God Can Love You and Be Angry at You at the Same Time

It’s Valentine’s Day. “A shy young guy goes to a restaurant and sees a beautiful girl sitting alone. He gathers some courage, goes to her table and asks: “Mind if I sit here beside you?”

She responds loudly: “No! I don’t wanna go out on a date with you!” Everyone at the restaurant turns and stares at the guy. The guy, shocked and embarrassed, goes back to his table.

After a few minutes the girl slowly walks to him, apologizes, and says, “I’m a student in Psychology and studying how people respond to embarrassing situations.”

The guy responds loudly: “What?! P3000?! That’s too much for a date!”

Everyone stares at the girl.

The guy whispers to her, “Do not mess with an Accounting student.”[1]

 The question now is, “Can God love you and be angry at you at the same time?” My answer is yes. Hosea shows us that God loves Israel at the same time God hates Israel, when Israel worships idols.

You’ve heard the words, “God hates the sin but loves the sinner.” But in the Bible, God hates the sin and also hates the sinner. Psalm 1:6 says, “The Lord knows the way of the righteous, but the way of the wicked will perish.” Psalm 2:12 says, “Kiss the Son, lest he be angry, and you perish in the way, for his wrath is quickly kindled.” John 3:36 says, “Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.”

The problem is that we separate the sin from the sinner. But the sin and the sinner are one. God hates both the sin and the sinner. Thus, you cannot say that God hates your sin, but loves you at the same time. Actually, God hates the sin and the sinner at the same time.

But God hates the sin and the sinner only as a response of His holiness, because we have sinned against Him. God loves the sinner, not as a response to the sinner’s love, but out of His character of love, his nature to love the sinner. That is why God loved the world that He gave His only Son.

We go back to the question, “Can God love you and be angry at you at the same time?” The answer is yes. God is angry at you, because you have offended Him by your sin. But God loves you, because love is the character of God.[2]

The next question is, “Where did God show His anger and love for you at the same time?” The answer is, at the cross. Where do you see God’s wrath for you? At the cross. Where do you see God’s love for you? At the cross.

John tells us in 1 John 4:10-11, “this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.” (ESV) There are two big differences between our love and God’s love. Our love dictates our will most of the time. But God’s love agrees perfectly with God’s will all the time.

Now John is telling us to love one another, as God has loved us. Do you have an unlovable husband or child? You are to love him not because he or she is lovable. You are to love him as God has loved you, with a love that works with the will to love, despite your imperfections.

Do you know of someone you don’t like? You are to set your love for her or him not because he or she is lovable, but because God has loved you by His will, and not from your own loveliness or unloveliness.

Because God has loved us so, we should also love one another.

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[1] Adapted from “Don’t Mess with an Engineer!”, Making It In The 21st Century. Cited February 18, 2014. Online: http://lifeandtimesreviews.blogspot.com/2011/09/dont-mess-with-engineer.html.

[2] Carson, The Difficult, 69.

God’s Wrath Flows From God’s Holiness

Second, God’s wrath is also a sovereign decision of God. (READ Hos. 11:9) Literally, the Hebrew reads, “I do not the fierceness of My anger, I turn not back to destroy Ephraim” (YLT). God gets angry by an act of the will of God. Anger is also a sovereign act of God. (READ Hos. 14:4) As God wills to love, so God wills not to be angry. God wills to be angry. God wills not to be angry.

Third, God’s wrath, however, is not a character of God, but an act of God’s holy character against sin. (READ Hos. 11:9) Note that the anger of God here is connected with the holiness of God. The reason is because Yahweh is God, and not man. Yahweh is the Holy One, in the midst of Israel. This statement recalls the presence of the Holy One in the Tabernacle, in the midst of the camp of Israel (cf. Lev. 11, 19).

“And the Lord said to Moses,

2    Tell Aaron your brother not to come at any time into the Holy Place inside the veil, before the mercy seat that is on the ark, so that he may not die. . .

3    But in this way Aaron shall come into the Holy Place: with a bull from the herd for a sin offering and a ram for a burnt offering.

4    He shall put on the holy linen coat and shall have the linen undergarment on his body, and he shall tie the linen sash around his waist, and wear the linen turban; these are the holy garments. He shall bathe his body in water and then put them on (Lev. 16:2-4).

God is so holy that no one can enter His presence in the inner room of the Tabernacle, except the High Priest, Aaron. But the High Priest can enter the inner room only once a year; and on condition that he brings a blood sacrifice for the mercy seat. Before he enters the room, he should take a bath. He should wear the right clothes. If he does not do all these, he remains unclean. Because he is unclean, he shall die. The death of the unclean thing is the wrath of God. Thus, the wrath of God flows from the holiness of God.

Because God is holy, God is against sin. Any sin against God offends the holiness of God. Thus, God is angry at sin because God is holy. The anger of God against sin therefore, is not a character of God, but a function of the holiness of God.

As D. A. Carson put it, where there is sin, there is the wrath of God. Where there is no sin, there is no wrath of God. But the love of God continues as a character of God. That is why God can love you all the time, and get angry with you some of the time.

God’s Wrath is an Emotional, But Sovereign Act of God’s Holiness Against Sin

I will now relate the love of God and the wrath of God. First, God’s wrath is an emotional anger against His people. Hosea 13:10-11 reads,

10 They shall go after the Lord; he will roar like a lion; when he roars, his children shall come trembling from the west;

11 they shall come trembling like birds from Egypt, and like doves from the land of Assyria, and I will return them to their homes, declares the Lord.

The Hebrew gives a parallel meaning. The anger of God here is the wrath of God (Hos. 8:5). The word, “anger” is from the Hebrew, ap, which means, “nostril, anger.” It is said that when a man is angry, his nose grows big.

Years ago, I remember when my elder sister told me before I left Cebu for Bacolod on December. “Don’t forget to ask everyone to pick me up at this time at the bus terminal. I will bring lots of Christmas goodies.” There were no cell phones then. The problem was I forgot to tell everyone to pick her up.

That day, my sister arrived in a taxi. When she got out of the taxi, she looked at me with her nose growing big with anger.

The word, “anger,” here refers to “the emotional aspect of anger and wrath.” (TWOT)

God’s love works with God’s will perfectly.

Third, God’s love works with God’s will perfectly. Hosea 11:9, “I will not execute my burning anger; I will not again destroy Ephraim; for I am God and not a man, the Holy One in your midst, and I will not come in wrath.” Note the three negatives here. “I will not execute.” “I will not again destroy.” “I will not come in wrath.”

God’s love is a sovereign love. By the word, “sovereign,” I mean that God loves by His will. Paul wrote that God “works all things according to the counsel of his will” (Eph. 1:11). God loves according to His will and purpose, which is independent from the behavior of people. Positively, God loves you by an act of His will to love you. Negatively, God loves you not by an act of your will to love Him.

   A little boy was attending his first wedding. After the service, he told his cousin, “So a man can marry many women? The man just married Sixteen women.”       

   His cousin was amazed that he had come to that conclusion so he asked. “How do you know that?”

  “Easy,” the little boy said. “All you have to do is add it up, like the Pastor said: 4 better, 4 worse, 4 richer, 4 poorer.”[1]

Herein is the first big difference between our love and God’s love. Our love dictates our will, our decisions, and our commitments. Our love dictates our will to keep or not keep our promises. But God’s love operates in perfect agreement with God’s will, God’s decisions, God’s knowledge, God’s holiness, and God’s justice. John 3:16 says, “God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son.” The love of God operates in perfect harmony with the will of God to give his only begotten Son. The love of God caused the will of God to give his only Son.

This means that God does not fall in love, but God wills in love. Paul wrote that “in love, he predestined us for adoption through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will” (Eph. 1:4-5).God does not fall in love, but God sets his love towards people.[2] God therefore loves us, because he chooses to love us. Conversely, nothing outside of God can ever move him to choose to love or not love, except his own sovereign will to love.[3]

The love of God is a sovereign love. This sovereign love of God is a character of God. The character of God refers to the nature of God. Love is a character of God; for God is love. Love is His character, His nature, His attribute. God loves Israel, not because Israel was lovely; she is not. God loves Israel, not because Israel was unlovely; indeed, she is. But God loves Israel, because it is His nature to love. It is His nature to love people. It is His character to love the world.

This is the second big disparity between our love and God’s love. We love because of the loveliness or unloveliness of the loved. You love someone because you like her eyes, her mouth, and her voice, and the way she talks to you. You don’t love someone because she’s ugly, smells bad breath, and talks a lot about herself. Our love depends on the loveliness of the loved. But God loves, not because of the loveliness of the loved, or the  unloveliness, but because God’s love is God’s character.

God’s love is not dependent on something outside of himself. God loves perfectly with God’s will and God’s purposes. That is why we can say that God loves you all the time. Because it is the nature of God to love those he wants to love according to His will and purpose to glorify Himself.

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[1] “4 better, 4 worse, 4 richer, 4 poorer,”  Osaze’s Jokes. Cited February 18, 2014. Online: http://oezekiel.blogspot.com/2012/05/4-better-4-worse-4-richer-4-poorer.html

[2] D. A. Carson, The Difficult Doctrine of the Love of God (Wheaton: Crossway, 2000), 61. I am indebted to D. A. Carson for some of the key concepts of the love and wrath of God in this sermon.

[3] Carson, The Difficult, 60.

God’s Love Works with God’s Justice Perfectly

Second, God’s love works with God’s justice perfectly. “My heart recoils within me; my compassion grows warm and tender” (Hos. 11:8). The verb, “recoils” (Heb. haphak), is a very interesting word. It means, “to turn (over on the other side): dish 2 Ki. 21:13,   hand (back and forth); 2. (upside down): overturn.” (Holladay) Like a hand, the heart of God is turned upside down. Like a dish, the heart of God is overturned. What overturns the justice of God against Israel? It is the love of God for Israel.

Do you see an amazing character about the love of God here? While God wants to punish Israel for her spiritual adultery, God also wants to continue to love Israel. In the end, God decides to love Israel! This is not to say that God’s heart won over his head. This is to say that God’s love worked perfectly with his justice. The justice of God will still make God punish Israel by exiling her. But the love of God will restore Israel from exile. The love of God works perfectly with the justice of God.

This brings us to my third point under this rubric.

God’s Love is an Emotional, But Sovereign Character of God

There are three things we need to learn about the love of God. First, God’s love is an emotional love of a parent to a rebellious son. “When Israel was a child, I loved him, and out of Egypt I called my son. The more they were called, the more they went away; they kept sacrificing to the Baals and burning offerings to idols” (Hos. 11:1-2). Yahweh has loved Israel as a parent loves a child. When did Yahweh call Israel to him? It was during the time of the exodus (cf. Ex. 4:22). But the more Yahweh called them, the more they went away to follow other gods, the Baals.

Baal was a weather-god in Syria-Palestine. He controlled rainfall, agriculture, and productivity. He was also a fertility god, giving children to barren couples.[1] This is how Israel went farther away from Yahweh. He worshiped idols.

But God loved Israel as a parent loved a wayward son.

Yet it was I who taught Ephraim to walk; I took them up by their arms, but they did not know that I healed them. I led them with cords of kindness, with the bands of love, and I became to them as one who eases the yoke on their jaws, and I bent down to them and fed them. (Hos. 11:3).

Yahweh loved Ephraim by teaching him to walk. As a father to a small son, Yahweh took Israel up by his arms. When Ephraim got sick, Yahweh healed him. Like a farmer to oxen, God eased the yoke on their jaws. As a loving parent, Yahweh bent down to His children and fed them.

Yet Israel did not honor his God. So as covenant God, God imposes the judgment of God upon Israel. Hosea 11:5-7 reads,

5 They shall not return to the land of Egypt, but Assyria shall be their king, because they have refused to return to me.

6 The sword shall rage against their cities, consume the bars of their gates, and devour them because of their own counsels.

7 My people are bent on turning away from me, and though they call out to the Most High, he shall not raise them up at all.

Because they refused to return to Yahweh, they shall return to captivity—Assyrian captivity. The Assyrian sword shall destroy their cities. Because they keep turning away from Yahweh, Yahweh shall also turn away from their cries of deliverance from Assyria. That is the justice of their covenant God.

But then in vv. 8-11, God gets emotional.

8How can I give you up, O Ephraim? How can I hand you over, O Israel? How can I make you like Admah? How can I treat you like Zeboiim? My heart recoils within me; my compassion grows warm and tender.

9 I will not execute my burning anger; I will not again destroy Ephraim; for I am God and not a man, the Holy One in your midst, and I will not come in wrath.

10 They shall go after the Lord; he will roar like a lion; when he roars,    his children shall come trembling from the west;

11 they shall come trembling like birds from Egypt, and like doves from the land of Assyria, and I will return them to their homes, declares the Lord.

God shall judge Israel through Assyrian exile. But God shall also return Israel from exile. This brings us to my second point.

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[1] Robert I. Vasholz, “Hosea,” ESV Study Bible (Wheaton: Crossway Bibles, 2008), 1620.

The Love of God and the Wrath of God–or–How God Loves You Always and Gets Angry at You Sometimes

Louise Hernan wrote the poem, “Even when I’m angry, I love you just the same. No matter what’s between us, That will never change.”[1] Is God bound to love and forgive you all the time? Or, is God bound to love you but get angry at you some of the time? I submit that God is bound to love you all the time, because God is love. But God is bound to get angry at you some of the time, for God is wrath.

From Hosea 11, we learn two things this morning. God’s love is a character of God. God’s wrath is a response of God’s holiness. Let us dig deeper into these concepts.

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[1] Louise Hernan, “Even When I’m Angry.” Cited February 15, 2014. Online: http://www.poemstosharefeelings.com/2011/02/even-when-im-angry.html

How God Loves You

You’ve heard about the three kinds of love. First is the physical kind of love, sexual love, from the Greek, eros, where we get our English word, “erotic.” Then there is the brotherly kind of love, from the Greek, phileo, where we get our English word, “Philadelphia.” There is the divine love, the greater kind of love, agape love, which is supposed to be an emotionless self-giving love that seeks the good of others.

But there are serious problems with these definitions. In the Greek version of the OT (LXX), in 2 Sam. 13:1, 4, 15, Amnon “loved” Tamar, his half-sister. He was “tormented” with his love for Tamar. His love was an emotional love. Amnon then raped Tamar. His love was a violent, sexual love. But the Greek word used is agapao. How can that be a self-giving love? In 2 Tim. 4:10, Demas “loved” the world and deserted Paul.1 The Greek word there is agapao, which is agape love. How can that be a self-giving love for the good of the other? . . . more