(Redeemer Monroe - 4/3/22)
Why can’t God just forgive humanity? Why is a sacrifice needed?
Because the suffering of Christ as a sacrifice demonstrates…
…God’s hatred of sin...
…the depth of His love…
...the extent to which He would suffer to win us to Himself.
God’s holiness and justice demanded punishment for sin, rightly deserved. If God would simply overlook sin, then He would not be perfectly just. We should be grateful that God is wrathful towards sin.
Stephen Davis writes, “Our only hope is the wrath of God.” OK. We can debate this. But Davis means to say that our only hope is that God is perfectly just, and can be depended on to do the right thing. At the root of God’s wrath is retributive justice. It’s not just that God is angry. Rather, it is that His holiness and justice cry out for punishment for sin.
My friend William Lane Craig writes: “At the cross, the wrath, and the love of God, meet, as we see God Himself, out of His love for us, paying the penalty for His own justice.” (Craig, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H-zqN8gh9oE )