IS JEHOVAH AN ANGRY GOD?
Bill Craddock

             While driving recently, I was listening to a programme on the radio that caught my attention.  The programme host was interviewing the author of a book, and it seemed that the main theme of his book was his view of God.  He spoke of how he viewed God when he was a child.  His parents had taught him that God was an angry God that had to be appeased through obeying the commandments He had given to the human race.  What a terrible misunderstanding of Jehovah God.  Because of this view, the man no longer wanted to serve God and wrote the book explaining his actions. 
            Jehovah God, by nature, is not angry!  The view of an angry god is the view the pagan has of his idol god.  Idol gods are always considered angry and the worshiper is doing everything he can to make the god happy so it will not bring its wrath down upon the man.  Worshipers of idols worship that which they do not understand.  They did not understand thunder and lightening and they were afraid, so they worshiped the god of thunder and lightening and offered sacrifices to that god to keep it from harming them.  Trying to appease an angry god is the object of idol worship.
Scripture teaches that Jehovah God is LOVE!
            “Beloved, let us love one another, for love is of God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God.  He who does not love does not know God, for God is love.  In this the love of God was manifested toward us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him.  In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He love us and sent His Son to be the  propitiation for our sins” (1 John 4:7-10).
            Verse 10 is a very key verse in understanding the true nature of God.  The word “propitiation” is very meaningful.  Propitiation was a word used when speaking of the pagan’s relationship with his idol.  Because pagans considered their gods to always be angry, they were doing everything possible to please their gods.  They offered sacrifices, even living sacrifices, to appease these idols.  They offered all these sacrifices trying to make their god happy.  They viewed their god as being angry and if it could not be satisfied it would hurt them.  All this was done in ignorance.
     Propitiation means “price paid.”  Notice in verse 10 it says that the Son of God is the propitiation for our sins.  A price had to be paid for the sins of mankind.  Man did not have the price to return to God that would be equal to or exceed the forgiveness of God.  The price of sin was too expensive for man to ever pay.  So, who paid this price?  Who made the “propitiation” for the sins of man?  Jehovah God Himself paid that price.  He paid the price to Himself for us.  Now, if Jehovah God were an angry God, who had to be appeased by people doing things for Him, why would He do a thing like that?  Jehovah God is not angry with mankind and wants to see them suffer.  Just the opposite.  Even in our sinful mess, God looks at man and loves him.  God does not love man’s sins, but God loves man’s soul.  God loves us and wants us to be saved.
     Can God be angry?  Certainly!  There are many examples of this throughout the bible.  He can be a God of wrath, but that is not His nature.  A good parent is not an angry parent, but if the children become overly disobedient the anger of that good parent will be aroused and many times a price has to be paid by the disobedient child.  But that is not the nature of a good parent.  God becomes angry because of man’s disobedience.  After all God has done for mankind, if man does not respond favourably he will feel God’s wrath. The Hebrew writer says that it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.  But if that happens, it will be man’s fault, not God’s.

Plantation, FL