The Balance of God's Love and God's Hate
Psalm 5:1-7:
1 Give ear to my words, O Lord; consider my groaning.
2 Give attention to the sound of my cry, my King and my God,
for to you do I pray.
3 O Lord, in the morning you hear my voice; in the morning I prepare a sacrifice for you and watch.
4 For you are not a God who delights in wickedness; evil may not dwell with you.
5 The boastful shall not stand before your eyes; you hate all evildoers.
6 You destroy those who speak lies; the Lord abhors the bloodthirsty and deceitful man.
7 But I, through the abundance of your steadfast love,will enter your house. I will bow down toward your holy temple in the fear of you.
How important are the doctrines we believe in as Bible believers? If you notice, I said, “Bible be- lievers,” and not just believers in general. Why? It is because I want to establish this clear conviction that we have as a church - The Bible should be the only source of our faith and practice.
In other words, if ever I or any other teachers in our church would teach a doctrine or a practice, we should see to it that they come only from the Bible. And not mere human opinions, teachings, or philoso- phies.
Having said this conviction, again, how important are our beliefs? Better yet, do you know what you believe? A well-known theologian rightly said:
“Theology is for doxology and devotion – that is, the praise of God and the practice of godliness”
I couldn’t agree more! You see, since our Christianity is basically based on our relationship with God, we will never be able to praise Him and live for Him if we do not know Him enough. We can never separate our beliefs about God from our behaviors as believers, or our creeds from our conduct. So, let me encour- age you to really know your theology or your beliefs.
Now, for the month of February, we will be talking a lot about theology. February is always a month of love, so our emphasis is knowing God more, who is the highest object of our love. The title of our series is: “Keeping a Theological Balance.” With this sermon series, we want to straighten out some imbalances in how we see God. There are four major topics we will focus on:
God’s love and God’s hate
God’s Sovereignty and Man’s Freewill
God’s Transcendence and God’s Eminence
God’s Forgiveness and God’s Justice
As we go through this series, we would like to show that our lopsided beliefs can result in serious
consequences in the way we will live our day-to-day lives. It’s almost like our understanding of the Trinity. I know that we will never find the word “Trinity” in the Bible, but the very essence of the doctrine is Biblical. When we refer to the Trinity of God, we believe that there is only one God with three persons – Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. If you emphasize only the “One God,” and do not balance it with the “Three persons,” it can result in a “Modal Trinity.” This teaches that there is only one God, but three different manifestations. He was the Father in the Old Testament, the Son in the New Testament, and the Holy Spirit in this present age. This teaching is wrong!
However, if you emphasize the “Three persons,” and not “One God,” you will be- lieve in “Tritheism.” The belief in three gods or a plurality of gods. This teaching is also very wrong!
Of course, Trinity is not my topic this morning, so if you have questions on this doctrine, you have to sit down with your E12 discipleship group for answers.
For this first Sunday, the doctrine we want to understand better is the balance between God’s love and God’s hate. These doctrines may appear contradictory, but in reality, they co-exist in the person of God. As we examine the main text we have this morning, we would realize that David had a well-balanced per- spective with these two important doctrines. To give us some background on our text, Psalm 5 is one of Da- vid’s lament Psalms. He uses the words of this Psalm to complain to God about his wicked enemies who were using lies to destroy him. The words in verse 6 seem to suggest this context, “You destroy those who
speak lies; the Lord abhors the bloodthirsty and deceitful man.”
Many Bible scholars believe that this happened when Absalom decided to overthrow David as the King of Israel. Absalom used his charm and deceitful manipulations to discredit David. Little by little, he un- dermined David’s credibility and was able to sway some leaders to side with him. As a result, David had to run and hide until the Lord vindicated him.
Can you identify with David’s situation? While David was struggling, he went to the Lord and cried with deep groaning. But what I want us to see is that as David went through one of his most difficult times in life, his balanced understanding of God’s love and hate sustained him. This is the reason why I’m bringing this Psalm to our attention. So, examining this Psalm, let’s highlight three imperatives in order to clarify these two essential attributes of God:
I APPRECIATE GOD’S LOVE
You might find it strange this morning that as I begin dealing with our text, I’m starting on the last verse, where King David conveys his confidence in life because of God’s steadfast love towards him. Verse 7, says, “But I, through the abundance of your steadfast love, will enter your house. I will bow down toward your holy temple in the fear of you.”
Again, despite the presence of dangerous enemies, he knew he didn’t have to be afraid because of God’s abundant and steadfast love. Do you have this deep understanding of how much God loves you? And how His great love for you can keep you confident regardless of what is happening in your life?
I know most of us are familiar with John 3:16, “For God so loved the world,[a] that he gave his only Son . . .” We know that God loves us so much that He was willing to display it by sacrificing His own Son. However, our most common problem in trying to understand God’s love is when we equate His love with the love we see in the world. Allow me to quote Henri Nouwen explain it in his book, The Return of the Prodigal Son: A Story of Homecoming:
“The world says: ‘Yes, I love you if you are good-looking, intelligent, and wealthy. I love you if you have a good education, a good job, and good connections. I love you if you produce much, sell much, and buy much.’ There are endless “ifs” hidden in the world’s love. These “ifs” enslave me, since it is impossible to respond adequately to all of them. The world’s love is and always will be conditional. As long as I keep looking for my true self in the world of conditional love, I will remain “hooked” to the world – trying, fail- ing, and trying again. It is the world that fosters addiction because what it offers cannot satisfy the deepest craving of my heart.”
The world’s love will always be conditional, but God’s love is not the same. There
is nothing we can do to cause Him to love us, and there is nothing we can do to stop Him
from loving us. God loves us simply because being loving is a part of His most basic na-
ture. Both the Old and New Testaments declare this truth:
Jeremiah 31:3 (ESV):
3 the Lord appeared to him from far away. I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore I have continued my faithfulness to you.
1 John 4:19 (ESV):
19 We love because he first loved us.
When you bring these two verses together, we would realize that He doesn’t love us because we first love him. It is quite clear from eternity past, even before we came into existence, He already decided to love us, and this love will never change despite our lack of love towards Him.
God’s perfect love for us is truly amazing, and I hope and pray that just like King David we will grow in our appreciation of His love. The hymn writer described his appreciation of the love of God with these words:
II
The Love of God is greater far
than tongue or pen can ever tell.
It goes beyond the highest star
and reaches to the lowest hell.
Could we with ink the ocean fill,
and were the skies of parchment made, were every stalk on earth quill,
and every man a scribe by trade,
to write the love of God above
would drain the ocean dry.
Nor could the scroll contain the whole. though stretched from sky to sky.
ACKNOWLEDGE GOD’S HATE
While King David appreciates God’s love in verse 7, the earlier verses, specifically verses 4-6, will show us his acknowledgment that God, in His holiness, is capable of hating those who do evil.
I know the idea of God hating someone seems contradictory to His nature of being loving. However, when you examine the words of verses 4-6, you can see how this truth is stated plainly – “For you are not a God who delights in wickedness; evil may not dwell with you. The boastful shall not stand before your eyes; you hate all evildoers. You destroy those who speak lies; the Lord abhors the bloodthirsty and de- ceitful man.”
There is no doubt that God is love, but in His holiness, He can never be soft on sin. He “hates evildo- ers and abhors the bloodthirsty and deceitful man” Both words, hates and abhors, do not simply speak of a mere dislike; they speak of God being loathed, disgusted, or deeply offended by evildoers that He would not dwell or associate with them.
The question is: Is it possible for God to love and hate at the same time? Abso- lutely! In the Bible, this is one of the paradoxes you will find. What is a paradox? A para- dox is a set of statements that appear to contradict themselves but are, in fact, both true.
The reality is that they are not contradictory, but with our finite minds, it is hard
for us to fully comprehend the very nature of God. For example, it is hard for so many people to reconcile how a loving God can create a place like hell where sinners will suffer for eternity. So, many people would explain it away by saying, “Hell refers to our worst experiences here on earth.” In fact, there are Bible teachers who no longer believe in hell because of God’s love. They adhere to Universalism - This is the be- lief that all humankind will eventually be saved.
But for us who believe in the Bible, hell is real, and it is the eternal punishment of sinners who reject- ed the gift of eternal life found in Jesus Christ. Here are some clear verses that teach this truth:
1. Matthew 25:41 (ESV):
41 “Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.
2. 2 Thessalonians 1:9 (ESV):
9 They will suffer the punishment of eternal destruction, away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might,
3. Revelation 20:15 (ESV):
15 And if anyone's name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire.
There are many more Bible verses that can support the doctrine of hell, and there’s no way we can deny it. I remember reading a story about two Christian young men serving in the military. For several weeks on the field, the two soldiers had listened to their unit chaplain explain away hell that became really disturbing to them. Because it really bothered them, they requested to speak to him privately. When the chaplain realized that his teaching on hell was their main concern, he explained to the two soldiers, “Today, scholars know that hell isn’t exactly what people thought it was for many centuries. Eternal punishment and hell have, for centuries, been spoken of in too literal sense. God is love, so I don’t think it’s literal.”
After hearing these words, the soldiers stood up and began walking away. “See you both at the ser- vice Sunday,” the chaplain called out. “I don’t think so, chaplain,” one of them said. “But, why?” said the chaplain. With childlike faith and consistent logic, one soldier answered, “Think about it, chaplain. If there is no hell, we don’t need you. And if there’s a hell, we don’t want to be misled.”
III APPLY BOTH WITH EQUAL WEIGHT
The truth of the matter is that we cannot deny the doctrine that God hates evildoers because we be- lieve that God is love. We need to accept both and do our best to apply them in our Christian lives. Let me highlight two essential applications:
A. If we love God, we will hate what He hates.
In Romans 12:9, the apostle Paul declared, “Let love be genuine. Abhor what is evil; hold fast to what is good.” This exhortation is really practical in that if our love for God is sincere and without hypocrisy, then we can show it by hating what He hates. Don’t say you love God, and then you keep doing what He hates. Proverbs 6:16-19 clearly identifies some of the things that God hates:
16 There are six things that the Lord hates, seven that are an abomination to him: 17 haughty eyes, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood,
18 a heart that devises wicked plans, feet that make haste to run to evil,
19 a false witness who breathes out lies, and one who sows discord among brothers.
Here is a good place to start in terms of what we need to avoid in our lives – (1)
pride, (2) lying, (3) murder, (4) planning to commit evil deeds against others, (5) feet eager to commit evil deeds, (6) false witness, (7) and sowing divisions. If we want to show God we love Him, then we avoid evil, and then begin embracing the things which are good in the sight of God.
B. If we love God, we will hate to see sinners suffer for their sins.
Since we know that God will surely punish sinners for their sins, we would partner with God in His desire to seek and save sinners. The apostle Peter reminds all of us in 2 Peter 3:9:
9 The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you,[a] not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.
There is no question, God wants to see as many people as possible come to the saving knowledge of Jesus Christ. This is the very reason Jesus came into our world and sacrificed Himself on the cross. This truth is also the reason why we do our best to develop believers in our churches. C. S. Lewis once wrote:
“The church exists for nothing else but to draw men into Christ, to make them little Christ. If they are not doing that, all the cathedrals, clergy, missions, sermons, even the Bible itself, are simply a waste of time. God became Man for no other purpose.”
Do you love God enough to hate sins and hate seeing sinners perish in their sins? It is always a great challenge to go deeper in our love for God. But as we love God more, let’s also love other sinners with great- er compassion for their souls.
February 5, 2023/Bishop Jeremiah Lepasana
Leading People To A Life of Commitment And Productivity In Christ