The Wrathful Love Of God - Did God Pour Out His Wrath On Jesus?

There is a growing belief in the Church that God does not need to punish people for sin and that His wrath is directed specifically against all the ungodly behavior and unrighteousness of humanity that is damaging them, hurting them, causing them to sin against each other, and anything contrary to His nature.

Beginning in the 16th century, teaching began that Jesus became sin, rather than becoming a sin sacrifice and paying the penalty by taking upon Himself the punishment of God's wrath against sin.

The sacrificial death of Jesus was not to appease an angry, wrathful, distant deity somewhere way up there in the sky who uses pain, sorrow, suffering, or sickness to punish people. The Bible tells us that God doesn't want or need sacrifices (Jeremiah 22:23). It is fallen human beings who need them.

The Cross is the plan of God from before the foundation of the world to bring reconciliation of the universe, making peace with all things and redeeming humanity from being lost and remaining in the grip of the enemy and their sinfulness by casting down the principalities and powers that enslave and oppress them (Colossians 1:9).

The Wrath of God

The English word “wrath” is translated from the Hebrew “chemah,” a noun that occurs 120 times in the OT as "wrath, heat, rage, anger, venom and denotes a strong emotional state (See Genesis 27:44; Ezekiel 3:14; Deuteronomy 32:33). The word indicates a strong state of anger and is used most often involving God's "anger" and "wrath" (See Deuteronomy 9:19; Psalm 6:1; Lamentations 4:11).

The Hebrew word ‘chemah’ is associated with ‘qinah,’ which means "jealousy," and also with ‘naqam,’ which means "vengeance." God was jealous of His holy name when dealing with Israel, which is why He had to deal justly with idolatrous Israel by avenging Himself and Israel against their enemies (See Ezekiel 24:8; Nahum 1:2). God is angered by the sins and pride of people because they insult His holiness.

Nowhere in the Bible does it explicitly say or teach that God poured out His wrath on Jesus. There are those who believe that the opposite is true and quote from the book of Isaiah who prophesied that the Messiah would be “stricken,” “afflicted,” “pierced,” crushed,” and “pierced,” by God for the sins, rebellion, and iniquities of humanity (Isaiah 53:4-6,10). Even though the Hebrew word “chemah” was not used, many believe that God poured wrath on the promised Messiah because He willingly died on the Cross as the final sacrifice for sin, and “became sin,” which caused the “wrath of God” to be “revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of people, who suppress the truth by their wickedness” (2 Corinthians 5:21; Romans 1:18 NIV).

It is important to note the Bible says God’s wrath was ‘revealed’ (Gk: ‘apokaluptó’ = uncovered, brought to light), but it does not say or insinuate that it was poured out on Jesus for any reason, including because He died under the Law for all people.

“For if those who depend on the law are heirs, faith means nothing and the promise is worthless, because the law brings wrath. And where there is no law there is no transgression.” (Romans 4:15 NIV)

The Bible does not say that the Law provokes, stimulates, or incites God's wrath, but it does say “the law brings wrath,” which will ultimately be poured out at the end of the Great Tribulation (Revelation 16-18). The Greek word for “brings” is ‘katergazomai,’’ which means to work out, accomplish, produce, to bring about something to completion, such as spiritual growth.

The Bible says that those who do not abide by the law are under a curse. However, on the Cross, Jesus took upon Himself all curses by “becoming a curse” and offered “redemption from the curse of the law” to those who repent of sin and place their trusting-faith in Him (Galatians 3:10-14).

There is no verse in the Bible that says that because God is holy, He must express wrath against sin. Nor does it say that because of His mercy, He delayed that wrath until the Cross. There are many verses that speak of God’s wrath, and that Jesus will deliver Christians “from the wrath to come” (1 Thessalonians 1:10), but there is no verse that says God’s wrath was satisfied at the Cross. It is to come when “destruction will come on them suddenly, as labor pains on a pregnant woman, and they will not escape” (1 Thessalonians 5:3 NIV).

Jesus delivered those who become Born-Again from the final day of wrath when He transformed them into “children of light, children of day.” … “For God has not destined us for wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us so that whether we are awake or asleep we might live with him” (1 Thessalonians 5:5,9-10).