If the same reasons
people use for not going to meet with the church were applied to one’s life, it
would be easy to see how inconsistent our logic would be. For instance, one
could conjure up “10 Reasons Not To Take A Bath”: 1) I was forced
to bathe as a child. 2) People who make soap are only after your money. 3) I
only bathe on special occasions like Christmas and Easter. 4) People who take
baths are hypocrites – they think they are cleaner than everyone else. 5) I
would bathe but there are so many different kinds of soap I can’t decide which
one to use. 6) Bathing got boring, so I stopped. 7) The temperature of the
bathroom is always too cold or too hot. 8) I’ll start bathing when I get older
and dirtier. 9) I just don’t have the time to bathe. 10) None of my friends
take baths.
I recently saw a bumper
sticker that read, “No Matter what…God Is Not Mad At You!” I
couldn’t help but think that someone has a misconception about the nature of
God. Now, it is true that God does not get “mad” like people often do, by
losing His temper, becoming flustered, turning red in the face. In the heat of
an angry moment, many a person has done a thing they have later regretted. God
does not do that. God is always in complete control; always takes the correct
action; always acts in harmony with his infinite nature. If God were ever to
get angry, it would be a perfect anger, for just reasons, executed in a perfect
way. God does not throw temper tantrums. But is it possible for God to be “mad”?
A quick Bible Concordance word search, depending upon translation, reveals that
the phrase, “anger of the Lord” occurs about 36 times, and the similarly worded
“wrath of the Lord” is found about 14 times in the Old Testament. In the first
person, God speaks of “my wrath” 44 times and “my anger” 31 times throughout
the Bible. Speaking of God’s anger in the third person, “his wrath” occurs some
20 times and “wrath of God” 11 times in the New Testament. In Jeremiah 49:37, God
even refers to “My fierce anger…” Doubtless there are other passages that
express the same idea, though worded differently. Surely this is enough for us
to understand there is such a thing as divine anger toward a person or even all
of humankind. Many want to perceive God as a grandfatherly figure in the sky
who is rather harmless and doesn’t have the will to mete out genuine punishment
which lasts for eternity. They think like that, not because the Bible teaches
it, but they don’t know what the Bible does teach. The New Testament put us on
guard against such delusions. Every right-thinking person wants to “avoid God’s
wrath” (Romans 13:5) and living every day as a Christian is the only way to do
so.
[2 Peter 2:1-11] Our
God is a God of infinite virtue. His love is boundless. His mercy is absolute.
His grace unhindered. But even our God in time will say “enough!” With the
world of Noah (Genesis 6:5-7), with the world of Sodom (Genesis 18:20-33; 2
Peter 2:6; Jude 5-7), with the nation of Israel (Mark 13:1-23), the time came
when God assuredly said, “I will go no further with these people!” (2
Peter 3:10-12). This is a lesson from the Word of God that people, nations, and
even the Lord’s church can’t seem to learn. In time, sometime, in God’s own
good time, He will bring an end to this foolishness; and one might say, the
curtain will come down for the final time. Paul, writing to the church in
Thessalonica puts it in these words, “…taking vengeance on those who know
not God and obey not the gospel…” (2 Thessalonians 1:5-10). The Hebrews writer
states, “It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God”
(Hebrews 10:31) “For our God is a consuming fire” (Hebrews 12:29). We
worry about money, wars, sickness (Matthew 6:25-34) – all kinds of things take
up our worry time. The one thing we should all be concerned with is when our
God tells His Son and angels, “I’ve had enough!” (Jude 14-15).
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