[!--QuoteBegin--][/span][table border=\"0\" align=\"center\" width=\"95%\" cellpadding=\"3\" cellspacing=\"1\"][tr][td]Quote (Guest @ Feb. 07 2003,12:35)[/td][/tr][tr][td id=\"QUOTE\"][!--QuoteEBegin--]So are you saying that God does not punish those who sin today?  Are you saying all we have to do is \"believe\"? Sounds like the same old faith only liberalism to me.  

Surprised, Nope  :alert:[/quote]
MC Hammer,

Perhaps you might want to register and thus share in all the benefits of membership here? It is quite possible to do so and maintain your anonymity.

Perhaps as well you might want to explain your post. For now I will assume you posted in all seriousness and not simply to flame. But I would appreciate hearing from you to better understand your position.

Greetings from the land of beer and cheese.  Aren't you just glad for God's grace, aren't you just glad for the blood of Christ.

Bobby Valentine

Greetings from the Valentine Desk.  I have been reading Paul's letter to the Romans and was reflecting on 1.18 today.  After doing a little checking in my Testament, I formulated these thoughts.  Hope you don't mind me sharing them with you.

\"For God's wrath is being revealed from heaven against every kind of ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who try to suppress the truth of their unrighteousness.\" (the Bobby V. translation)

\"For\" indicates the relation of the section 1.18-3.20 to the statement of Paul in 1.17 (\"for in it God's righteousness is being revealed . . .\").  The fact of the revelation of God's wrath against sin proves that there can be no question of a human having a \"righteous\" status before God other than by faith.

Now some scholars have been distraught over the idea of God's \"wrath.\"  C.H. Dodd, for example, sees this \"wrath\" as merely irrational anger.  However, is it not true that even fallen human anger is not always \"irrational.\"  A person who knows, for example about the far reaching injustice and cruelty of discrimination (in all its varied forms), or child abuse, and is not \"angry\" at such wickedness demonstrates a failure to grasp the true meaning of love.  Likewise, God would not be truly a loving God if he did not react to the horror of sin in holy wrath.  His \"wrath\" is not a misguided attempt at revenge but in fact a manifestation of pure and holy love.  It is precisely because he so deeply loves those he creates in his image that he is wroth over that which steals our humanity and live (as he intended it) from us.

We must consider another matter that arises from this text -- that is the words \"is being revealed.\"  From a casual reading of v. 18f it is possible to get the initial impression that Paul is speaking of something taking place in the observable disasters and futilities which result from human ungodliness.  

However, this does not seem to be what Paul had in mind at all.  The structure of v.18 is \"parallel\" to v.17 (functions sort of like a \"mirror\") as is the language itself.  In v.17 Paul said God's righteousness was \"being revealed\" in the Gospel, that is in the proclamation of the Cross.  In view of the parallel structure and content of these verses it seems that Paul is saying that God's wrath is ALSO being revealed in the proclamation of the Cross or Gospel.  This, I believe, is presupposed throughout the rest of the Epistle and Paul's other various writings.

These two revelations that are referred to in vv. 17 and 18 are in fact two aspects of the same process.  The Gospel, message of the Cross, is at the same time both the revelation of a  status of righteousness for humans before God and also the revelation of God's wrath against their sin.  How could this be?  Because in the Gospel events themselves (the Death of Christ for our Sin, Burial, and Resurrection) were both.  At the Cross we see the full extent of the \"wrath\" of God against sin.  The \"full extent\" of God Almighty's holy wrath was not seen in the Flood or Sodom and Gomorrah but in the moment that he poured out his wrath upon the One who bore the Sin of the history of the world.  So the Cross reveals both the Righteousness of God to those who believe and his wrath against the sin we bear.  This is what the word \"atonement\" means.

With this understanding of the significance of Golgotha we understand why Paul can say to those who are in Christ Jesus, \"there is 'now' NO condemnation.\" That is simply true because the condemnation for our sin has already taken place in Jesus while he hung on the Cross.  God has no wrath left for those who have been washed. Now wonder Paul was \"not ashamed of the Gospel.\"  Even the message of God's wrath is Good News for those who believe that Jesus bore our sins to the Tree.

Shalom,
Bobby Valentine

[!--QuoteBegin--][/span][table border=\"0\" align=\"center\" width=\"95%\" cellpadding=\"3\" cellspacing=\"1\"][tr][td]Quote (Guest @ Feb. 07 2003,09:35)[/td][/tr][tr][td id=\"QUOTE\"][!--QuoteEBegin--]So are you saying that God does not punish those who sin today?  Are you saying all we have to do is \"believe\"? Sounds like the same old faith only liberalism to me.  

Surprised, Nope  :alert:[/quote]
How did you get that out of what Bobby wrote?

The cross is the symbol for what will happen to those who do not accept Christ. They will be seperated from God and die, suffering the wrath that Christ has offered to take in our place.

Bobby, of course your exegesis is correct and honors the text, how in the world anyone could come to any other conclusion is beyond me. Why would anyone want the wrath of God to be still directed at them?

The double revelation of Romans 1 is crucial for our understanding of the way God works; His way of putting persons in the right with him and His wrath are revealed.

As you noticed, God's wrath is not some personal grudge against us, it is more like the parent whose son is a drug addict, the more he loves his son, the more he hates what the addiction is doing to his boy. So, he will not condone it, he will not overlook it, for that is death. Instead, he reveals it to the boy so that he knows he has a choice to turn from that behavior.

Or, the wrath of God is like some inspector in an airplane factory who sees a defective part going by on the assembly line, and who stops the entire line and removes the offending part because to leave it in would be the death of everyone on the plane.

Or, perhaps the wrath of God is like an oncologist who spots a cancer in a patient and is furious at what cancer does to people. She does not hate the patient but she hates what cancer is doing to that person's life and all her energies are put into attacking it and getting rid of it. She will not smile and say; \"If I tell this person about the cancer, it will ruin his day.\" No, she would rather ruin his day in order to give him the gift of many days! First the bad news, so that we can understand the glory of the good news!

God's wrath is part of His love, and His love will not condone sin, forgive it ever, condone it never!

But, in Romans 3 we do discover that we, by faith, do continue to have ourselves made right by God; Romans 3:19ff.
(My translation-bh) beginning with the phrase; Oidamen de hoti hosa ho nomos ktl:
Now, we know that whatever things the law says it speaks to those in the law, that every mouth may be shut up and the entire world be made to be accountable to God, because by works of law shall no human in his presence be put in the right with God, for through law comes the recognition of sin. Now, apart from law, a status of being put in the right with God is made clear, and it is witnessed to by the law and the prophets, it is a right-standing with God available through faith in Jesus the Messiah and it is for all who believe; for no distinction exists, since all have sinned and continue to fall short of God's glory, but we are continuing to be put right with God freely by his grace through the redemption that is in the Messiah, Jesus; This is the one whom God appointed to be a cause of atonement to be received by faith, at the cost of his blood so that God could demonstrate his personal righteousness in the process of forgiving the sins of the past, and in the forbearance of God to demonstrate his righteousness in the present time, so that God might be both just and justifier of the person who is what he is by means of faith in Jesus. 3:19-27

So, yes, I am grateful that the wrath of God is not directed against those who have faith in Jesus!

Bob, I am with you on \"topical\" preaching.  I have sort of an \"allergy\" to topical preaching.  Although I am currently doing a topical series on Christology (the various images of Jesus in the NT).  However I am doing my best to do these \"topical\" messages in an expository manner. For example I used Isaiah 52.13-53.12 to explore the image of Jesus as Suffering Servant.  The one I have struggled with so far is \"Lord.\"  Of course I camped on Phil 2 but I wanted to use a bunch of info from the Hebrew Bible that illuminates what that term means.  I used Heb 4.14-5.3 for my High Priest text.  But I typically go through whole books.

I think I will be at Lake Geneva -- and we have your tea on the stove already -- along with some perfectly aged cheese  :yummy:

Shalom,
Bobby Valentine
Milwaukee, WI