Grateful for Wrath

Do you ever wonder why God is allowing such painful suffering and cruel treatment of people who are trying to live in faith and obedience to His Word? One of the ways that Paul encourage the Church through their suffering at the hands of persecutors, is to remind them that persecution is a sign that God’s Word is working in us, and to remind us that God will avenge His children with righteous wrath. We generally find it easier to focus on God’s love, but God’s wrath is part of His love and meditating on it is of great encouragement to His children, especially in times of suffering.

Scripture

1 Thessalonians 2:13-16 ESV  And we also thank God constantly for this, that when you received the word of God, which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men but as what it really is, the word of God, which is at work in you believers.  [14]  For you, brothers, became imitators of the churches of God in Christ Jesus that are in Judea. For you suffered the same things from your own countrymen as they did from the Jews,  [15]  who killed both the Lord Jesus and the prophets, and drove us out, and displease God and oppose all mankind  [16]  by hindering us from speaking to the Gentiles that they might be saved—so as always to fill up the measure of their sins. But wrath has come upon them at last!

Bible Study Questions

• The Church of Thessalonica is commended for receiving the Gospel for what it was, the very Word of God. What did the Word of God do in the believers because of their faith in receiving it? 1 Thessalonians 2:13

• What was the result of God’s Word working in the believers, how did they become imitators of other Churches of our Lord Jesus Christ? 1 Thessalonians 2:14

• What does the reception and application of God’s Word always bring about in and for believers? 2 Timothy 3:10-13

• 1 Thessalonians 2:15-16 talks about the way that the Jews have treated those who have brought them the Word of God in the past. In the opening of Mark 12, Jesus use Isaiah's prophecy (Isaiah 5) on God’s judgement through the Babylonian exile of the Jews in a parable. What does this parable teach?

• The result of the Jews’ rejection of God’s messengers is His wrath. Does Jesus pronouncement of Judgement in Mark 12:8-9 mean that God has rejected and abandoned the Jews? Romans 11:25-29

• God’s wrath came on the Jews after many centuries of their persecution of His messengers. Why did God take so long to pour out His wrath? 2 Peter 3:9-10

• Why should we be grateful that while God is slow to anger, He certainly does get angry? Romans 12:17-19

Worship

Day of judgment! Day of wonders!
Hark! the trumpet's awful sound,
louder than a thousand thunders,
shakes the vast creation round.
How the summons
will the sinner's heart confound!

See the Judge, our nature wearing,
clothed in majesty divine;
you who long for his appearing
then shall say, "This God is mine!"
Gracious Savior,
own me in that day as thine.

At his call the dead awaken,
rise to life from earth and sea;
all the pow'rs of nature, shaken
by his looks, prepare to flee.
Careless sinner,
what will then become of thee?

But to those who have confessed,
loved and served the Lord below,
he will say, "Come near, ye blessed,
see the kingdom I bestow;
you forever
shall my love and glory know."