The Merciful Wrath of God, Part Two

Psalm 30:5 --

For his anger is but for a moment

and his favor is for a lifetime

Weeping may tarry for the night

but joy comes with the morning

Suffering and the pain it causes are temporal, but those who find the favor of God will enjoy it forever.

Let me suggest that all suffering and all pain are our way of experiencing the wrath of God in a very tangible way. Don't judge this post too quickly. Anytime we find ourselves reaping the consequences of sin (illness, disaster, relational conflict, etc.) we are experiencing the wrath of God being poured out on sinful humanity. Stay with me.

David writes in Psalm 30:5 - "his ANGER is but for a moment". That God is angry about sin is a reality. That this anger is being directed toward the sinners is a reality. Read Lamentations 3:1-20. Notice how it feels to be under the wrath of God:

• he has made my flesh and my skin waste away
• he has made me dwell in darkness
• he has walled me about so that I cannot escape
• He is a bear lying in wait for me
• He drove into my kidneys the arrow of his quiver
• He has made my teeth grind on gravel
• my soul is bereft of peace
• I have forgotten what happiness is

ouch.

But, then, in Lamentations 3:21, things turn the corner. In spite of all this gloom and doom being experienced, the author writes, "But this I call to mind, and therefore, I have HOPE". How is it that someone can experience so much sorrow and woe, recognize that said sorrow and woe is from the hand of God, and still have hope?

Remember the verse we started with. Psalm 30:5:

For his anger is but for a moment

and his favor is for a lifetime

The manner in which we experience God's wrath while on this earth is NOT eternal. It will end. In fact, I would suggest that the wrath of God which we experience on earth (whether it be direct consequences of our sin or indirect consequences of being a sinful person living in a sinful world) is a CORRECTIVE wrath intended to:

1) Inform us of our own sin and how our sin separates us from God.
2) Warn us of the terrible situation we find ourselves in as people deserving the wrath of God.
3) Impress us that if this is a taste of God's wrath on sin, we DO NOT want to eternally suffer his wrath on our sin.

In this, I would suggest that God's wrath is indeed a very MERCIFUL offering to us. It is a warning sign that says, "This is the route you have chosen, and it only gets worse from here. CHANGE DIRECTION." (Jesus said something like, "repent and believe!") God's wrath which lasts only for a moment, or for the night gives way to his favor and joy if we are His! His wrath teaches us that the best we can hope for on our own is this meaningless life full of sorrow and suffering and culminating in an eternity under his FULL wrath.

Yet there is hope.

To whatever degree you/me/we have experienced the wrath of God, it could be much worse. Sin deserves death, eternal death, instantly. Anything less than that is God's mercy. Of course, one man did experience the full wrath of God. 1 Thessalonians 1:10 tells us that Jesus rescued us from the coming wrath. Paul teaches us in 2 Corinthians 5:21 that Jesus accomplished this by becoming sin for us. 1 Peter 2:24 says that He bore our sins in His body. When God directed his all His righteous wrath toward the body of Jesus, we received a new hope. 1 Thessalonians 5:9 says that God did not appoint us to suffer wrath, but to receive SALVATION through Jesus!

Psalm 30:11-12:

You have turned for me my mourning into dancing

you have loosed my sackcloth

and clothed my with gladness

that my glory may sing your praise and not be silent

O LORD my god, I will give thanks to you forever.

Experiencing the wrath of God, visible all around us, is cause for mourning.
Recognizing the mercy of God, demonstrated in Christ, gives way to dancing.