The Wrath of Love
If I were a dog, I think my breed would be Pointer.
This is a two-day post. The next one will drop this coming Sunday morning.
Oh, let the evil of the wicked come to an end, and may you establish the righteous — you who test the minds and hearts, O righteous God!
My shield is with God, who saves the upright in heart.
God is a righteous judge, and a God who feels indignation every day.
Psalms 7:9-11 (ESV)
I use passages from Scripture because they make the most sense to me in being able to understand life as close to reality as I can possibly reach.
I read and listen broadly and happily to those who do not share my opinions (something the culture currently is having a hard time doing) and what I find on the atheist-side of arguments is mostly a desire to run the show as best they can without any outside help. Plus they are religious in their own right, believing by faith, that God does not exist.
I write at an intersection between two groups I personally have great affection for, who, for the most part, treat each other with a bit of distain. I’m not the only one who sees this and is sad, but, as usual, I find my side to be in the minority. The two groups I care about are the twelve-step recovery groups and the Bible faith community.
Having stated all of this, I do not see my role within this self-imposed writing project to be one of bible teaching. For that, I strongly recommend you go check out a bible teaching faith community near you. Also, I am not here to explain the recovery community as even an approximate substitute for the real deal. Go check one out near you, especially if your life is becoming a bit unmanageable.
Instead, I write to the hurting and confused, which, if people were real honest and have lived long enough outside any sheltered childhood, would be all of us. Even those not wanting to admit this, a form of denial, should they ever wake up, will likely find benefit spending a few moments once in awhile here with this still point project.
So, I am not here to teach or convince, but to point. This is consistent, frankly, with what a witness is called to do in the faith community and what people in recovery are advised to do in relating with others. Pressuring, prodding, cajoling, whining, begging, demanding, scolding, manipulating, avoiding, and deserting create stresses in others but are unloving actions, regardless how someone “feels” about why they think they are necessary in the moment.
Which brings me to my controversial topic of today.
Wrath
Probably the best argument against the idea that God is love has to do with descriptions in the Bible of him being jealous and vengeful.
Fair enough.
Let’s address this, but understand, this is far from a complete argument. It hopefully gives you some food for thought and motivates you to dig deeper on your own.
First of all, if you have been reading along here you know I believe God has a personality. This does not make him human. It explains in part what it means that we, who also have personalities, were made in his image.
Secondly, the idea that God is love does not mean that love is God. This would strip him of personality. The intention of the passage is to say one of God’s strongest or dominant attributes is love. If you want to understand God, one way to do this is to study his love.
Thirdly, because God loves people, he doesn’t love them as a group, but as individuals. Please take this point to heart because it is meant specifically for you.
He sees you.
He knows you.
Specifically.
And history with all its mess and turmoil had to play out to at least the time you were born, grew up, and decided whether or not to love him back. (Who knows? That might be today).
So what is God’s wrath and how does it relate to his love?
First, just like we have had to do with love, (True Love compared to pop love), it is important to separate God’s wrath from man’s wrath.
We know man’s wrath. Look at war, crime, and basic man’s inhumanity to man and nature. Man’s wrath is rebellion. It’s purpose is to obliterate or annihilate those who get in his or her way. It is taking the law into one’s own hands.
Now one big difference between man and God has to do with death. Look at this statement by Jesus.
And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell. Matthew 10:28
To God, physical death is not the end of the matter; to evil men, they think it is.
This doesn’t make death a good thing, but it is still a necessary one as part of God’s patient long-game to save people eternally (well past your life time) and to join us back together with those we love who have already died.
This helps make sense of what Jesus meant (just before raising a few dead people back to life) that they were sleeping.
…he said, “Go away, for the girl is not dead but sleeping.” And they laughed at him. Matthew 9:24
After saying these things, he said to them, “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep, but I go to awaken him.” John 11:11
It also makes sense of the passage that tells us that we are to grieve for those who have died, but not “as others who have no hope.” (1 Thessalonians 4:13).
So, Love does not excuse sin, it covers and protects its Beloved from it.
What does this look like?
When we turn and run into God’s loving arms, we are still a mess. But we are now God’s mess and he promises to never from the time we accept him, to leave us nor forsake us. He also promises to help us clean up our acts.
Now I am not here to determine who is and isn’t saved; who has a relationship with God and who doesn’t. I do understand that many may profess to know God but are simply wolves in sheep clothing. Ultimately those who believe will be changed, and if they live long enough there will be evidence of good fruit, but not necessarily initially in the same way a newly planted fruit tree is not expected to do anything but sink it’s roots deep and grow.
The point here is, your relationship with God is your problem, not anyone else’s. He will help you work out your salvation with the appropriate fear and trembling to get you to maturity.
But what if we refuse God’s offer?
He respects our decision. However, this decision, to separate from God has cataclysmic consequences. To the one who elects to go this way, it is to walk essentially into outer darkness. This can’t be good, and it isn’t, because good was that path heading in the opposite direction.
Does this mean everyone who chooses against God is condemned already?
I’m afraid so, but I do not believe this includes those who do not have enough information to make a clear un-coerced decision. (I’m not sure you reading this fall into the latter category, however).
So what does this look like globally?
God patiently waits until a time in which it is no longer necessary to wait any longer, when the final decision to accept his offer has occurred. Until that time he has been holding back final judgement, one involving not just the body, but the soul. (See Matthew 10:28 above).
And what happens when justice is delayed?
Wrath builds up. You see, wrath is simply the end of a delayed sentencing.
It is like the pressure applied to set an old spring-style mouse trap. All the evil, violence, large and petty crimes that make up the word sin are being held back in order to protect the children AND at the same time, the amount of mess is building thus setting the trap with all its wound-up tension that will, one day, discharge with violence and destruction. In this way, wrath is not the expression of anger, but the expression of true justice. True Love and True Justice are characteristics of the holiness of God.
And all of it comes back to God’s Beloved (that would be those who have put their faith in him). You see, True Love defends the Beloved. This is the role of the husband for his wife and children, the mother for her children, the older child for the younger one, the healthy for the weak, the wealthy for the poor, the police for the community, the healthcare worker for the patient, and the soldier for the country. Potential violence may be necessary to defend the innocent and weak, however, those who trust God need to take seriously these words.
Repay no one evil for evil, but give thought to do what is honorable in the sight of all. If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all.
Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God, for it is written, “Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.”
To the contrary, “if your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink; for by so doing you will heap burning coals on his head.”
Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.
Romans 12:17-21