#12 On the Nature of God: The LOVE and HATE of GOD

The nature of God is often confusing. He is sometimes viewed as a giant Santa Claus that just gives out blessings and is so loving that He would never punish anyone by sending them to hell. At other times, God is viewed as a vengeful, hateful God who gladly sends people to hell. Are either of these two views right? What can be learned from the Bible about the true nature of God?

God is definitely a God of love, 1 John 4:8:

“Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.”

But at the same time, God hates all who do wrong, Psalms 5:5:

“The boastful shall not stand before your eyes; you hate all evildoers.”

Likewise, God is holy, Leviticus 11:44:

“I am the LORD your God. Consecrate yourselves therefore, and be holy, for I am holy.”

Because God is holy, nothing unclean will be in heaven, Revelations 21:27:

“But nothing unclean will ever enter it, nor anyone who does what is detestable or false, but only those who are written in the Lamb’s book of life.”

God’s holiness would not allow Adam and Eve to continue in the Garden of Eden after they sinned. But God’s love and mercy was immediately shown in that a long-term hope for mankind to return to a state of bliss like that of the Garden was expressed as a prophecy: Genesis 3:15:

“I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring; he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel.”

This prophecy foretold a continuous battle between satan and God. God would win. Satan would be cast into hell, Revelations 20:10:

“and the devil who had deceived them was thrown into the lake of fire and sulfur where the beast and the false prophet were, and they will be tormented day and night forever and ever.”

Likewise, the unrighteous of mankind will be sent to hell, Revelations 21:8:

“But as for the cowardly, the faithless, the detestable, as for murderers, the sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars, their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death.”

What did God’s prophecy cover?

God’s righteous and just nature requires death for sins committed. So, God mercifully decided that He would die on the behalf of man. Therefore, He sent part of the Godhead, His Son, to die on the cross for the sins of mankind. This was a tremendous manifestation of the love and justice of God, John 3:16:

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God.”

So, Jesus became the propitiation or payment for the sins of mankind, 1 John 4:9-10:

“In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.”

Thus, God gave Jesus Christ, His Son, as a sacrifice to satisfy the requirement that blood be shed to atone for sins. In this way, the Apostle Paul describes God as both just and the justifier. He describes Jesus on the cross in Romans 3:25-26:

“… whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God’s righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.”

This scripture shows that God is just. Sin has been paid for, and God paid it. At the same time, He made Himself also the justifier. This means that God alone paid the price and mankind is totally dependent on God’s sacrifice of His Son to go to heaven.

In summary, the nature of God is to be a loving God who loved us enough to give His Son as a sacrifice so that we could be saved eternally. But God’s nature also is to punish the evildoers by sending them to hell.

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