Angry or Loving?
God Behaving Badly Series
WHAG (June 7th, 2015)
Scripture- 2 Sam 6
Opening Questions-
1. Think of negative thoughts or opinions you have about God
2. In our bible reading- Old Testament passages do you avoid because they paint a picture of God that doesn’t seem to match with Jesus or your view of HIM?
3. For a couple of years, I read the bible in chronological order- meaning I’d spend a good 8 months or so reading only the Old Testament.
4. If you read a lot of Old Testament you can come to the opinion that God is very crabby, volatile, and ready to lash out at any little thing. You live in fear instead of faith, until you really study the context of when God does show judgment and wrath.
5. One of the worlds most renowned atheists, Professor Richard Dawkins said in his book “The God Delusion” (QUOTE)
The God of the Old Testament is arguably the most unpleasant character in all fiction: jealous and proud of it; a petty, unjust, unforgiving control-freak; a vindictive, bloodthirsty ethnic cleanser; a misogynistic, homophobic, racist, infanticidal, genocidal, filicidal, pestilential, megalomaniacal, sadomasochistic, capriciously malevolent bully. (end quote)
And really, this isn’t just his view- it’s the view of the unsaved world about God
6. We are going to answer these questions and the accusations of Professor Dawkins this morning by exploring one of the instances in scripture where God seemingly acted in irrational anger with a violent result
2 Sam 6:1-10
David again brought together out of Israel chosen men, thirty thousand in all. 2 He and all his men set out from Baalah of Judah a to bring up from there the ark of God, which is called by the Name, b the name of the Lord Almighty, who is enthroned between the cherubim that are on the ark. 3 They set the ark of God on a new cart and brought it from the house of Abinadab, which was on the hill. Uzzah and Ahio, sons of Abinadab, were guiding the new cart 4 with the ark of God on it, c and Ahio was walking in front of it. 5 David and the whole house of Israel were celebrating with all their might before the Lord, with songs d and with harps, lyres, tambourines, sistrums and cymbals.
6 When they came to the threshing floor of Nacon, Uzzah reached out and took hold of the ark of God, because the oxen stumbled. 7 The Lord's anger burned against Uzzah because of his irreverent act; therefore God struck him down and he died there beside the ark of God.
8 Then David was angry because the Lord's wrath had broken out against Uzzah, and to this day that place is called Perez Uzzah. e
9 David was afraid of the Lord that day and said, "How can the ark of the Lord ever come to me?"
Prayer
Big idea- How do we reconcile the God that loved us so much that He gave His one and only Son with a God who strikes a person dead for doing what appears to be a good deed.
I. Why was God angry, Why did He do such a sudden and seemingly irrational and angry act?
A. First- they lost the ark in the first place
1. Battle with Philistines. (1 Sam 4)
2. First battle- got their butts kicked.
3. Decide to go to the Tabernacle and get the Ark
4. Thinking God will never let us lose if He is with us
5. Israel not honoring God (as long as we have the Ark, we are good)
6. Treating Him like a pagan God
7. Ark like a good luck charm
8. Showed their utter lack of respect for God
9. “We need you for battle, but after that we are sticking you back in the tent”
Crusades bearing God’s Holy Cross
B. The ark represented the Presence of God
Mercy seat was throne
Shekinah Glory fell on that exact spot
They were treating this presence with contempt
C. Represented the Royalty of God
1. What was ark covered in? Gold symbolizing both of the invaluable worth of God, and His royalty
2. That’s what the problem was with this whole incident
3. Royalty in David’s day, and through much of world history, were never placed in or on a cart- that was beneath them (grave insult).
4. Only prisoners, the dead, and anyone else not deemed worthy of honor road in a wheeled cart.
5. Modern equivalent- Queen of England being picked up in my van, having you crawl over the back seat to sit in the luggage area.
6. Youth still understand this when they call “Shotgun!” because they know the front seat is the honored seat.
7. Royalty were carried, by servants, carrying poles attached to a box that was richly laid out in gold and fine linens. Carried on the shoulders of the servants.
8. In the law (Ex 25) the Ark was to be carried on the shoulders of Levites
9. The law was given because God at least deserved the same if not better honor than an earthly king. If God allowed this incident to go unchallenged, then people would view Him less than an earthly king, and that could be spiritually devastating to them and to us if we don’t hold God in a place of honor.
10. Transition to-
II. God was protecting us, through protecting Himself
A. Our image of God affects our reverence of Him
1. Obedience
2. Love for Him is drivin by our image of Him
a. David knew the law of God. All Hebrews were taught Torah by their parents, and participated in the weekly synagogue meetings, and the religious festivals that occurred throughout the year
b. He could not claim ignorance of how this ark was to be moved (even if he did, the Levites with him would have known)
c. David made a decision to do it his way, either through pride, or eh…God’s ways aren’t all that important
d. Isn’t that typical of the church today?
3. God is very jealous of relationship with us
a. We see dimly
b. We have a 5 min perspective
c. God has eternal perspective
d. He wants to spend all of eternity with us, and if that means light and momentary afflictions, so be it.
e. That’s what Gethsemane was all about
III. Purpose of God’s Anger
A. Holy and Righteous- it cannot do evil
B. The bible does not say God is love, love, love, but Holy Holy Holy-God’s overriding Character that defines all others
C. That is why His Anger is Restorative- it seeks the best for those it’s directed at
D. Tied to Justice
1. Relieving Oppression- one of the critizms of God is that he is genocidal- gleefully wiping out people for no particular reason or just because he’s mad
a. Joshua’s Campaign
b. Understanding why God told Joshua to wipe out everyone in Canaan, we have to go back over 400 years to Genesis 15
1. Sins of the Amorites has not yet been fulfilled
2. Shows the loving mercy of God, that He gave the people of Canaan over 400 years to repent.
3. But what about Israel? 400 years of slavery?
4. Israel would have died in Canaan, either from starvation or from being killed by rival clans (Simeon and Levi)
5. God’s justice saw Egypt was wiped out for how they mistreated Israel
E. God is very slow to anger
1. Very, very slow. Generally centuries before He acts.
2. Not like us- Road rage/Microwave- partner with bad temper
3. To put God’s anger into perspective, He has by His own word every right to judge us immediately the next time we sin
4. According to Genesis 2- “On the day you eat..” God has every right to kill each and ever one of us when we sin.
F. Finally, God is a big picture God
1. Not only every hair on your head, but the big picture
Is God Angry or Loving? Yes, but both have a purpose.
And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.
Musicians
Conclusion
Reading bible, or experiencing life- When God doesn’t make sense-
Remember John 3:16-17
Embrace mystery- you will never ever completely understand God’s Actions- that’s where faith comes in and knowing Him for who He is.
One of the greatest prayers you can pray to God is “God, I don’t understand why, but I trust you and worship you in the midst of not understanding.”
Altar Call
