Wrath or Love?
You remember the little girl that was asked why God was sterner in the OT than in the NT? The one that thought for a moment and then said, "That was before God became a Christian." She wouldn’t have known it but she was voicing a lot of modernist and some evangelical theology.
The OT is much larger than the NT and it rehearses much more history than the NT. But, more to the point, its central concern is with God working with sinful Israel and the sinful nations whereas in the NT the central story is his work with Jesus Christ (Gospels and Acts) and the outworking of Christ’s person and work in the Epistles. So while there is certainly tough speech from and about God in the NT, for obvious reasons, it isn’t nearly as packed with it as the OT.
Still, since Jesus is the express image (in human form) of the invisible God and since he was so kind and caring and healing in his life we’re inclined to wince a little at some of the almost brutal responses of God rehearsed in the OT. "Modernists" had no problem there—they simply denied that the OT presented the truth. People thought God did these awful things and writers said he did them but anyone that had a heartknew that he didn’t do them.
Evangelicals (in the main) don’t feel at liberty to go the modernist direction. They can’t permit themselves to dismiss the OT’s witness so what do they do? Well, many of them just try to "balance" the record. They can’t deny God’s wrath but they emphasise his love and hope that that will lower the emotional temperature about the wrath. That works (and should in some ways) at the therapeutic level. "Well, he’s not all anger. The wrath sections are God sort of ‘acting out of character’."
But I’m sure our central problem in this area is that we construe God’s "wrath" as the absence of his love. This is a very great mistake! God can never act lovelessly! Not even once! God’s wrath is the form his love takes when he must chastise.
I’m going to ignore for now the proposals of those that are utterly opposed to the very idea of "punishment". I think this is a wrongheaded view of things. In any case, the Bible doesn’t agree with their viewpoint. Suppose a child repeatedly and knowingly does something very wrong and the parent punishes the child. Observers who don’t know the ins and outs of the situation and know even less about the parent might conclude that this is a loveless act. The parent and those that know the parent is devoted to the child’s welfare won’t construe the chastisement as the absence of love. Inflicting on the child what is painful or displeasing is love making its presence felt and made visible in the chastisement/punishment.
If we define love in such a way that it can never under any circumstances inflict pain or loss on a transgressor why, then, the wrath of God would be loveless. But it’s only when we so define love that we have a moral problem. Even if we believe that love may well inflict pain and loss under certain circumstances we might still feel emotional protests rising (see Hebrews 12 on chastisement). Haven’t parents hurt when they chastised their children? Haven’t we felt misgivings when (some) criminals are sent to prison? None of those feelings is surprising.
Let me repeat and move on. The wrath of God is one of the faces of his redeeming love.
It would help also if we took a close look at the context of some of God’s strange acts. [Note that in Isaiah 29 he attacks his own chosen city Jerusalem—just as David did earlier—but he did it in order to put his name there.]
Some young people from Bethel (a centre of idol worship) insult God’s prophet and God slays them. Is the issue simply the insolence of the young people or is there a message for Bethel and the Northern Kingdom of Israel?
In Leviticus 10 God slays Nadab and Abihu in circumstances that are far from clear. But it's clear that as representatives of God they dishonoured God. Before the chapter closes he passes by another violation of his Tabernacle law, committed by Aaron and the other two sons; a violation carried out because they honoured God in their hearts. He slew Uzzah in circumstances that make even his devoted servants raise their eyebrows. Click here.
I’m not suggesting that I approve of war but I do want to say that there was a time when hosts of men and women took up weapons to kill people, precisely because they thought human life and freedom were precious. We can sneer at that if we wish or we may rationally and calmly disagree with war, nevertheless, millions of people who "wouldn’t hurt a fly" said to predatory nations, "We will kill you if we have to because we hold life precious." Can you take a human life because you hold human life precious? I think you can; courts do it sometimes. Can God’s love show itself as wrath? I think so. God in wrath purposes to remove the sin that generated the wrath in the first place.
This little piece may have lost its way somewhat but two points I think are worth remembering. God’s wrath is not the absence of God’s love; it is God’s love taking a form we don't like. Two, a close examination of context and a broad survey of God’s purpose for the human family will open our eyes to truths imbedded in tough sections.
©2004 Jim McGuiggan. All materials are free to be copied and used as long as money is not being made.
Many thanks to brother Ed Healy, for allowing me to post from his website, the abiding word.com.