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Countdown to Easter: The Wrath of Love?

Trevin Wax has written another insightful and illuminating piece over at Kingdom People about what he sees as the deficiencies of the new presentations of the gospel message, admitting that the message has historically been over-condensed, but also warning of the dangers of marginalizing hugely significant aspects of the message in an effort to give a more prominent place to themes that may have been historically overlooked or muted.

Again, I am greatly indebted to and support Trevin in his effort to bring us all back into a proper balance when we're talking about fresh ways to communicate the truth of the revelation of God in Jesus Christ in today's world. But one aspect of the piece struck me, and it struck me precisely because it incorporated a phrase that, I believe, has gone a long way in marginalizing what both Trevin and I believe to be an nonnegotiable component of the gospel. The passage in question reads as follows:

The substitutionary atonement gets left out in many of these
presentations. Thus we miss the reason why Jesus had to die -
not the historical reasons for Jesus’ death, but the theological reasons why
this death was necessary
. Jesus dying as the Passover lamb is a clear
statement that:
1. Jesus is taking God’s wrath upon himself in place of his
people and
2. A new exodus is beginning.
Most of the new gospel
presentations emphasize Point 2, but sidestep Point 1.

And the phrase within that passage that I'm talking about is this: God's wrath.

I've been think intently about that phrase of late, precisely within the context of substitutionary atonement. Let me say up front that I don't have a clearly-delineated theological position on this, but it's something that my heart and mind keep coming back to again and again whenever I see the phrase used in theological contexts, within the doctrine of substitutionary atonement as well as many others. In other words, rather than a doctrinal position, its an idea that I want to float out there and see what comes back at me.

"God's Wrath."

The God fully revealed in Jesus Christ.

Jesus Christ, who exemplified, embodied, and redefined (for us sinners) "Love," and thus revealed that central characteristic of the One He called Abba.

And if it is that God to which I refer when use the term "god" in a Christian context, and the more directly and consciously I do so, the more I get the sense, "in my bones" (a la Lewis) that the phrase "God's wrath" is an oxymoron. Either that, or the term "wrath" has developed such a different connotation today than from biblical times that it has since become an oxymoron.

Don't get me wrong. I wholeheartedly believe that God is grieved to the core of his being by our sins, both individually and collectively as a human family. But I can't get myself to embrace the resultant reaction when it has historically been labeled "God's Wrath." What does it mean to say "Love's Wrath?" "Agape's Wrath?" The wrath of the Prodigal's father in Luke 15?

And the more I think about it, meditate and pray about, the more I come the same recurring thought, which is this. Sometimes the best we can do, within the parameters of our limited and impoverished language, is simply the best we can do. But that doesn't limit the immeasurable qualities of God to have to fall within those limitations. Failing to recognize this sometimes makes us a slave to that language rather that a slave to the Creator and Lover of the cosmos. The ancients spoke about "the heavens" as God's realm because the mystery of that aspect of the space/time universe was the best analogy to the mystery of God's realm of existence. But look where at the damage that such language has caused throughout Christian theological discourse over the centuries. And that's but one example, leaving aside myriads of other areas where this danger has also been realized ("second coming" language, "salvation" language, etc.).

Here's the thing. I think one of great contributions of Chesterton's Orthodoxy was that it allowed us as a body to recognize that doctrinal statements that may appear paradoxical within the Western Enlightenment world were, rather, illuminations of a larger truth within the Kingdom of God. "First shall be last," "He who wishes to find his life must lose it," and many other "strange" utterances by our King are paradoxical, folly to those who are perishing, but they make utter sense within what Wright and Lonergan call "an epistemology of love."

"God's Wrath," in my humble opinion, does not fall within that category.

Here's what I think is going on with phraseology like wrath, curse, etc., that are categorically inconsistent with the God revealed in Jesus Christ, when such phrases appear in the Bible. In one, very narrow sense, they are true. God created this world, and because He loved His creation, He bestowed it with freedom, the dignity to choose His way or to choose otherwise. And here's the catch. In so doing, God (and only God) knew the consequences of choosing the latter. Doing so would necessarily bring forth dire consequences, things that would appear to the flawed human eye as wrath, curse, etc., when, in actuality, these are simply the natural consequences of our own choices, as opposed to the ultimate paradox of the vengeful actions of (what we know, through Christ) to be a loving, faithful, God; a God who endures patiently the flaws and foibles of His children, respecting their dignity if they chose to foresake him, and consistently ready to embrace and forgive, in fact, to foresake His own dignity by running toward us to embrace us when we, even half-heartedly, choose to turn shamefully home, only to find that the best robes have been prepared and the fatted calf slaughtered to celebrate that return.

So did Jesus take on God's wrath on our behalf on the cross? Absolutely!

Did a vengeful God appease his bloodthirst by requiring the sacrifice of His own son because he so loved us? Absolutely not!

Did Jesus, on the cross, exhaust the consequences of our collective, human sin by willingly and lovingly allowing those consequences to fall upon His person, His perfect image-bearing humanity, the exemplar of perfect humanity. I think that's one aspect of what was going on, yes.

And like Trevin, along with a legion of modern voices, are striving to proclaim, that's one aspect of what was going on. There are a myriad of others, old and new, and we forget any one of those aspects to our peril. But let's also not forget to re-imagine not just the doctrines, old and new, but the language we have used to communicate them. "Confessing Jesus as Lord," as but one example, means something very different today than it did within the Roman Empire under Caesar. Maybe it is precisely that language that has allowed some aspects of the gospel message to become marginalized in the first place. May God give us wisdom to recognize where that has occurred, and the imagination and courage to help change it, to His glory.

Grace and Peace,
Raffi


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3 Comments:

  1. Mofast said...
     

    Raffi,
    I think on these very things often as well. I think the focus of your inquiry being "the God revealed in Jesus Christ" is dead on. If we are Christians, after all, then it would make sense that our hermeneutics and theology would all go through the lens of Christ. We understand God through Christ. The Bible is important because it testifies to and about Christ (as the imonk has said well as of late).

    "The Scandal of the Cross," by Joel Green has an interesting bit about God's wrath that I want to read again and post on because it goes down the line that we're heading, I think.
    God pouring his wrath upon Christ in the sense of God being really angry at Christ and hurting him seems to me, and others smarter than I, to present a rather troubling division within the Godhead itself. I think the struggle with language is a good and worthwhile task for us.

    I don't have a problem with God being angry at us and angry at sin. It's how it plays out that makes me wonder. Does God reach out and kill people because of anger? Again, is that the God we see revealed in Christ? Yet, Christ was angry in the Temple and he chased some guys out.

    Anyway, good post, I love thinking through this stuff. Part of the reason I've loved Wright and Hart is because they've helped me to formulate a more consistent and in depth theology of atonement.

  2. Anonymous said...
     

    I wonder if you had a very stern angry father who even beat the what-ever out of you???

    What About God's freely Given Love to all beings and the entirety of "creation" altogether?

    1. www.dabase.org/tfrbklih.htm

  3. Anonymous said...
     

    One view expounds upon the idea that God is a consuming fire. He is all-holy, and in the Day of Judgment, his presence will be made totally manifest to us, as opposed to our dim understanding of him in this life, and the piercing specter of his holiness will stand in sharp contrast to our sin. This is the Judgment. God's wrath is not a passion of his, as though his honor were offended, or as though his sovereignty were threatened by it. God hates sin for what it does to us, how it separates us from him, and how it sentences us to judgment in light of his holiness.

    In the judgment of fire, when our works are judged, those who are in Christ will be like the gold that shimmers and is purified in the fire. Christians will see God's holiness as love and light and peace. What sin is left in their lives is burned away, leaving only the pure holy new creation he has made them to be forever. However, those without Christ will be naked before a holy God with nowhere to hide. The contrast of his perfect love with their iniquity will be terrible for them. There is no new creation to be purified. All there is, is dross to be consumed. It is this that we call "wrath." In the presence of his holiness, they will be consumed as in a fire.

    The Bible says the same thing to us about love when it tells us that to respond to evil with love is to pour hot coals on the head of the evildoer.

    Think back to the Fall in the Garden of Eden when Adam and Eve became aware of their nakedness and sin and sought to cover themselves in the presence of God. It is even more so in the Final Judgment, except the only covering is the blood of Christ, so those who have rejected him stand before God with no recourse.

    Think of the sun, how it gives us light and heat, and makes plants to grow for us to eat. However, we need covering from the sun. We live in shelters; we wear clothing to protect ourselves. If we were to be left out in the desert where the sun is high, naked with nowhere to hide, the warmth and light of the sun soon would become a terror for us as it burns our flesh and destroys us. How much more so the glory of God, who in his holiness and love sustains us every instant, and without whom for even one instant creation would cease to be?

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Parables of a Prodigal World by Raffi Shahinian is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.