September 20
September 20
No one can withstand the anger of the Lord; that is why we are thankful for his forgiving and reconciling grace.
The little book of Nahum begins with a heart-rattling description of the anger of God. This description has been recorded and preserved as a means of instruction and rescue. Often when people read through the Old Testament and encounter a description of God’s anger, they wonder about or even doubt the goodness of the Lord. As you read through Scripture, notice that God does not hide his anger from us. He is not ashamed of his anger, as though it were a mortifying character weakness. It is impossible for God to have character weaknesses of any kind. If God is perfectly holy—and he is—then his anger is not a contradiction of his holiness, but an aspect of it. God could not be perfect in holiness and tolerant of the enormous evil of sin at the same time. Think about a time when you were sinned against, and those around you didn’t seem to care. How did you feel? God’s unending anger with sin is a constant demonstration to us of just how holy and good he actually is.
God reveals his anger toward sin again and again for good reason. First, God’s anger with sin reminds us of how deeply evil and destructive sin is. We need this reminder because sin doesn’t always look sinful to us. God’s anger with sin is also a call to never minimize or deny it, but to run from it into his arms of grace. God’s revelation of his anger with sin is meant to give us hope that there will be final justice, when sin is defeated forever. God’s revelation of his anger with sin is also designed to cause us to love the rescuing wisdom of his commands. God’s revelation of his anger with sin is meant to cause us to stand in awe of his holiness and to give him the worship that he deserves. But most of all, God’s desire to reveal his anger is designed to point us to Jesus. Through Jesus’s perfectly righteous life, substitutionary death, and victorious resurrection, God’s anger is satisfied and we are no longer under its threat. On the cross of Jesus Christ, God’s holy anger against sin and his tender heart of grace met. Jesus had to die because God could never compromise his holiness just to extend grace.
So when you read, “Who can stand before his indignation? Who can endure the heat of his anger?” (Nah. 1:6), know that you are being loved. God is warning you to take sin seriously, to never see it as beautiful, and to never think that on your own you can escape his anger with sin. In these words God lovingly reminds you of how much you need the atoning work of the Lord Jesus Christ. He took your sins on himself. He bore the anger of God in his own body. He endured the Father’s rejection. And he did it all so that you may be reconciled to God forever.