Along with this devastating category four Hurricane that hit the Texas coast last week with unprecedented flooding, came those who claim that this was God’s wrath. They claim that Houston and the surrounding areas were being punished for their sins. The social media threads are filled with those who give the reasons that God is punishing this area. Some of the reasons cited are:
Houston is being punished for electing an open lesbian Mayor, even though her term ended in 2016. That Houston has a large homosexual community. That God is punishing Houston and Texas for helping elect President Trump. They are ignorant of the fact that Houston voted 54% for Hillary to only 42% for Trump. Also a University of Tampa, Florida professor stated that the widespread devastation was “instant karma” for those who voted for President Trump. Since he is such a believer in instant karma, he received it himself in the form of being fired from his job. Others say that God is trying to get our attention. Many see God like a mob boss. God is God the Father, not the god-father. God is not drowning a few folks to get our attention.
Some say since the hurricane made landfall between Corpus Christi and Victoria, that this is a special message from God. Corpus Christi is Latin for Body of Christ and Victoria is Latin for victory. What’s the message? The Body of Christ is victorious? We already know that. We don’t need a hurricane to tell us that, we have the Bible. Duh! Some have even said that because America didn’t head the warning of the American Solar eclipse, God four days later sent this hurricane.
I am somewhat encouraged that so far, I have not heard major religious leaders declaring this hurricane was God’s judgment on America for her sins, as many of them have done in the past. When Super storm Sandy hit New York in 2012, a well-known minister stated, “God is systematically destroying America, over the homosexual agenda.” A very famous, world known minister, blamed Hurricane Katrina on New Orleans’s “orgies”. A well-known Christian syndicated radio minister blamed the Sandy Hook School shooting on America’s acceptance of gay marriage and abortion. Another famous, world known minister stated, that if God did not soon judge America for her sins of homosexuality, that He would have to repent to Sodom and Gomorrah. My answer to that statement is that if God ever does judge America or any other nation for her sin, then He will have to apologize to Jesus. He would be saying His sacrifice was not enough to pay for all the sin of the world.
I’m thankful that most of the major Christian leaders, up to this writing, have just focused on responding with concern, prayer, and outreach efforts to those who are suffering due to this horrible storm. But this idea of a vengeful, angry God is nothing new in America. This theology came here with the Puritans and was firmly established here with the Rev. Jonathan Edward’s 1741 sermon, “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God,” which is still studied by seminarians and history and English students today.
This sermon painted God as full of anger and vengeful toward sinners. Let’s read an excerpt from this sermon:
The God that holds you over the pit of hell, much as one holds a spider, or some loathsome insect over the fire, abhors you, and is dreadfully provoked: his wrath towards you burns like fire; he looks upon you as worthy of nothing else, but to be cast into the fire; he is of purer eyes than to bear to have you in his sight; you are ten thousand times more abominable in his eyes, than the most hateful venomous serpent is in ours.
Is this view of God accurate? Jonathan Edwards said, “God holds you over hell, that He abhors(HATES) you, that His wrath towards you burns like fire”. What? Is this the “Father” that Jesus showed us? Absolutely Not!
What About The Wrath of God?
Romans 5:6-11 (NKJV) 6 For when we were still without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. 7 For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet perhaps for a good man someone would even dare to die. 8 But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. 9 Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from wrath through Him. 10 For if when we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life. 11 And not only that, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received the reconciliation.
Prior to Jesus’ coming, there was wrath from God against mankind for his sins. Once the Law was given by Moses, the Old Testament writers record a brutal history of God’s wrath upon sin and disobedience. But all that changed at the cross of Jesus Christ. Prior to the death of Jesus, people’s sins were held against them. But when Jesus died, God stopped holding people’s sins against them. This is exactly what the Bible teaches:
Hebrews 8:12 (NKJV) For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more.”
Hebrews 10:17 (NKJV) then He adds, “Their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more.”
2 Corinthians 5:18-19 (NKJV) 18 Now all things are of God, who has reconciled us to Himself through Jesus Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation, 19 that is, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not imputing their trespasses to them, and has committed to us the word of reconciliation.
The word “reconciliation” is talking about making peace. To bring into harmony. This is what we are doing when we reconcile our checkbook. We are trying to get our checkbook in agreement/harmony with what the bank shows that we have in our account. We need to get our theology in harmony with what God says we have through Jesus Christ.
Paul says in Colossians 1:14 that, in whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins.
Religion says, “God can reconcile you”, but the Bible says, “God has reconciled you to Himself, that we were reconciled to God”. Not, will be reconciled, but have been reconciled to God. How were we reconciled to God? By God not imputing our trespasses to us. God is no longer holding our sins against us. Instead, He imputed our sins to Jesus.
This is why God is not angry. At the cross, more than 2000 years ago, the sin of the whole world was forgiven by God and His grace was extended to all men. Does that mean that all men are saved? No. We must receive Him to be saved, but all men are forgiven by God, they just haven’t received the benefit of His forgiveness until they trust in Jesus. Isaiah spoke about this glorious New Covenant that God would bring God’s anger to an end:
Isaiah 54:8-10 (NKJV) 8 With a little wrath I hid My face from you for a moment; But with everlasting kindness I will have mercy on you,” Says the LORD, your Redeemer. 9 “For this is like the waters of Noah to Me; For as I have sworn That the waters of Noah would no longer cover the earth, So have I sworn That I would not be angry with you, nor rebuke you. 10 For the mountains shall depart And the hills be removed, But My kindness shall not depart from you, Nor shall My covenant of peace be removed,” Says the LORD, who has mercy on you.
I want to look at three extraordinary facts about the cross.
- On the cross Jesus became sin.
2 Corinthians 5:21 (NKJV) For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.
Someone once said, “Don’t marvel that you have become righteous. Marvel that Jesus became sin.” This is a great wonder, I can’t explain, I just believe it.
Jesus had no sin of His own; just like I had no righteousness of my own. Jesus took our sin so we could have His righteousness. Jesus was made sin with my sin, so I could be made righteous with His righteousness. Jesus was made sin without sinning, so that I could be made righteous without doing works of righteousness.
- God condemned sin in Jesus.
For what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh, God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, on account of sin: He condemned sin in the flesh (Rom 8:3, NKJV)
That word “condemned” is the Greek word “katakrinō”. It’s made up of the verb krino, which means to judge, to punish, and the word kata which means down or against. It means that God came down hard on sin. How hard? So hard that the sin of the whole world was condemned in the space of a few hours. So hard that the Son of God himself couldn’t live through it. So hard that sin has been dealt with once and for all. Hebrews 9:26 states, that once at the end of the ages, He has appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself. The cross was the total destructive blow to the power of sin and the total victory over sin and death for us.
- God was with Jesus on the cross when he died.
2 Corinthians 5:19 (NKJV) that is, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not imputing their trespasses to them, and has committed to us the word of reconciliation.
We have this idea that God was up there while Jesus was down here, but Paul understood that God was in Christ the whole time.
“But didn’t Jesus say God had forsaken him?” Some say that maybe from the flesh perspective of Jesus he felt forsaken. Maybe? But I would like to offer you this perspective.
The 22nd Psalm is a Messianic prophetic Psalm of David where he saw the crucifixion hundreds of years before it was even invented by the Persians and perfected by the Romans. The Jews knew this Psalm well, just like most of us know and have heard of the 23rd Psalm before we were believers. Psalms 22, 23, and 24 form a “Messianic Trilogy,” one that virtually every Israelite knew by heart. Psalm 22 is a detailed account of His crucifixion, the 23rd Psalm shows Him as our shepherd and us as His sheep. Psalm 24 shows us the King of Glory and His Kingdom and us as the gates and everlasting doors. Let me ask you this. Did Jesus know the 22nd Psalm? Of course He did. Then that means He also knew verse 24:
Psalm 22:24 For He has not despised nor abhorred the affliction of the afflicted; Nor has He hidden His face from Him;
So He would have known that His Father would not forsake Him. So why did He cry that out? It was not a cry of despair at being forsaken by God, but rather a cry of proclamation to those Jews gathered at Golgotha that what was taking place before their eyes was the fulfillment of the Messianic prophecy in the 22nd Psalm, and that He really was who He said He was. We need to change our view of the cross. God didn’t abandoned His Son. Not for a second. Neither will He abandon you, not ever!
The cross was not God engaging in child sacrifice, it was not God killing His Son. Sin killed Jesus, the sin of the world. The cross was God becoming man, becoming the sin that afflicts all of us, and condemning that sin in his own flesh. It was God the Son and God the Father working together with God the Holy Spirit to rid the human race of the scourge of sin. Jesus saved us from sin and He also saved us from wrath. If you are in Christ, you don’t need to worry about the wrath of God. Since Jesus experienced it, you never will.
Amen Pastor, Thank you.