The Goodness and Severity of God
Paul warned the Romans to consider two sides of God’s nature. “Behold the goodness and the severity of God” (Romans 11:22). Many people want to emphasize only one aspect of who God is. Usually, it is His love, although there are some who want to emphasize His severity, wrath and judgment, and have nothing to say about His love, mercy and grace.
It is so easy for believers to get out of balance. To forget that we serve a God who requires our faithfulness and our obedience. He is God, and we are to honor and glorify Him as God. Whether we understand or agree with it or not, does not change the fact that it is true.
God is a God of love, grace, mercy, and forgiveness. We need to emphasize Him love and feel loved by Him. The plan of salvation was His idea. He wanted us to be saved and go to heaven so much that He gave His one and only Son to die for us. Jesus is God’s love letter to us. The cross of Christ shouts that God loves us and delights to have mercy upon us.
At the same time, we must not overlook that God is a God of wrath. The cross of Christ makes no sense apart from the wrath of God. Why did Jesus have to die as a sacrifice for our sins? To satisfy the righteous anger of God. To pay the price for our sins because sin makes us an enemy of God. The terrible nature of Christ’s death at the cross is proof that God is a God of justice and wrath.
The good news is, Jesus has satisfied the wrath of God and the justice of God by standing in our place and taking the punishment that we deserve to receive. But let us also realize that those who reject what God has done in Christ will face the consequences of His wrath for themselves. Someone is going to pay for your sin. Accept Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior who has paid for your sins. He has died for and saved all of His people, and you can be one of His people by trusting in Him.
But to refuse His free offer of salvation, is to say to God that you did not care that He gave His son to die for you, and that is a very, very dangerous, spiritually deadly and totally unreasonable thing to do. Remember the wrath and the judgment of God. It causes you to run to Jesus for mercy and grace, which you will receive in abundance through the one who loved you enough to die for you.
Dewayne Dunaway
