God: God’s Wrath

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The Bible tells us that “God is love” (1 John 4:8); the Bible also speaks of God’s wrath, his anger. How can a being of pure love be angry?

There is no contradiction between love and anger. Love (a desire to do good) always includes anger or a strong dislike against anything that hurts. God is always love, so he hates everything that works against his love, everything that is sin. God wants to undo the results of sin and eliminate it.

The Bible occasionally says that God is angry at people. What does this mean? His main goal is not to cause pain for the people, but he wants them to change their ways and to escape the pain that sin causes. God did not create them for destruction, but for salvation (John 3:17). God is not angry at the people for who they are, but only because of their behavior. His anger lasts only as long as they insist on doing wrong.

In contrast, God’s anger at sin is permanent. God will never change his mind about the evil of evil. This holy and loving attitude against sin in every form is called “God’s wrath.” (Wrath is an older English word for anger; the same Greek word when used for humans is usually translated as anger.) This is not an outburst of bad temper — it is a constant opposition to evil.

God is sinless, perfectly holy. If he were not angry at and opposed to sin, it would mean that he did not care. This would imply that sinfulness is not evil, that human suffering caused by evil is acceptable. That would be a lie, because sinfulness is evil.

God is love and righteousness; doing what is right is simply another way to describe what love is. He cannot permanently allow anything that works against who and what he is, and who he created us to be. He takes it personally, because it is personal – it is a rejection of who he is and everything that he stands for.

Therefore, it is impossible for a righteous and loving God not to have anger against sin. This anger is a righteous judgment against anything that is unholy (Romans 1:18-26). “God’s judgment against those who do such things is in accordance with truth” (Romans 2:2). A day will come when God’s “righteous judgment will be revealed” (verse 5).

End of the hostility

God has already taken the actions necessary to end the conflict between humanity and himself. His actions are motivated by love, his central characteristic (1 John 4:8).

In love, God allows us to choose him, or to fight against him. He allows us to hate him, even though he doesn’t want us to choose that, because it hurts the people he loves. He allows things that he does not want, because he wants to allow the choice.¹ Although we may choose evil, he works against what we have chosen.

God opposes our evil choices, because he is actually for us. He wants the best for us, so he works against anything that hurts us, even if we (in our lack of wisdom) want to do things that will eventually hurt us. God wants us to live in love, not in evil.

God showed his love by sending Jesus Christ to suffer the death that we deserved (1 John 4:9-10) and to restore us to a good relationship with himself. At great cost to himself, God did everything that is needed. Jesus died so that we could be forgiven. This shows how serious sin and guilt is, and it shows what sin would do to us if Jesus had not come. Sin causes death, and God hates it.

When we accept God’s forgiveness in Jesus Christ, we admit that we have been sinful, working against God, and that we need a Savior. We admit that we were “children of wrath” (Ephesians 2:3) and alienated from God (Colossians 1:21). Ephesians 2:1-10 describes our journey from sin into salvation by grace. Through Christ we are reconciled, transformed and given eternal life – all as a gift, something we did not deserve. We repent of working against God and thank him for accepting us in Jesus Christ.

God’s purpose from the beginning was to show his love for humans by forgiving our sin through the work of Jesus (Ephesians 1:3-8). He knew that Christ would have to suffer and die for us (Revelation 13:8). But he created us anyway, because he saw the end result: we will be able to live with him forever in joy and peace. God hates sin, but he also knows how to rescue us from it. We might call it “loving anger” – working for us by working against sinfulness.

From the beginnings of the world, God planned a reconciliation through Christ (Ephesians 2:15-18; Colossians 1:19-23). This comes about not through human efforts, but through Christ, living and working on our behalf. People who are “in Christ” are not children of wrath, but are children whom he loves, and we live in peace with God. Christ “rescues us from the coming wrath” (1 Thessalonians 1:10).²

We are being saved from sin, and God’s anger against it, through the work of Christ and the Holy Spirit. God has reconciled us to himself (2 Corinthians 5:18); he does not want to punish us. How do we receive his forgiveness and begin experiencing a new life in right relationship to him? We do it by turning to God and turning away from everything that is against him (1 John 2:15-17).

To summarize: Human beings became enemies of God. Our lack of trust in God led to a necessary push-back from a holy and loving God. His anger is a response to our hostility, but his love for us moved him to deal with the problems that sin caused. Christ deals with our guilt, death, alienation, and even our desires to do things that are contrary to his love. Even before creation, the solution was in place before the problem arose.

God’s anger is not like human anger, but anger is a word that can help us understand God’s attitude toward sin. Sin deserves punishment, and Christ volunteered to suffer what we deserved. Our understanding of God’s anger must always keep in mind that

• God’s anger is focused on sin, not the people in themselves.
• God wants to save us from our sins; he has already acted to rescue us.
• His anger against sin will never end, because sin hurts the people he loves.
• God’s anger is a result of and an expression of his love.
• God’s anger against sin will destroy it, even if it is inside us, so humans may have an eternal relationship of love with him.

Jesus’ warnings about hell

“If your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away,” said Jesus. “It is better for you to lose one of your members than for your whole body to go into hell” (Matthew 5:30). If we take Jesus seriously when he teaches about mercy, we should also take him seriously when he teaches about hell. Mercy doesn’t mean much unless we are escaping something. Jesus warns people not to hang on to anything that would cause them to miss out.

In one parable, Jesus warned that wicked people will be thrown into a fiery furnace (Matthew 13:50). He mentioned “weeping and gnashing of teeth” and torment (Matthew 18:34). Another parable describes the wicked person as tied up and thrown “into the darkness” (Matthew 22:13). He spoke about a “resurrection of condemnation” (John 5:28-29).

The unpleasant results experienced by people who refuse the mercy of God are described as fire, darkness, torture, and destruction. Fire and darkness can’t happen at the same time. These are metaphors. Jesus’ purpose is to warn people, not to give an exact or literal description. He is using word-pictures common in his culture without necessarily saying that they are literal descriptions of what will happen. He highlights the choice we must make and warns that there are indeed real and serious consequences.

Some verses suggest eternal suffering, while others suggest a temporary punishment.³ But either way, Jesus wants us to take it seriously and avoid it. God is merciful, but the person who refuses God’s mercy will suffer the unavoidable results of sin.

New Testament letters

The apostles also talked about judgment and punishment. “There will be affliction and distress for everyone who does evil” (Romans 2:9). “These will suffer the punishment of eternal destruction, separated from the presence of the Lord” (2 Thessalonians 1:9). One definition of hell is “separation from God.”

The Old Testament penalty for rejecting Moses was death, but anyone who deliberately rejects Jesus deserves a greater punishment (Hebrews 10:28-29). God is merciful, but if people refuse his mercy, they will experience unpleasant results. God does not want anyone to suffer, but he allows it to happen, if that’s what the people choose. God prefers that everyone to come to repentance and salvation (2 Peter 2:9).

The Bible describes in many different ways what happens when we reject him, his instructions, his love and mercy. The variety of word-pictures indicates that God is not trying to give us an exact description of what will happen, but is saying that it is very important that we accept him and his love.

The final victory of God is an important part of biblical story. Everything will be brought under the control of Christ, for he has paid for all creation (1 Corinthians 15:20-24; Colossians 1:20). Everything will be set right. Evil will be no more. Even death and Hades will eventually be destroyed (Revelation 20:14).

God’s mercy never ends, but neither does his opposition to sin. Mercy does not mean that Jesus lets evil be eternal. We don’t know all the details, but we trust that God, full of righteousness and mercy, will finish his work in the best possible way.^{4, 5}

The most important thing is that Jesus is the solution to humanity’s problem. In him, there is no condemnation (Romans 8:1). He is the way, the truth and the life eternal. He is love, righteousness, and eternal joy.

Father, we have many questions about what will happen to people who don’t want your mercy and refuse to turn to you in repentance and receive your forgiveness. We hope that people hear Jesus’ warnings, and that they respond to his grace and love. Help us learn from Jesus, and be led by your Spirit in how we talk about these things today. Amen.

Endnotes

1. Theologians sometimes speak of God’s “permissive will” (what he allows), in distinction from his “perfect will” (his ultimate goal, the way that he wants humans to choose). God has given us the ability to choose, and it is good for us to have a choice, even though we do not always use it for good. This is related to the question of why God allows evil even though he does not want it. We can see how this is a good thing in some ways. Without personal will and choice we could not enter into true relationships of love with anyone or anything. But, even then, we do not claim to completely understand why God allows evil as part of a perfect plan.
2. Paul doesn’t give many details about what God does in his anger – he is willing for his readers to use their imagination to fill in the picture. Jesus gave more details about it. In both cases, the example is set that it is appropriate for us to warn people that Christ saves them from a very unpleasant future, even if we do not say exactly what that means. The warnings are given in sorrow, not glee. The desire is that people might heed the warning and be saved. We may also warn people that a self-centered life will lead to frustration, pain and sorrow.
3. The gospel includes the fact of judgment (Acts 17:31; 24:25; Romans 2:16), but we should not preach “It’s not as bad as some people think it is.” The nature of hell is a legitimate question, but it’s not the focus of our message. Like Jesus, Paul wants us to warn and so not to imply that the consequence for rejecting Christ is really a minor one.
4. We do not teach universalism, that everyone necessarily will eventually be saved. Such a doctrine would imply that Jesus’ warnings were not genuine. The last book of the Bible implies that even after there are new heavens and new earth, some people will be on the “outside” of his rule and reign (Revelation 22:15). They apparently insist on living in ways that are not compatible with what God offers. God’s love wins, but love “does not insist on its own way” (1 Corinthians 13:5). In his love, God allows them to make wrong choices, just as he allowed evil spirits to make wrong choices.
5. Similarly, we cannot claim to know God’s plan for people who seem to have had no opportunity to know about Jesus, such as those who die as infants, or who lived in nations around the world before Jesus lived. God may be able to teach them in a fraction of a second before they die, in some time period before the resurrection, or on the judgment day, or in some other way. We do not know, because Scripture is focused on how we should respond, not on our questions about other people. When inquiring about eternal destiny in heaven or hell, we are asking questions about a quality of life and time so different from our own that we may be unable to understand the details, even if there were words to describe it. We cannot preach our theories as biblical doctrine. It is better to say what we know for sure – God is love – than to preach as doctrine something that is speculative.

Author: Updated 2025