Resistance to the Word brings the wrath of God

I am struck by this idea of God's wrath. Many times we do not like to think of an angry God. The image we normally prefer is how God is love, the loving God, the tolerant God, the forgiving, patient, compassionate God which is true because that is an element of God's character.

But in the same way the Bible tells us that God is a consuming fire and I think it is important that we understand this because today, one of the strongest arguments of those who promote homosexuality is that God is love and that therefore God accepts all people, God accepts behaviors, that if we love people we must accept them as they are and that if we oppose their behavior we are not expressing God's love, which is a complete misrepresentation of the truth .

The Bible says that God is love but as we have said it also says that he is a consuming fire. There is an aspect of God that is wrathful and that aspect of God manifests when God is resisted. We see for example that on several occasions God was angry against the Hebrew people when they resisted Him, when they murmured about Him, when they despised His works of salvation that He had done when He brought the Hebrews out of Egypt; on several occasions we see that God's wrath is terribly frightening and that God has times when He is angry as well.

There is a place for the wrath of God, indeed there is a place for the wrath of man. The Bible says: "Be angry but do not sin." The Gospel is serious, God is serious. When men insist on resisting the Will of God, this definitely brings divine wrath.

The Church of Christ has to understand this in order not to be intimidated or emotionally exploited saying that of course not, we always have to be gentle and calm and supportive of everything and patient. There is a place where the Church must also declare that God is a God of justice and that there is a condemnation for those who resist the Word of the Lord. We do not do it with joy, we do not do it with any kind of personal satisfaction but it is a duty that we know that for the person who resists God there is a condemnation, there is an eternal fire.

At the end of the world the Bible says that God is going to judge the living and the dead, God is going to cast unrepentant and sinners into eternal fire, hell is a manifestation of God's wrath and justice. So we have to understand this from the beginning right? There is a dimension that is an angry dimension and it must be said this way, it is a holy anger, it is a perfect anger in the sense that it is not an anger that comes out of selfishness, hatred or resentment but rather it is an anger that a just, sovereign God who takes offense when small, imperfect men resist His perfect Will and His perfect judgments.

So I think in this meditation I just want us to establish this fact right? God has His moment when He rages against those who resist His Will and the Church has to also present that aspect of God to present the total counsel of God's Word to sinners so that they can repent. Thank you for your attention and in our next message we will continue to study this passage. God bless you.