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| > Sermon Archive > Sermons by Author > Dr. Wes Bredenhof > You do not want to be on the wrong side of the Divine Warrior | Previous Next Print |
| Order Of Worship (Liturgy) Hymn 3:1,2 Psalm 18:1,4,5 Hymn 70 Hymn 1 Psalm 62:1,3,7 Scripture reading: Nahum 1 Catechism lesson and text: Lord's Day 4 and Nahum 1:2-3 |
Beloved congregation of Christ,
I recently read this story about an Arab Christian named Azeem. Azeem was taking a taxi in the Middle East somewhere and soon found out that the taxi driver believed he would go to heaven, even though he wasn’t a Christian. He believed he’d have to pay for his sins in hell first, but once that was done, then God would allow him into heaven. And it wouldn’t take too long to pay for those sins because there weren’t many of them.
Azeem tried to think of a way to get this taxi driver to understand the seriousness of sin and the weight of God’s justice. He asked the driver, “If I slapped you in the face, what would you do to me?” The driver said, “I would throw you out of my taxi.”
“But what if I went up to somebody randomly on the street and slapped him? What do you think he would do?” The driver said, “He would probably call his friends and they’d thump you.”
Azeem went on, “What if I went up to a cop and slapped him in the face?” “You’d get beaten for sure and then he’d throw you in jail.”
Azeem asked one last question: “What if I went to the king of this country and slapped him in the face? What would he do?” The driver laughed and said, “You would die.”
Azeem explained, “So you see that the severity of sin’s punishment is always a reflection of the position of the person who is sinned against.” Then the taxi driver could begin to see that he was minimizing sin and minimizing who God is.
Sin is heinous – which is to say that it’s extremely wicked, in fact, infinitely wicked. And it’s been said that the heinousness of sin rests in the infinite majesty of the one you sin against. If you sin against infinite majesty even just once, you deserve infinite, eternal punishment.
Our catechism lesson from Lord’s Day 4 is driving home that point to us this afternoon. We have to take God’s infinite majesty seriously, especially when we consider how we have sinned against it. To help us understand that better, we’re going to focus on what God’s Word says in Nahum 1:2-3. I’ve summarized the sermon with this theme: You do not want to be on the wrong side of the Divine Warrior.
We’ll learn how the Divine Warrior is both:
- Slow to anger and
- Just
The book of Nahum is directed towards a particular people. The Assyrians were notorious enemies of God’s people. But they were also enemies of God with their idolatry, love for warfare, and oppression. As a result, God sent his prophet Nahum to confront them.
That wasn’t the first time God had done this. In fact, about a hundred years earlier, God sent another prophet to the Assyrians, to their capital city of Nineveh. That prophet was extremely reluctant – it was as if God was sending him to an unrepentant serial killers’ convention. He didn’t want any part of it. But as you know, God had his way with Jonah and eventually Jonah entered the gates of Nineveh. He proclaimed a message of repentance.
Amazingly, God worked through that message and the king and the rest of the Assyrians turned from their wicked ways. God relented from the judgment he had threatened to bring through Jonah. You’ll remember how Jonah wasn’t too happy about that. He was hoping to see the Assyrians destroyed. But God told him he would have mercy on whom he would have mercy – and he chose to have mercy on the Assyrians and bring them to repentance in that time.
But time went on, and as it did, the Assyrians fell back into their old ways of rebellion against God. And yet, God didn’t destroy them right away. Yet God still gave them time. A hundred years after Jonah, God sent his prophet Nahum to speak to the same people the same message. The whole book of Nahum is an oracle of judgment against Nineveh, the city which represents the entire Assyrian empire.
What’s important to realize is that this oracle of judgment was on the same lines as Jonah’s preaching. What I mean is that when Jonah preached to Nineveh, it wasn’t a certain thing that God was going to destroy it. The whole point of him preaching was to bring them to repentance. They could repent and doom could be averted. It’s the same with the message of Nahum. The people of Nineveh again could repent and the judgment prophesied by Nahum would be turned away. God would never destroy those who hear his warnings and respond rightly with repentance.
This is the first way in which we see how God is slow to anger. If you think about it, it’s amazing that God was so long-suffering with the Assyrians. He sent them not only one, but two prophets over this period of a hundred years to warn them of his judgment. Think back to what Azeem said in the introduction. Imagine a king who was slapped. The first time he’s slapped, he doesn’t punish the one who slapped him. Instead, he warns him to stop and not do it again or there’ll be consequences. The king gets slapped again, and he warns again. That happens again and again over 100 years before the king finally responds. That’s slow to anger. That’s what God is like and it’s seen with the repeated sending of warnings through the prophets.
But then God also says it explicitly in verse 3. It’s actually an interesting expression in the original Hebrew. Literally it says God is long in the nose. Some people when they get mad they get this automatic response of their nervous system which causes their nostrils to flare. The nose gets increased blood flow and the nostrils widen. But if someone is “long in the nose,” it takes a long time for their anger to get up to that point where the nostrils flare. This picture is meant to help us understand how God doesn’t lash out impulsively. He has an extraordinary amount of patience with sinners. He’s merciful and long-suffering, not cruel and impulsive.
That’s connected with what it says further in chapter 1. In verse 7, we read about God’s goodness, “The LORD is good, a stronghold in the day of trouble; he knows those who take refuge in him.” His being mercifully slow to anger is an expression of his goodness. You would expect someone good to be like this. Someone bad would be cruel and have a short fuse. Someone good would bear long with sinners, even with sinners who deeply offend him. That’s what God did with the Assyrians and that’s what God does in general terms with everyone else too.
In our Catechism, we’re at Lord’s Day 4. This is in the section on our sin and misery. There’s a lot of bad news in this section. But here in Lord’s Day 4, there’s also a wee bit of good news: God is merciful. Question 11 says, “But is God not also merciful?” And then the answer says, “God is indeed merciful…” And before we go on to the next words about God’s justice, it’s good to slow down and savour this beautiful truth about our God. He is indeed merciful, slow to anger, long-suffering with sinners.
That had a purpose back in the days of Nahum. It still has the same purpose today. That purpose is described in 2 Peter 3:9. God is “patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.” God’s long-suffering mercy is meant to give us time and opportunity to turn away from our sins and turn to Christ. When Scripture tells us God is slow to anger, that’s not meant to encourage us to continue in sin, thinking we can just keep on going and no worries. No, it’s meant to turn us away from sin and bring us to Jesus and what he did on the cross, so we can be saved from the coming judgment. So when you hear about God being slow to anger, don’t presume upon that. Instead, be thankful he isn’t quick to anger, and use the time he’s given you to see your sin and rebellion, turn away from it and rest and trust only in what Jesus has done.
When anyone does that, the Bible tells us there’s a certain kind of emotional response in heaven. In Luke 15, Jesus told the Parable of the Lost Sheep. Most of you know the story. A man has a flock of a hundred sheep and one goes missing. So he leaves the ninety-nine behind and goes searching for that one lost sheep. When he finds it, he rejoices. Not only that, but when he comes home he gathers his friends and neighbours and invites them to rejoice with him. Then Jesus says in Luke 15:7, “Just so, I tell you, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance.” Jesus was saying that God rejoices when his patience leads to the sinner’s repentance. Loved ones, God wants to rejoice over you. So repent and believe in Christ.
But when God has been extravagantly patient, extremely long-suffering, extraordinarily merciful, and someone still refuses to repent, God’s justice comes into play. In our passage from Nahum, God is portrayed as a warrior. But he’s not an ordinary warrior. At the end of verse 3 it says “his way is in whirlwind and storm, and the clouds are the dust of his feet.” The language here is meant to evoke the picture of a soldier marching into battle. But this isn’t just any soldier. An ordinary soldier would have the dust of the earth under his feet, but the Divine Warrior has the clouds. An ordinary soldier would walk on paths made of earth or rock, but the Divine Warrior treads on violent gales and storms. It’s meant to be a terrifying picture.
It reinforces what Nahum says in the previous verse, in verse 2. We read there first of all that God is jealous. In our world, we often consider jealousy to be a negative trait. You shouldn’t be jealous of other people. The kids can relate to this. Someone in your class gets some special recognition for something they’ve done. Maybe you get jealous. Maybe you wish you’d be the one to get that award or certificate. You know this jealousy is wrong. You’ve been taught that it’s wrong. And it is, for sure. So how can the Bible say that God is jealous? Why can God be jealous and we can’t? Have you ever thought about that?
Well, here’s the thing. There are actually times when it is good and appropriate for human beings to be jealous. A wife should be jealous for the love of her husband and vice-versa. You want your spouse to be exclusively committed to you and no one else. The special love a married couple shares together should be shared only between the two of them. And when someone comes between them, jealousy is the appropriate response. Jealousy is right in that context. It’s the same with God. God wants human beings, including the Assyrians and including you and me, to be exclusively committed to him as our God. He doesn’t want us to love or serve any other gods. As our Creator, he has the right to insist on that. Whatever is created owes allegiance to whoever created. We were created by God and we owe exclusive allegiance to him as God. When we don’t, he becomes jealous.
And eventually his jealousy leads his justice to respond. The Divine Warrior takes action. That’s described for us in the rest of verse 2. God is avenging, avenging and wrathful. Parallel to that is the next part of the verse which says God takes vengeance on his adversaries and keeps wrath for his enemies. And then in verse 3 it adds to this picture by saying that the LORD will by no means clear the guilty. There’s a lot here and we have to unpack it bit by bit.
There are those who have trouble accepting that God has wrath towards sin and sinners. They say that if God is love, then he shouldn’t be angry. If God is love, then hell should be empty. If God is love, he should want to have everyone who hates him live with him forever. How do we respond to that?
First, and most obviously, the Bible says what it says. Both the Old Testament and the New Testament tell us of how God is avenging and wrathful. In the New Testament, no one spoke more about that than Jesus. So the only way to insist that a loving God cannot also be wrathful is to hold that the Bible is wrong on some things. But I trust we don’t want to do that. We have a high view of the Bible – it’s the inspired and entirely trustworthy Word of God from Genesis to Revelation.
So how is it that God can be loving and wrathful at the same time? To answer that, we have to swim a little bit in the deep end here. We need to do a little theology. You need to realize that, properly speaking, wrath is not an attribute of God like love is. For something to be an attribute or characteristic of God, it has to be true of him always, both before and after the fall into sin. Before the fall into sin, God never had wrath. There was nothing to be wrathful about. But love is an attribute of God. The Bible says in 1 John 4:8 that God is love. That has been true of him always, before and after the fall into sin. Even before creation, God was love. There was eternal love between the persons of the Trinity, between the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. This intratrinitarian love needs to be at the forefront of our minds if we want to know how God can be loving and wrathful at the same time.
You see, it’s because there is love between the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, that there is wrath when sinners unrepentantly set themselves against God. Let’s go back to that illustration from the beginning. If you were part of the royal family and you loved your father, the king, you would be angry if you saw someone else come along and slap him in the face. You would be even angrier if you saw your father the king warn this person repeatedly and yet he kept doing it, kept on slapping. But that anger comes from your love for your father. It’s the same with the Trinity. Because of their love, the persons of the Trinity become angry for one another when there’s rebellious opposition and wickedness. They want to uphold one another’s honour because they love one another with an infinite love.
That connects to the next point we need to understand and that’s God’s justice. God becomes wrathful because he loves justice. As our Catechism soberly puts it, sin committed against the most high majesty of God must be punished with everlasting punishment of body and soul. This wrath, this punishment, is an expression of the justice God loves. God’s infinite triune majesty has been offended and the only appropriate and just way to deal with that is infinite wrath expressed in hell.
And as far as human beings go, remember again how God in his mercy gives so many warnings. In his mercy and love, God shows so much patience with sinners. It’s not like he’s eager to send people to hell. But he will if they don’t repent and turn to Christ.
This is where you need to notice an important detail in our passage from Nahum. It says that “the LORD takes vengeance on his adversaries and keeps wrath for his enemies.” And then in verse 3 that “the LORD will by no means clear the guilty.” God’s enemies are the ones on the wrong side of him. Because they’re guilty, they’re the ones who should be afraid of this Divine Warrior. They hate him and they rebel against his will. And they will find him to be their most fearful enemy.
Now you need to ask yourself why God’s enemies would even want to be with him forever. If you hated someone with all your strength, would you want to spend eternity with them praising them forever with everyone who loves them? When you die, you don’t suddenly turn into someone who loves God. If you hated God and wanted to be apart from him during your life on earth, he gives you what you want in the hereafter. No one is going to be in heaven who didn’t want to be there when they were here on earth. So not only does the holy God not want one of his hateful enemies with him in heaven, they wouldn’t want to be with him either.
God’s justice should be a terrifying thought for sinners who don’t turn from sin and turn to Christ. But if you have repented and believed in Jesus, God’s justice should be a comforting thought. If your sin against the infinite majesty of God has been punished with the most severe punishment of body and soul, then the requirement of God’s justice has been met. That’s what Jesus has done for every believer on the cross. Jesus took the punishment for your sin if you believe in him. If that’s true, then God’s justice has been fulfilled. This is why 1 John 1:9 says God is just or righteous to forgive us our sins. His justice demands that our sins be forgiven because Christ has paid for them. The curse is gone. And if the curse is gone, then his justice requires that you be blessed. Justice means that God turns to every believer now with his favour and friendship. If we look at the situation in the terms of Nahum 1, we’re no longer God’s adversaries who deserve his vengeful wrath. Instead, we’re not only on friendly terms with him, we’re actually welcomed into his family. Since we have Christ and what he did on the cross in our place, we’re no longer the guilty who will never be cleared. In Christ, we’ve been cleared once and for all. In Christ, we’re righteous in the sight of God and with such immaculate righteousness, his justice requires that he bless us with life and favour.
Sadly for those Assyrians, they didn’t repent and turn to God. Nineveh was destroyed and so was their kingdom. What they experienced with that disaster on earth was only a shadow of the disaster they experienced in the hereafter. It was their fault. They were to blame for it. They were responsible to repent and turn to God, but they didn’t.
But now what about us? What about you? Loved ones, I want to urge you to make sure you’re not on the wrong side of the Divine Warrior. Being on the wrong side might not seem like such a big deal now, but it certainly will later. Instead, turn to Jesus Christ. Turn to him for the first time, if you’ve never done that before. Turn to him again, if you’re already a Christian. Whatever the case, place your trust entirely in him so God’s wrath is turned away from you and his favour comes instead. Your sin is a great problem, but God has provided a great Saviour. When the Day of Judgment comes, please, please make sure you’re found in him as a friend of God. AMEN.
PRAYER
O great and holy God in heaven,
Your majesty is infinite. You are so highly exalted above us. Your holiness is incomparable. It’s your infinite glory and majesty we have sinned against. We deserve to be your enemies. We deserve to have you as the Divine Warrior with great and fearsome wrath against us. You love your own honour and you love justice and justice demands we be punished with the most severe punishment of body and soul. Thank you that in your love you sent your Son to be our Saviour. Thank you that he took the punishment we deserve. We worship you for giving us the righteousness we need in him. With your Holy Spirit, please help us all to turn away from our sin and place our trust entirely in Christ. We pray that none of us would hear this good news and then perish through unbelief. Please work in all our hearts, both young and old, so we sincerely and wholeheartedly believe in Jesus alone.
* As a matter of courtesy please advise Dr. Wes Bredenhof, if you plan to use this sermon in a worship service. Thank-you.
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