love and hate

God Loves Everyone

God loves all men and he has made this very clear throughout scripture.

The Lord is gracious and merciful; slow to anger and great in lovingkindness.
The Lord is good to all, and his mercies are over all his works.
Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good, for his lovingkindness is everlasting.
Nothing is too difficult for you, who shows lovingkindness to thousands.
Do I have any pleasure in the death of the wicked, rather than that he should turn from his ways and live? … I have no pleasure in the death of anyone who dies.
For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten son.
[God] desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.
[God] is the Savior of all men, especially of believers.
If anyone sins, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the Righteous; and he himself is the propitiation for our sins; and not for ours only, but also for those of the whole world.[1]

Can God have spoken any clearer than this? He loves everyone and he wants everyone to be saved. What more is there to say? Wesley believed that God shows his love for all in his provision for his Creation.

God so loved the world, yea, the ungodly world, which had no thought or desire of returning to him, that he gave his Son out of his bosom, his only begotten Son, to the end that whosoever believeth on him should not perish, but have everlasting life.[2] … Nothing is more sure, than that as the Lord is loving to every man, so his mercy is over all his works; all that have sense, all that are capable of pleasure or pain, of happiness or mercy. In consequence of this, he openeth his hand, and filleth all things living with plenteousness.[3]

Finney believed so strongly that “God is love” that he said, “[Love] expresses comprehensively God’s whole moral character.”[4] Love “is the choice of the best possible end in obedience to the demand of reason and of God.”[5] God’s entire purpose is to love his Creation. Love is the most rational and moral choice in every situation. James Arminius believed that the entire end of theology is “the blessedness of man.”[6] God himself causes man’s blessedness, his goodness motivates it, and he executes it by his power.[7] Walls and Dongell conclude that “if ‘God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son,’ then it would seem that the loving heart of the Father embraced the whole world as he set in motion the saving mission of the Son…It appears that God’s universal love energizes God’s worldwide mission of redemption.”[8] We see God’s love in his command to evangelize. Norman Geisler concludes that since God is infinite and his essence is love (1 John 4.16), then his love must be infinite and encompass all men.[9]

God simply loves every person in all of Creation. He loves them equally and he wants all men to be saved. He shows his love by sending his Son to die for our sins.

God Hates Everyone

God is holy, however. God’s holiness separates him from everything else in Creation that has been tainted by sin. He is known by his holiness. His holiness requires his execution of wrath on the sinner. His holiness requires that he hate sin and the soul corrupted by it.

Isaiah witnesses the seraphim flying about God’s throne and emphasizes his holiness by thrice describing the holiness of his character: “Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord of hosts, the whole earth is full of his glory” (Isaiah 6.3). Isaiah responds correctly in expecting immediate judgment for being a sinful man in the presence of the Holy God: “Woe is me, for I am ruined! Because I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts” (Isaiah 6.5).

The Arminians love to expound on the love of God as his “essential” or “primary” attribute.[10] If John says, “God is love,” (1 John 4.8, 16), then they conclude that love is his primary attribute; love is the expression of his nature first and foremost above all other attributes because of this statement of equivalence, that God equals love. If by this they conclude that God is love before all else, then we can surely conclude by the triple statement both in the Old and the New Testament that God is thrice holy above and before every other attribute.

Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God, the Almighty, who was and who is and who is to come.[11]

Stephen Charnock says, “The holiness of God is his glory, as his grace is his riches: holiness is his crown, and his mercy is his treasure. This is the blessedness and nobleness of his nature…Holiness is a glorious perfection belonging to the nature of God.”[12] If we can declare that any attribute of God’s be his “primary attribute,” then holiness is that attribute.

If any, this attribute hath an excellency above his other perfections. There are some attributes of God we prefer, because of our interest in them, and the relation they bear to us; as we esteem his goodness before his power, and his mercy whereby he relieves us, before his justice whereby he punisheth us; as there are some we more delight in, because of the goodness we receive by them; so there are some that God delights to honor, because of their excellency. None is sounded out so loftily, with such solemnity, and so frequently by angels that stand before his throne, as this. Where do you find any other attribute trebled in the praises of it, as this (Isaiah 6.3)? “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts, the whole earth is full of his glory;” and (Revelation 4.8), “The four beasts rest not day and night, saying, Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty,” &c., His power or sovereignty, as Lord of hosts, is but once mentioned, but with a ternal repetition of his holiness. Do you hear, in any angelical song, any other perfection of the Divine Nature thrice repeated?[13]

Arthur Pink states, “This perfection, as none other, is solemnly celebrated before the Throne of Heaven. God himself singles out this perfection, “Once I have sworn by my holiness” (Psalm 89.35). God swears by his holiness because that is a fuller expression of Himself than anything else.”[14] Thomas Watson says, “Holiness is the most sparkling jewel of his crown; it is the name by which God is known.”[15]

Again and again they tempted God, and pained the Holy One of Israel.
Holy and awesome is his name.
I will vindicate the holiness of my great name which has been profaned among the nations.[16]

Watson also tells us that “God’s holiness consists in his perfect love of righteousness, and abhorrence of evil. ‘Of purer eyes than to behold evil, and cannot look on iniquity.’ Habakkuk 1.13.”[17] God necessarily hates sin because he is holy. “He loves everything which is in conformity to his law, and loathes everything which is contrary to is,” says Pink.[18]

The devious are an abomination to the Lord.
Evil plans are an abomination to the Lord.
You hate all who do iniquity.
The one who loves violence his soul hates.
There are six things which the Lord hates,
Yes, seven which are an abomination to Him:
Haughty eyes, a lying tongue,
And hands that shed innocent blood,
A heart that devises wicked plans,
Feet that run rapidly to evil,
A false witness who utters lies,
And one who spreads strife among brothers.[19]

God hates sin and the sinner who commits sin. He does not “love the sin and hate the sinner.” Sin is not simply an act that men commit separate from themselves. Sin is not simply an act of defiance but a state of defiance. We do not only commit acts of rebellion against God—we are rebellious in our thoughts, our desires, our intentions, and our actions. We are wicked. Pink says

He must necessarily punish sin. Sin can no more exist without demanding his punishment than without requiring his hatred of it. God has often forgiven sinners, but he never forgives sin; and the sinner is only forgiven on the ground of Another having borne his punishment…For one sin God banished our first parents from Eden. For one sin all the posterity of Canaan, a son of Ham, fell under a curse which remains over them to this day (Genesis 9.21). For one sin Moses was excluded from Canaan, Elisha’s servant smitten with leprosy, Ananias and Sapphira cut off out of the land of the living.[20]

We know God does not love everyone because God hated Esau (Malachi 1.2; Romans 9.9-13).[21] God hates the sinner and everyone sins, so God hates everyone.

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[1] Psalm 145.8,9; 136.1; Jeremiah 32. 17, 18; Ezekiel 18.23, 32; John 3.16; 1 Timothy 2.4; 4.10; 1 John 2.1-2.

[2] Wesley, “God’s Love for Fallen Man,” I.1.

[3] Wesley, “The General Deliverance,” 1.

[4] Finney, 140.

[5] Ibid.

[6] James Arminius, The Works of Arminius: Volume 2, (Public Domain), Disputation III, page 8.

[7] Ibid.

[8] Walls and Dongell, 51.

[9] Geisler, Theology, 586.

[10] Ibid, 86; Wesley, “Free Grace,” VI.; Finney, Theology, 140.

[11] Revelation 4.8

[12] Stephen Charnock, The Existence and the Attributes of God: Volume 2, (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 1996), 110.

[13] Ibid, 112.

[14] Arthur W. Pink, The Attributes of God, (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 1975), page 42.

[15] Watson, 82.

[16] Psalm 78.41; 111.9; Ezekiel 36.23

[17] Watson, 83.

[18] Pink, 43.

[19] Proverbs 3.32; 15.26; Psalm 5.5; 11.5; Proverbs 6.16-19.

[20] Pink, 43.

[21] God chose Jacob and not Esau. God made a covenant with Jacob and led him to Egypt so he could demonstrate his power and love through his deliverance, but to Esau he gave Mount Seir (Joshua 24.4). God had no covenant with Esau, neither the person nor the nation, and no desire to show his love for Esau through a great trial and redemption, because he did not love Esau.