God's DNA
The Attributes of God
God's Wrath
July 17, 2011 • Jon Anderson • Romans 1:18–32, Romans 8:15–39
Good morning. For those of you don't know me, my name is John Anderson. And this is Amber my Daughter. Friends, there's some aspects to God, or some attributes to God that perhaps we don't like to look at. Because I think probably we must, we must understand that we don't understand exactly what that means on the ground for us. We look at it through a human eyes. And we try to explain it from our experience, but our human experience is so limited. And so what I'd like to I'd like you to carry with you this morning is this picture. Have a dad and his daughter sitting together, just the two of us, if anyone else said perhaps, was probably besides my wife, and if any of you guys had to come up and sit on my lap like this, it would just be a little bit weird, okay. But very easy for her to do. Because this is she's got this kind of access to me. And I don't know what your expectation of God is like, I don't know what your picture of God is, like this morning. I don't know what you think he intends for you, or what he intends for your life. Or what you think his relationship with you should look like. When it's time and time again, in Scripture. It paints a picture of us having this deep, intimate relationship with a God who loves us, much like this. So once you carry this picture with you in your head this morning, as we speak about, we're going to be talking about this morning, have you got it, I'm going to cuddle a little bit more, kisses more, you can go get a piece of cake. Now, if you check his time for cake we're gonna be looking at the angle or the wrath of God this morning. For many of us, perhaps you've got a little bit of a negative view of the wrath of God or because we humanize it right? When I get angry with someone I know what goes through my mind. And that's not nice things. When I'm angry with someone, I'm not thinking about giving them a hug, or presence or giving them a kiss, I'm thinking about driving over them with my car or hitting them right, very angry. And the same time because I know that about myself, when someone else is angry with me. I kind of tried to predict what they thinking about me. And so I'm in fear of bodily harm for myself, you know that this person is really going to hurt me. So if a human being can evoke that in us, right? This fear of rejection or just keep someone you don't, an angry person is not the kind of person you invite them to whom you want to keep them at arm's length. You know, what about this God of the universe that we've been speaking about who is has no interest power, he knows everything. He can do anything he wants. The thought of a being like that being angry with me with you, is a terrifying thought. Right? Because if Mark was angry with me, if you give me a black car, maybe break my leg, okay? He thinks more. If Mike Tyson was angry with me, I'd be in hospital. Right? But the God of the universe, would he be anything even left of me if he was angry with me, and the something that we wrestle with. And the problem is when we start to think of God as having this attribute of anger, then he becomes like the family member that you never want to talk about. Right? You know, the embarrassing family member? That it's like, Did you invite them to the wedding? I didn't, how did they know to come? I don't know. Facebook, they must have just heard about it from someone else. And it's so embarrassing. She tried to keep people away from them. And our family, we've got this one particular uncle who knows everything about everything. And we think she does. And what we've done is we just like in the beginning, you would kind of you know, target them but like he just put up with it now said family gatherings and stuff. And he's telling you about, you know, he knows everything from rocket science to how earthworms eat. So he's like, just nodal. And in our family we don't talk about you know, we just kind of put up with them like I said, until one day I invited my fiancee Cindy to a family gathering with his uncle was present and she didn't know the family rules the way we did things in the family. So an uncle so and so started spotting all the things that he thoughts about this and that and he made a comment about our relationship. Because Cindy called me babes. And he said, You know what to call babes says that there's an infant pneus and a youngness and a you to your relationship and you need to Well, that was the wrong thing to do to Afrikaans wife, she pulled out her machine gun, and she just, she just mowed him flat. And it was so embarrassing, because it never ever happened to this uncle. Like he looked like someone had just stolen his car sitting in it. And it was like, Whoa, that was so awkward. But it was good for him actually. I think he's changed a lot. He still doesn't send cards and presents and stuff but but you know what, sometimes you got to be cool to be kind right? But God can be a little bit like that. Right, this, this being that we don't want to really talk about, we don't mention it over, you know me sitting having a meal with people want to tell people about how much God loves them about all the good stuff about him. You know, we try explaining away perhaps in our minds, we think God of the Old Testament was angry, because we just messed up his nice garden, he built this nice little Lego block house and then we messed it all up and he was angry with us. So that's why in the Old Testament, he just was angry at everyone killing everyone. And then what happened was about by the time the New Testament came, he kind of forgotten a bit about it was right, and he had a kid Since then Today was more relaxed. Okay, son called Jesus. And now, she's way more relaxed. And so God nowadays is a nice guy. He doesn't get angry anymore. In fact, him and Jesus are on holiday. We know that because we hear that they're coming back sometime. One day is coming back. You've heard that. And that's rubbish theology. Okay, I know that as well as you do. But friends, if I had to be honest with you, and I, to be honest with myself, Do I really believe that there's that God is still angry today. And that is rough. His anger is still against mankind today. Although I think that's a bit archaic. It's a bit old fashioned, you know, angry God, whatever. No Gods wearing sunglasses and using an iPad. Nice, cool, you know? The Bible's very, very clear about this, right? You read your text. I'm not ashamed of the gospel. It's poor writing for the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes to the Jew first and also to the Greek. From the Bible for a minute, the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith as it is written, but the righteous man shall live by faith. Verse 18, for the wrath of God, as revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness, of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness. Because that which is known about God, as evident within them, for God made it evident to them. For since the creation of the world, His invisible attributes, His eternal power, and divine nature have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that these men are without excuse. Even though they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks to Him. but they became futile in this in their thoughts, speculations, and the foolish hearts was darkened. Professing to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the incorruptible God for an image in the form of corruptible man, and of birds and forfeited animals and crawling creatures. There's more references in Scripture to the Roth and the anger of God than it is to the love of God. But I'd like to put it to you this morning, that it's impossible for God to be a God of love. And this is also a God of anger. me explain to you what I mean. He made me write my little sausage, okay, Emma's two years old. If one day, she's 13 years old, and she decides she's had enough she's running away from home. And so she leaves my house goes away to make it on your own. And I hear stories about her. Perhaps having to sell her body to make ends meet, lose her dignity, people taking advantage of her. What kind of a father of love we're happy to sit here and look at that and not be angry at that. Because I know that this is where she's supposed to be. There's a family and a father who loves her. This is the right place for her to be and I'm not alright with that. It's not alright. Not winking at a grain. Oh, well, you know, whatever. Whatever floats your boat. And friends in the same way God has created mankind for a relationship with Him. For God so loved the world. He loves us. He's created us to be in this love relationship. But when man is rebellious against God and off doing his own thing, and living and righteously, God's wrath and his anger is against that man and that situation. Is not alright with it. That's not fine. Wrath of God has revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness it's the perhaps the opposite of God's wrath or is anger. So love but righteousness, being in right standing with God, in right relationship with God. See, because God's anger is firstly against sin, and against unrighteousness and then those who caught in that those who are involved in that those are slave to that says anger is against sin. It burns against it. He doesn't look at and say it's absolutely fine. guy called aw ping said this The wrath of God is eternal detestation of all unrighteousness your friends is so easy to look at the world we live in today and everything that goes past and we think, Arkansas right, you know, it doesn't seem like I was watching the stand up comedian last night. And he was ripping off Jesus and saying that the reason Jesus became the Messiah was because he couldn't hack it as a carpenter. This is like all the stuff he made was so bad that he had to try another job right? Now, you know, funny whatever for you know? But then he goes on to say this, he says, But you know, what if Jesus was really would have fried me with a lightning bolt by now. And he says, imagine how funny that would be if I just suddenly got fried by lightning bolt said that would be a show you'd remember. And but because it's not like these the instance reactions from God, we summer can con ourselves or just get into thinking that you know, because I'm really angry school, he understands it's fine. I'd like to show you this money, friends, that there are only two camps in which men can false those who are in relationship with God, His righteousness, those who draw everything they need from him and correct standing with God right standing with them. And those on the other side who are not fine. But they are enemies of God, children of Satan, okay, and condemned to an eternal death separate from God. That's it. So the Bible says it's that clear because it's so much easier for me to think you know that person and I'm just being honest because I feel the same thing so much easy for me when I go through the tool you know, pick and pay and I see the person sitting across in something just legals my heart and I think I'd love to just say something to them, you know, so much easier to think you know, cotton mascots fun, you understand, you know, looks like a nice person, or colleague at work. Something's been knowing the way the inside of us come on. It's got to be an in it's an opportunity just to talk about Jesus and, but you know what, I got to understand someone else. So what we do is we soften God, to justify our own fear. And I'm talking about myself as well, friends, okay, I'm not pointing fingers here. We get an understanding that it's not alright, in God's sight. It's not fun. All of a sudden starts to spring into action, we realize you know what, actually, there is a world that's dying. There is a world that's condemned in eternal separation from God away from this relationship that we experience as the church. You know, that expression, you give a damn about something? You give a damn about? Shuffle, we're damnation. eternal separation. That's what damnation means eternal separation from God, you give a damn. What I'm not swearing, I'm just saying. So that would mean people that I'm hoping that while we look at this this morning, godsister something inside of us, he puts faith and he puts courage and excitement inside of us to go and do this thing for him. All right. So the wrath of God today on the ground, what does it look like? Well, it's a good question. Because we can kind of think that we don't know the last time you were walking down the road and someone swore and just got obliterated by lightning bolt. I've never seen that. Okay, never had the privilege. And, but there are other things where God is at work against the world where his wrath is poured out against the world. And it's good for us to know friends and good for us to understand this. Because we need to understand the people outside of God and His wrath. The first one is that all human beings die. You know, the fact that all of us die is as a direct result of God's wrath in Eden, before Eden before we got kicked out the Garden of Eden in the Bible, right, the beginning and forever in relationship with God man sinned, The wages of sin is death. And so every human being from that point onwards does. And people spend the zillions of cash on freezing themselves, cryogenically just in case someone finds a cure, but it's not going to happen. Right? There's no cure for death. Clever entrepreneur who came up with the plan. One of the privileges we have as pastors of the churches, we get to attend funerals. And one of the things we also do is that if there's a funeral on site yet, well maybe I should talk for myself because I don't want to cast aspersions on my illustrious comrades. But one of the things I do is sometimes perhaps there's a funeral and someone says, Wow, there was so much food at that funeral. We can I'm waking up in my office, I think to myself, Oh, maybe I should just pop down and my condolences to the family because there's food involved Don't be hypocrite said because you guys do the same thing. Okay. Just a different way. You know, when you sitting at the office and someone says hey, it's obvious birth and it's a hate on Am I spending time I'm not gonna go wish him. Let's say you have a pretty good cake. It's in the kitchen. You're such a bad guy. So humans might as well go wishing. Same thing, same thing. But you come to a funeral and you sit there and there's the casket. And the reality of death is hectic, the moment the meeting finishes, people run for the food. Why? Because it reminds them they're alive. This muffin tastes amazing. This might be the last sausage roll I ever eats. I'm like this is this is an intense sausage roll. Alive. Food has never tasted so good. Friends, for all of us. Every man man on the planet is a sentence of death that sits over us as a result of the wrath of God against mankind. Today second one is this life on planet earth without God is futile and meaningless, absolutely meaningless. That's you born, get a bit older, go to school, learn stuff, that you never use a varsity, but you learn how to learn. This is why they tell you you have to learn. And you got to ask you spent two years studying something. And then you realize what to change. Of course, you do another course and then you finish last year don't want to do that. She did something completely different. And then you work to get enough money to go on holiday so that you can rest so that you can go back and work harder. So you can earn more money to get a better holiday tourists and most of the time, get back to work and eventually retire. With retirement and the kids are out the house now. It's amazing. But now that wonderful big house is lonely and empty, and you can hear your footsteps. Me, you know, scary seas, sell the big house and you spent all your life working for you sell the house to get a smaller house, live in the smaller house. And then you go on holiday because you're so bored. And then you realize that boredom is like a king on and goes on holiday with you. Okay, so you still bought on holiday. And so you just keep going around in circles and join a club and do this and that and next and then you get sick. Okay, towards the end of your life. And now your kids are trying to spend as little money on you as possible so they get the largest inheritance that they can. Okay. And then you die. You know what I'm waiting for? I'm waiting for the moment where it was all made it all made sense. Because I just don't see it. What's the point? Do you know that that futility and meaninglessness is as a direct result of the wrath of God? Maybe that's you. If you want to turn them, flip me to Romans chapter eight. Verse 18, to 20. I'll read this verse 20, Paul says, For the creation was subjected to frustration not by its own choice, but by the will of one who's subjected it to the frustration, in hope that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay, and brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God. She finds if it was possible for us to find meaning in anything other than God, and identity and all those things that come from a relationship with Him. God wouldn't be God. Because he's perfect. And because he's perfect, we have to draw everything that we are from him. And because he made us that way, he's the perfect being perfect and everywhere. So life outside of God has absolutely no meaning. There's no punch line, you never get to the punch line. It's like the never ending joke. That just is not funny. Cindy and I were driving recently was a while ago actually, we're driving and you only see one of those big hills and you think I'm gonna climb that big hill. You don't do that. You know when you're driving. I think that's a small hill I want to how long would take to climb so then you stop and you get up and you try and climb it. You've never done that. That's fine. You people need to live men anyway. So we pull over and we get out and and it filled it looks so smooth. Okay, looks like you Corolla mobile Dan it is not very smooth. Okay, it's got lots of holes covered by grass. And eventually so you're climbing up the ceiling looks so small from the road looks massive now and you get to originally think you've got to the top and then there's another part and then you get to the top of that and there's another part and then another part and and eventually you get to the top you'd like to talk now wolves howling? You know, we've made it to the top took us eight hours, we thought it would take us like 20 minutes. And then you look over there and in the setting sun you see there's a mountain higher than where you're standing. Just so meaningless, to somewhere else to go get a promotion. What do you mean I have to work harder now. I get this call and then all of a sudden one that went on meaningless, absolutely meaningless, frustration, the wrath of God against mankind. Thirdly, moral standards and human behavior on a downward spiral. wrath of God against mankind, Romans 118, verse 222, and 23 and 24. Although they claim to be wise they became fools and exchanged the glory of immortal god for images made to look like mortal man, birds, animals and reptiles. Therefore, God gave them over in their sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. Because and to say that they exchange truth, the creator for idols and stuff. So God has given the world over in its sin, and his rebellion, he's given it over and said, right, there you go. And so what happens is people grow up moral fiber, perhaps from appearance. And then someone says something was situation happens. And my moral fiber begins to weaken. And things I would never dreamed of doing. I'm doing now. When I started my business, I wanted ethics, and I wanted to do it the right way, and tax returns and what I want to all get it right. But over time just gets worn down. So WRATH OF GOD leaving man, God, when God is distant, when God God is absent from something, okay? It just slips into decay. That's probably not the most peachy picture that I've painted this morning. With friends, that is the truth. The Bible says about mankind, but the world that we live in today, there's one other thing that it says as well that one day we're going to go and stand before God. We're going to face judgment. And it's not going to be based on what I didn't didn't do. Good or bad. It's based on what did I do with Jesus? Was I here was or there. That's it. And friends from over there, the Bible doesn't mince words, can condemned to eternal separation from God, His wrath, and his anger burns against me for all eternity. It's too late. It's a heavy truth. The most beautiful thing is this. Matthew 2427 says this, oh, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? It's Jesus talking when he's sitting on the cross. See, because there's all of the sin that man has been piling up, depositing in the bank, or as much muck and sin and whatever is we can depositing it, building it up against us. It's like this massive, and one day, there's a withdrawal on that and mankind is finished. And mankind can do nothing to change, because the wrath of God is against him. And Jesus Christ comes and says, I will take the penalty for that because the wages of sin is death, a loving God. Remember, I say the loving God has to also be a god of anger. Otherwise, he's not a loving God. A loving God can't sweep that stuff under the carpet. A righteous God can't sweep that stuff under the carpet, because He's pure, and He's holy, and he can't look on that stuff. And so Jesus comes, and he takes the hit for us. And he pays for that. And it's so bad that he himself says, God, why have you forsaken me? And in that moment, God's anger burns against his Son. Jesus does. Then he rises again in new life. And so for aspirins, we're able to move from here to here, it's impossible for mankind to bridge the gap. But Jesus makes a way pays the price for us. And so what does that mean for us on the ground? Well, that's a good question. I'm glad you asked. Let's look at those those four things that we mentioned. Just now. fact that all men are gonna die. Okay. Life is meaningless on this planet. The moral standards going down the toilet, that's just the way it is Ward's degrading the one they will face judgment alone, and without any way to stand. What does it mean when we're across the side? Or friends, the most amazing thing is now that Death Blow, the fact that we're going to die one day is just like a like a passport to heaven. That when we die, we'll be with God. It's incredible. The thing that was designed to wipe us out completely now, God sanctifies that thing and makes it like the doorway to heaven for us. The Bible's not joking when it says that God comes and he takes things that are so bad. And when we submit our lives and give our lives to Him stand in His righteousness in relationship with him. He takes that he takes the negative and he turns it around. He makes something beautiful out of it. All of a sudden, the thing that was supposed to be like when Satan struck his final blow and killed Jesus and he was like Cuba, we did it. He didn't realize the same hammer blow was the hammer blow that said Man free from sin. And so it's like the ultimate I got you. God says, ransack, haha. And it's like, whoop, and we like Yeah. Amazing. turning things around. So death is no longer something to be feared friends. So invite me to your funeral and have good food. They're the little trays with all the little things on this amazing. Okay? Secondly, the meaninglessness of life. You know, I was ripping off Aiden just now. Excuse me at the other meeting, put him to bed when a good way. When he first first met his wife, Eloise is one of the passage of the guys leading worship there. He started running, right and doesn't run. He was looking into running. And he was like, so So do you know he couldn't tell you how fired ran? He couldn't tell you his routes? Nothing. It was just what was it? What was it all about? It was who is running with. It wasn't about, Oh, we did this farm, we training for comrades, there was no goals. Other than spinning time. All of a sudden, now the journey was more important. Like, like he would have run into the fall over she said, Let's go another seven case he would have been up for it, you know, probably would have had to go to hospital afterwards. Or like maybe vect in the helicopter. But he would have been so stoked to go the extra seven because just I remembered saying I'm like, why is this kind of running. And then all became brutally clear over time it and then and then they would get in the car after they've run. And let's measure the distance that's driving the car, measure the distance, how far you see, friends, when we sit you in relationship with God, all of a sudden, this life that's so meaningless. It's got all these targets and things we try and hit to when we get there. It means nothing. And then there's the next one and the next one and the next one. And then we die. All of a sudden, every moment along. It's in the words of Aerosmith, that old 80s band, life's a journey, not a destination, you know, whatever, you know, good quotes, okay? So it's the journey was God every day, it's the fact that we do with him. It's less about getting there than the fact that we're we know who we going friends, heaven is our home. It's an incredible so we get to walk this journey everyday with him. And that's the that's the adventure the relationship. And all of a sudden now it's got meaning and substance. So learning changing process where we are in relationship with God and is working with us and in us brings meaning to the sanctifies that few tallness is in the world. And we know why. Why am I here? You know, the eternal question. And I know. Thirdly, the moral standards, the whole slide. He takes away this inability to stop sinning, and he replaces it with a love for righteousness. I've been accused of being a bit OCD at times, okay, I can live with that I'm cool. If I'm involved with something and doing something, don't tell me to stop. Because it's like I'm doing it. You know what I'm saying? Like, John, stop that. The moment you turn your back, I'm gonna carry on. Because this is what I was doing. Right? I'm involved like some of us have got a picture some stingy, killjoy, God, who says, Don't do that? Don't do that. Stop that. Don't do this. Stop that. Do this. And you just got to sit, sit on your hands, because anyway, you can be safe. Just wait. Now what? It's the long wait to heaven. You know, they said it was going to be a narrow road. But I didn't quite know how narrow you know. What happened to the walk of faith? What happened to life and love full of abundance? And this crazy adventure that we have with Jesus? What happened to that? There's something wrong. There was an old song we used to sing, that we don't sing anymore. But that's cool. Because it's quite fun. The Bible says. He gave me beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning. garments have praised for the spirit of heaviness. And then it goes on to say, My friends, God comes to us. He doesn't say stuff that. He says I want to show you another way. And he changes our hearts. He changes the way we see the world. He changes the way we see laugh and walk away from that because I want to take you somewhere better. Leave the ashes leave the mess. Leave the rubbish dump where you live as an orphan and come and live in a home Come and take whatever you want from the fridge. You don't have to go to funerals anymore. At home Oh, that was funny. So you get what I'm saying? Beauty for Ashes, he replaces things for us. What's your picture of God this morning? Some stingy God who doesn't have enough to give you a God who is more than enough once to take us on a journey and turn to Amazing Grace. If we live here in his righteousness submitted to him it's no longer Adler's but God who lives in me. He's calling the shots can stand righteous before God. And the last one is mentioned that one day we're going to stand before God judged as the standard from what do we do with it? Or friends? The beauty is this because it's a relationship, right? We stand there but with Jesus as our advocate. And he does all the speaking on our behalf. We don't have to say a word. He says whatever. And we and we just stand it's like, I'm with him. Name is written. The Lamb's book of life. God knows who we are. And it's rough. All that stuff that's been meted out over mankind no longer applies to us. And we enter heaven as free sons and daughters in relationship with God.