A11 The Anger of the Lord

What does it mean for the Lord to be angry? Let us look to Jesus to define God's anger for He is the way to the Father. 

When Jesus stood before the leaders of Israel and told them they were hypocrites he was certainly angry. Was the culmination of this anger?

Matt 23:37-38  O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest them which are sent unto thee, how often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not!  (38)  Behold, your house is left unto you desolate.

It causes the Lord incredible grief to finally have to allow his wayward children have their decision to reject Him. The anger of the Lord is to leave the house of the wicked desolate while experiencing terrible grief. 

A common word anger in Hebrew is aph and it means rapid breathing through the nose. It can be either anger or grief or both. It depends on how you view God. 

When you see the biblical meaning of anger your heart will go out to our Father in sorrow for all the suffering He has endured because of our sins. We we allow Him to gather us to him or will our house be left desolate for the serpent to come and destroy?

A10 Putting the Fear of God into you

What does it mean to have the fear of God put into you? Most people understand this to mean that God causes a person to feel that He will destroy them if they don't submit to Him. 

If we wish to look at what God is like we must look to Christ and we get a picture of the fear of God when Jesus cleansed the temple. If we examine this story carefully we can discern more clearly that the fear of God is a conviction of sin that leads us to see the love and care of God for us. God never wants to harm us. He does not want anyone to perish. If we know that God is merciful, when He gently shows us our sins and we feel overwhelmed by them with fear, we can know that God is not against us and He does not seek to harm us but simply to be free from our sins which destroy us. Look and live. 

This video is from the book called Agape.

A06 Fire From Heaven

Just before Elijah was taken to heaven the Bible tells us that he called fire down from heaven on 2 lots of 50 men and their respective captains. When the disciples of Jesus came to Jesus frustrated with some Samaritans who were not treating their master correctly, they cited the example of Elijah bringing fire down from heaven to destroy them. The answer of Jesus tells us something profound about the character of God.

Luke 9:54-56  And when his disciples James and John saw this, they said, Lord, wilt thou that we command fire to come down from heaven, and consume them, even as Elias did?  (55)  But he turned, and rebuked them, and said, Ye know not what manner of spirit ye are of.  (56)  For the Son of man is not come to destroy men's lives, but to save them. And they went to another village.

Did Jesus rebuke the actions of Elijah as well as His disciples? This presentation puts these pieces together to reveal the loving character of our Father in heaven. 

A05 Love Your Enemies

In the book of Matthew is recorded one of the greatest sermons ever preached. It is a sermon preached by Jesus Christ. In these sermons He tells us to turn the other cheek and to love our enemies that we might be children of our Father in Heaven. So we become children of God when we love those who oppose us.

The Template for the Judgment

Get the notes: http://maranathamedia.com/article/view/the-template-for-the-judgement

God considers all men His precious children. He has paid an infinite price for every human being. When we judge others and have angry feelings towards them and desire to separate from them then we are challenging God’s judgment of that person. We are negating what He has decided about them. We are taking His place on the judgment seat and we are administering the counterfeit justice of Satan which ultimately will be mirrored back to those who sit there. 

As we pass judgement on others this negates His love for others, because we are the same as them in nature we negate His love for us and we judge ourselves unworthy of His love. We are in the prison because we grabbed the man by the throat and told him to pay.

The Atonement and the Demands of Justice

The condemning power of Satan would lead him to institute a theory of justice inconsistent with mercy. He claims to be officiating as the voice and power of God, claims that his decisions are justice, are pure and without fault. Thus he takes his position on the judgment seat and declares that his counsels are infallible. Here his merciless justice comes in, a counterfeit of justice, abhorrent to God. {CTr 11.4}

The Penalty of Sin - God is not the Author of Death

It was generally believed by the Jews that sin is punished in this life. Every affliction was regarded as the penalty of some wrongdoing, either of the sufferer himself or of his parents. It is true that all suffering results from the transgression of God’s law, but this truth had become perverted. Satan, the author of sin and all its results, had led men to look upon disease and death as proceeding from God,—as punishment arbitrarily inflicted on account of sin. Hence one upon whom some great affliction or calamity had fallen had the additional burden of being regarded as a great sinner. – {DA 471.1}