For some, the wrath of God is the Almighty reigning down fire and brimstone on a wicked world to punish it for its immoral and evil ways. Others, however, choose to just toss the whole idea of God getting angry at humanity out the window and we get this picture of the "Buddy Jesus" who never gets angry and would never do anything to punish wayward people. Yet, one can't escape the fact that God (and Jesus for that matter--anyone remember him whipping and chasing the money changers out of the temple?) gets angry in the Bible.
Loving Wrath?
Too often in today’s world people try to separate wrath from being a part of God’s work in salvation. “God is love,” is thrown around in theological discussions like a haphazard hacky sack that fails to truly define or embody what exactly is meant by “love.” The preferred view of God is to see God’s love as always bestowing wonderful things upon us, and that God would never cause any sort of misfortune or pain. This "buddy Jesus" view, however, completely dismisses the reality of God’s righteous anger at sin that is prevalent throughout the entire Bible, both Old and New Testaments.
The key to understanding God’s wrath lies in understanding the nature of God's love. For anyone who has loved another should recognize the reality that love, while at times wonderful, can also hurt—more deeply than if love were not involved at all. To quote Dr. Rolf Jacobson from his book "Crazy Talk," the wrath (or anger) of God is, "The puzzling--to human beings--concept that God loves our neighbors so much that God gets angry at us when we do (or don't do) things and cause them to suffer." [1] Indeed, if God is a just God as the Bible claims He is, God HAS to get angry quite a bit with the way humans tend to treat one another on a pretty regular basis. This anger is what might be termed as "God's loving wrath." After all...who do you get the angriest at? The people you love the most.
The problem is, in today's world, people are always trying to ascribe this thing or that thing to "God's Wrath." God's wrath against the licentious living in New Orleans caused the levees to fail... except, as Tony Campolo quite aptly pointed out, if that was the case, God missed the mark. Bourbon Street was left alone, it was all the poor people who couldn't get out that he destroyed. Sometimes, perhaps a low pressure system is just a low pressure system and part of how the world is ordered that keeps the planet alive and thriving.
Wrath is Never the Final Answer
Natural disasters aside, however, seeing Christ hanging on the cross reminds one of the very real nature of both God’s love and God’s wrath. God rages against sin, and rightfully so as it is what separates humanity from Him, to the point of death. Given no one is without sin, no one can view themselves as being exempt from being targets of that wrath.
Yet that wrath is not without its purpose and is not just a deity throwing a temper tantrum when He doesn’t get His way. Wrath, as an instrument of love, is employed by God in order to bring about change, but is never the final answer.
To look at Christ is to see God’s love wrought through His wrath. Christ was crucified and took upon himself the full wrath of God’s anger against humanity’s sin. Were the story to end there, it would seem like God engages in divine child abuse. However... the story does not end there, because Christ was then raised from the dead three days later. Thus, while one can't ignore God's anger and God's wrath at sin, what is important to remember is that the final answer lies not in the wrath and suffering of the crucified Christ, but in the hope of the resurrected Christ to which all must cling, for there is where one finds God’s mercy...and love. The two are inseparable and must go hand in hand.
God's Wrath is Always Temporary
Psalm 30:5 says, "God's anger is but for a moment; his favor is for a lifetime." To quote Abraham Lincoln, "God is angry with all of the people some of the time, God is angry with some of the people all of the time, but God is not angry with all of the people all of the time." So while God may get angry at how humans fail to love each other and harm one another, his love and forgiveness through Christ "is for a lifetime" and beyond.
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1. Rolf A. Jacobson, Crazy Talk: A Not So Stuffy Dictionary of Theological Terms, (Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress, 2008) 8
