An Eternally Loving God Is Great

Holiness | Wrath | Glory

1. HOLINESS

Holiness — to be set apart.

God is not the highest point on a spectrum; he is in a category of his own.

Sin isn't just breaking rules — it's failing to love.

2 Corinthians 5:21

"For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God."

Ephesians 2:13

"But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ."

1 Peter 1:15–16

"But as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, since it is written, 'You shall be holy, for I am holy.'"

God isn't holy instead of loving. God is holy because his love is unlike anything we've ever known.

Holiness — set apart love.

2. WRATH

God is not wrathful despite being love. God is wrathful because he is love.

"God's wrath is his holy hostility to evil… the reaction of righteousness to unrighteousness." — Stott

Romans 12:9

"Let love be genuine. Abhor what is evil; hold fast to what is good."

The triunity of God matters because only a God who has eternally existed in love can have a settled, righteous response to evil.

Every sin will be dealt with:

Hebrews 9:27

"It is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes judgment."

God's wrath will fall in one of two places:

• Either on Christ:

1 Peter 2:24

"He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness."

• Or on you:

John 3:18

"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."

"The sword of divine justice must fall; it must either smite the sinner or the sinner's substitute." — Spurgeon

Wrath — perfect love responding to evil.

3. GLORY

John 17:5

"Now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had with you before the world existed."

Glory — weight, substance, ultimate worth.

Glorifying God — recognizing, responding to, and reflecting what is already infinitely true about him.

To not glorify God is to:

• Live disconnected from reality
• Give your soul to things that can't satisfy
• Place ultimate weight on what can't hold you

Isaiah 22:21–24

"I will clothe him with your robe and fasten your sash around him and hand your authority over to him. He will be a father to those who live in Jerusalem and to the people of Judah. I will place on his shoulder the key to the house of David; what he opens no one can shut, and what he shuts no one can open. I will drive him like a peg into a firm place; he will become a seat of honor for the house of his father. All the glory of his family will hang on him: its offspring and offshoots — all its lesser vessels, from the bowls to all the jars."

Isaiah 22:25

"In that day, declares the Lord Almighty, the peg driven into the firm place will give way; it will be sheared off and will fall, and the load hanging on it will be cut down. The Lord has spoken."

John 12:23–24

"Jesus replied, 'The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. Very truly I tell you, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds.'"

Hebrews 1:3

"He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power. After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high."

Glory — the weight of perfect love revealed.