Dear Friends,

This week’s chapter deals with a question that most contemporary Christians dismiss with a rather strong emotional flare.  For them “God is love” has been transformed to “Love is God.”  This view cannot accept divine hatred in any personal sense.  The best they can do when confronted with such passages as Romans 9:6-13 or Psalm 5:5 is to say, “What the Bible really says is that God hates the sin, but loves the sinner.”  The most obvious error must contain an element of truth for anyone to accept it.  There is no doubt about the fact that God hates sin.  There is no doubt about the fact that God loves some sinners.  However, if we build our view of God on Scripture instead of our emotions, there can also be no doubt about the fact that God distinctly does not love all sinners; in fact these two passages affirm that He “hates” some sinners.  If we try to impose our emotion-based love and hate onto God, we have about as much problem with God’s love as with His hate.  If we allow Scripture to teach us, rather than attempting to correct and instruct the Scriptures, we will readily learn that neither God’s love nor His hate are based on cosmic emotions.  We utterly fail to grasp the Biblical truth when we attempt to create God in our own image, precisely the opposite to what Scripture teaches about God and creation.

Stated in its simplest form, what does Scripture teach us about both God’s love and His hate?  In this week’s chapter I will make the case that both divine love and divine hate are moral, not emotional qualities in God.  This premise comfortably explains why neither God’s love nor His hate are in a state of near constant flux or change.  They are permanent, because God’s moral character is fixed.  The Biblical model of Christian ethics is that we look at Jesus Christ and work constantly to mold our lives according to His image, not that we work to reshape Him to our image! 

od bless,
Joe Holder

Divine Hatred

Not as though the word of God hath taken none effect. For they are not all Israel , which are of Israel : Neither, because they are the seed of Abraham, are they all children: but, In Isaac shall thy seed be called. That is, They which are the children of the flesh, these are not the children of God: but the children of the promise are counted for the seed. For this is the word of promise, At this time will I come, and Sara shall have a son. And not only this; but when Rebecca also had conceived by one, even by our father Isaac; (For the children being not yet born, neither having done any good or evil, that the purpose of God according to election might stand, not of works, but of him that calleth;) It was said unto her, The elder shall serve the younger. As it is written, Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated.  ( Romans 9:6-13 )

            The idea of God hating anyone is typically rejected by many Bible students, not on the basis of what the Bible teaches, but on the basis of their own emotions and on their perception of hatred as they experience it.  When confronted with our study passage, those who reject divine hatred will protest that the word simply means to “love less,” as if that definition provides any relief for their dilemma.  If that be the intent of the passage, we relieve God of hatred, but we accuse Him of blatant favoritism.

            The first distinction we should draw when examining the Scriptures that deal with God’s hatred is to come to terms with the fact that divine hatred is not the expression of divine emotion, but of divine morality.  God’s hatred of individuals is in fact a moral hatred, not an emotional hatred.  This facet of the question is corroborated by another passage that also deals with divine hatred.

The foolish shall not stand in thy sight: thou hatest all workers of iniquity.  ( Psalm 5:5 , KJV )

When confronted with this verse, those who reject divine hatred as a Biblical principle typically claim, “Well, God hates the sin, but He still loves the sinner.”  However, their view clearly violates the simple grammar of the passage.  Without question God hates sin, regardless of the person who commits it, but that is not what the verse says.  It clearly says that He hates sinners, the workers of iniquity.  Spiros Zodhiates, not by any means a strong defender of divine election, rejects the “God hates the sin but not the sinner” idea in his Keyword Study Bible, “The problem with this view is that there is nothing in the context or grammar of the passage to support this understanding of the verse.  Simply stated, ‘God hates all those who do iniquity.’”

            Grammatically Psalm 5:5 and Romans 9:13 state a clear, if difficult, concept for our study.  God hates certain people, in one case a single individual, Esau (and likely all whom he represents in Paul’s teaching in this chapter), and in the other case a class of people identified as “workers of iniquity.”  In Luke 13:27 Jesus used this exact term to identify those who shall be judged and sentenced to eternal separation from Him at the Last Day.  I suggest that the Holy Spirit intended these same people in Psalm 5:5 .

            Occasionally sincere people will attempt to side-step the teaching of Paul—and of the Holy Spirit—in the ninth chapter of Romans by interpreting the passage as an allegory to depict the two natures of a regenerate person.  However, this interpretation contradicts Paul’s specific identification of his purpose in using these Old Testament passages, “…that the purpose of God according to election might stand….”  Paul wrote nothing whatever in this passage about God’s purpose to explain the conflicting natures that battle within a regenerate person.  Since he tells us why he included the lesson, we cannot ignore or evade the point he made and follow both his and the Holy Spirit’s inspired intent with this passage.

            I rather doubt that most people, my self included, can clearly grasp the idea of hatred apart from rather strong emotions.  We typically link both love and hatred with particular emotions, and rather strong emotions at that.  The New Testament specifically defines the kind of love that God has toward His people and the kind of love that we are commanded to show toward each other in terms of actions, not emotions. ( 1 Corinthians 13:4-7 )  Without question the actions specified will evoke strong and healthy emotions.  However, the distinction should be clear.  The actions of Biblical love evoke emotions, while our existential, self-centered view of love functions in precisely the opposite manner; self-centered emotional love evokes actions.  In the Biblical case the action evokes the emotion; in the corrupted case the emotion evokes the action.  Actions that grow out of emotions are usually unstable and at times irrational.  If you allow your emotions to control your actions, beware.  How will you react when your emotions take a sudden turn?  If you do not at the moment “feel” loving toward your brother or sister, do you feel justified in showing hateful actions toward him/her?  As a minister of some fifty years, I can tell you that I have witnessed this sinful rationalization many times over in various church situations.  The consequences of such emotion-based conduct are never right or pretty.

            If we can get our minds around the concept that divine love is action based, not emotion based, we are on our way to understanding that divine hatred is also not a divine emotion.  If you look up the Greek word translated “love” in the New Testament, particularly where the passage deals with God’s love, you will discover a rather simple, though surprising definition, “…love in a social or moral sense.”  If in fact love and hatred are true opposites, how would we define hatred in this model?  Would it not be “hatred in a social or moral sense” not hatred in an emotional sense?

            As we develop this unique Biblical concept of both divine love and hatred as action words, not emotional words, and as moral concepts, not emotional bias words, the truth that Paul presents in the ninth chapter of Romans begins to take shape.  There is something that justifies a divine moral response of either love or hatred.  What is it?  First of all, Paul never indicates in his inspired writings that man’s righteous standing before God grows out of man’s inherent moral good.  Quite the opposite!  Go back to the third chapter of Romans and read Romans 3:9-20 .  Take the time to look up every Old Testament reference that Paul used in these verses.  The moral basis of God’s hatred against sinful man becomes incredibly clear.  Apart from divine intervention of some kind, this sentence of divine “moral hatred” falls upon every human who has lived long enough to develop and to manifest his sinful nature.  This moral description of sinful humanity more than validates Paul’s conclusion of God’s moral hatred against humanity.

            The greater mystery in a study of Biblical election has to do with the miracle of God’s love, not with His understandable moral hatred of sinners.  How could God love anyone, especially in a “moral sense”?  Often even those who believe in Biblical election as presented by Paul in this chapter, overlook its basis and attempt to teach or defend it based on divine justice.  While God took great and detailed steps to settle the justice question on behalf of those whom He elected, Paul makes God’s mercy, not His justice, the basis for election in this context.  Notice his depiction of the two vessels in Romans 9:22-23 .  One group is depicted as vessels of God’s wrath, His moral hatred against sin, and the other group is presented as vessels of God’s mercy, not His justice.  Thus in Paul’s perspective divine mercy, not divine justice, explains God’s election of His people.

            We will never understand either God’s love or His hatred so long as we attempt to view them from an emotional basis.  Paul quotes the “love-hate” thought from Malachi 1:2-3 .  We often go directly to these two verses and overlook the context in which they appear.  Malachi gives voice to the sentiment of the people of his day questioning God’s love.  They feel forsaken, anything but loved of God.  Despite their feelings, God professes His love for them to which they question, “Wherein hast thou loved us?”  To their question God responds with His commentary regarding Jacob and Esau.  Clearly in this reference the people of Judah stood in the “Jacob” tradition, not the Esau identity.  There was little moral distinction between Jacob and Esau as individuals.  Both men exhibit despicable attitudes and conduct.  If God’s love and hatred were based on His sentiment, His emotions, God would justify both His love for Jacob and His hatred for Esau on the basis of their personal conduct, on something in each man that justified the divine emotion.  However, that is not at all the case.  God loved Jacob and hated Esau in the objective moral sense of love and hate.  This is suggested in the language of Malachi to which Paul referred his readers.  God “sane” (hated) Esau.  Strong defines this word as utter, odious hatred.  It is hatred objectified (as opposed to “subjectified” or emotionalized) .  God hated Esau, the product of sin, as a personification of sin.  Thus, God’s love for Jacob and His hatred for Esau take on an objective basis, not a subjective one.  We could readily understand God’s hatred for both men!  We can easily grasp God’s hatred for the man, Esau, who despised his God-given inheritance, rendering it a bare equivalent to a bowl of soup.  We can as easily understand if God had stated equal hatred for Jacob, the scheming supplanter, but He didn’t.  Instead, and to our surprise, He professed inexplicable love toward Jacob.  In the New Testament Paul will explain that love through our being chosen in Christ and thus identified in God’s mind with His beloved Son.

Only as we perceive both divine attitudes from the perspective of God’s spotless moral character will we be able to understand these passages.  Often in human behavior we observe incredible inconsistencies of moral judgment.  If someone whom you “love” does something bad, you will work to explain or rationalize the conduct.  However, if someone whom you intently despise does precisely the same thing, without hesitation you accuse this person of low, devious motives.  We thus reveal our perception of both love and hate as primarily emotional values, not as moral values.  If we followed Scripture and based our own love and hate on moral values instead of emotions, we’d treat anyone who practices a certain sin exactly the same way.

            As he reasoned through the work of God on behalf of His chosen people in the eighth chapter of Romans, Paul consistently affirmed God’s moral basis for His showing of mercy to the elect.

He that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things?  ( Romans 8:32 , KJV )

When we deal with the sins of people we like, we stretch every ethical rule available to “spare them” from critical judgment for the wrong they practice.  We seek ways to give them a “free pass.”  In this unbalanced moral judgment we reveal how diametrically opposite to God we truly are in terms of moral character or qualities.  Despite His covenantal everlasting love for His chosen people, God refused to give them a “free pass.”  In order to preserve His righteous character and to manifest that character in His dealings with His elect, God did the one thing He could do to maintain that moral character.  He spared not His own Son!  Thus our sole hope of favor with God and escape from righteous punishment for our sins lies in God’s mercy, shown to us in Christ.

            Thus we cannot explain God’s love for Jacob based on anything lovable in the man.  We must enter the sanctuary of God’s heart, not Jacob’s life, to understand God’s favor toward the scheming, supplanting Jacob.  That, my friends, is precisely what Paul does in this lesson.  Jacob is the representation, the personification, of everything related to God’s mercy toward His elect.  He is in that sense the personification of God’s mercy as displayed in electing, discriminating, and unmerited love.  Likewise, Esau becomes the personification of God’s intense moral rejection of sinful, fallen humanity.  One man personifies divine justice in its purest manifestation, while the other personifies God’s incredible and merciful love in its finest hour.