to-read books on various attributes of God, such as
8. R. C. Sproul’s The Holiness of God [Tyndale],
9.  A. W. Pink’s The Sovereignty of God [Banner of Truth],
10.  
11.  or John MacArthur’s The Love of God [Word]. Understanding God’s attributes will give you a firm footing
when you encounter trials.
 
2) Interpreting your circumstances in light of God's attributes is essential for your spiritual well being.
 
You must know God, but then when trials hit, you have to process what you know in light of your difficult situation. By faith, you have to rehearse for yourself what you know to be true, maybe a hundred times a day.
The psalms are full of this type of thing. The psalmist is in a huge crisis. He rehearses for himself what he knows about God’s character and His covenant promises. By the end of the psalm his circumstances haven’t changed, but his attitude and emotions have changed dramatically, because he has interpreted his circumstances in light of who God is. For example, in Psalms 42 and Ps 43, there is a refrain, where the psalmist talks to himself. Three times he asks (Ps 43:5; see also, Ps 42:5, 11), "Why are you in despair, O my soul? And why are you disturbed within me?" He answers himself (Ps 43:5), "Hope in God, for I shall again praise Him, the help of my countenance and my God." When you’re in the emotional throes of a major trial, you have to do this by faith in God’s Word, not by your feelings. Your feelings will be all over the chart, but your faith must rest on the facts about God as declared in His Word of truth: He is good
 
 

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