Irreconcilable attributes?
Down through the ages, this apparent inconsistency has been raised again and again. How can God be both loving and just? How can He show mercy and punish wrongdoers? Is He a god of love or a god of wrath?
This supposed paradox appears throughout the Old Testament. For example, the sin of King David exposed the Israelites to the anger of the Lord. And yet, in spite of his understanding that evil deserved the wrath of a just God, he also had confidence in a God who was merciful. He asked that they “fall into the hand of the Lord, for His mercies are great” (2 Samuel 24:14).
Essential opposites
This contrast is not what it seems – not only is there no contradiction between the love of God and the justice of God, it is essential that in a universe where evil exists, a god of love is also a god of wrath.
To unpack this, let’s consider two things that the judgement of God teaches us – one about Him and one about us.
1. What the judgement of God says about God
The fact that God is not indifferent to sin tells us a great deal about His character – it tells us He is loving. He will always act to protect what is good, and this will involve showing wrath in His opposition to evil.
What kind of God could look at evil and suffering, just shrug His shoulders and say, “it doesn’t matter to me, I don’t care”? If God overlooked the wicked deeds of men like Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin, would He be worthy of our worship?
Of course not. But because God is loving, He must punish evil. True love hates what is wrong. True love demands fairness and justice.
So there is no contradiction between the love of God and the wrath of God. In fact, the wrath of God springs from the love of God. If He did not display wrath towards evildoers, we could not claim that He is a god of love.
2. What the judgement of God says about us
Strange as it may seem, the judgement of God upon us is actually a compliment to us. It shows that God cares about us and what we do. It tells us that we matter to Him.
Think of it like this – anyone who uses technology knows how infuriating it can be. Maybe you’ve broken a phone or smashed a PlayStation controller in frustration. But doing that is ridiculous, punishing a machine is absurd – it’s an inanimate object so it can’t be held morally accountable for its actions.
But we can be. The fact that God needs to punish us shows that we are not just molecular machines or robots – we are magnificent, moral, spiritual beings, and God treats us as such.
The God of love and justice
Of course, most of us are happy for God to punish the Adolf Hitlers and Joseph Stalins of this world. It all becomes a lot less palatable when we realise that God’s justice demands that we must be punished, too.
Because we have sinned, the loving goodness of God demands that the consequences of our sin are dealt with. But the loving goodness of God also leads Him to act so that we don’t have to deal with the consequences of that sin ourselves.
Instead, through Christ’s death on the cross, God has dealt with it Himself. There, the love and justice of God perfectly harmonized. The justice of God was satisfied as Jesus paid the price for sin, and the love of God was magnified as salvation was provided for sinners.
Because of this, God can “be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus” (Romans 3:26).
