Does God Love and Hate Us?

Photo by Emmanuel Phaeton on Unsplash

There is this very popular saying in Christian communities which goes, "Love the sinner, hate the sin." And I think it carries with it a bit of a confused notion about the nature of God, and how Christians are supposed to deal with the world. First of all, obviously we have been commanded to love God above all things with all our mind, soul, heart, and strength. Then, we should love our neighbors as ourselves. We should take pains to resist sin and temptation because for Christians, we have already been freed from it, so it makes no sense to willfully go back to the bondage of sin. So, that's the meaning of the statement in a nutshell, but there are some nuances to it.

I believe this statement has mostly been used in the context of how Christians should deal with members of the LGBT community, and it tried to tackle the issue of how we should evangelize to them. Because society has deemed it hateful to tell people who have homosexual tendencies or are living a homosexual lifestyle that what they're doing is sin. Furthermore, society has deemed it bigotry when we say that there is only male and female, and you cannot decide your sex based on how you feel. Moreover, the fact that you cannot honestly claim to be a Christian and be steeped in a homosexual lifestyle.

So, the statement I think tried to cushion the message of the gospel in a way. But I think it comes from the fundamental misconception of God's nature, why Christians are acquiescing to society's demands. And so we have to look at what the Bible says about God, and what He says about sin and about man.

God is love. That is simply His nature. That means that He dictates what love means. It doesn't mean that because God is love, He will be loving toward people who are in opposition to Him. Obviously, because of His holiness, He will always be at odds with sin and sinners. We humans will always be in enmity with God. That's just how the dynamic works, because in our core, we despise God and the things of God, since we want to exalt ourselves as god.

To say that God loves the sinner despite their enmity toward Him might be a bit inaccurate, at least from the way I understand scripture. God's wrath will always be on the sinner. But, this is where His other attributes come into the picture. His mercy and grace which He showed on the cross through Jesus Christ, as well as throughout the life of Jesus while He was still on earth, shows us what it means that God is love. Because He wants to save people from sin and eternal damnation, He sent Christ to be the atoning sacrifice, so that in Him, people who believe will be saved.

So it's improper to say that God loves people for who they are but with the same breath say that God created them as homosexuals. God hates sin and the sinner, but He extends His mercy and grace to us through Christ, because He is love. It is only through Christ that we are able to experience God's boundless love. Otherwise, we are under His wrath. I think the important point in all this, the crucible is that Christ becomes the mediator through which we exchange God's wrath for His love. Again, we cannot experience God's love, we cannot be loved by God as sinners unless we are in Christ.

Going back to the question, does God love and hate us? I think the answer is no. God hates us because we are at odds with Him. Our sin puts us in enmity with Him, no matter what good deeds we do, or no matter how we try to appease Him. He will not be pleased, neither will He accept any of the good deeds as payment for sin. It's clear in the Bible that the only acceptable sacrifice or propitiation for our sin is death, but God provided that for us in Christ. Therefore, we can only experience God's loving nature if we believe and give our lives to Christ, who exchanged His for ours so that whoever believes may have eternal life and be saved.

It's a simple concept that got confused because people want to squeeze God into their personal idea of who He should be, even though the Bible says otherwise. We do preach that God is a loving God, but He is also holy and just. His love does not oppose His holiness or justice. Therefore, it's only logical to say that for the sinner, God's wrath rests on them. And only those who have been regenerated by the Holy Spirit to come into faith in Christ, will be able to experience the love of God.

Some might point to Romans 5:8 as a possible inconsistency with the view I have laid out. But I don't think it's consistent, rather it simply clarifies the situation. Romans 5:8 says, "But God demonstrates His own love for us in that, while we were still sinners, Christ died for us." You can possibly interpret it to mean that God loves us and so Christ died for us. You can think of it that way. But to me, it's more like, by sending Christ to died for us, God showed to us what His love looks like.

Another possible interpretation is that Paul is only referring to those who have been called to Christ. We can say that God's love for His chosen people is special, and that when Paul wrote that God demonstrated His love "for us", he only refers to those in God's fold, whom He has elected. In general, God has given common grace to everyone whether they be righteous or wicked, and in that way, God shows His loving nature, but only in a limited sense. For those who are in Christ, the love of God is more richly revealed. We experience His goodness, faithfulness, loving kindness, discipline, justice, mercy, and grace.

At the end of the day, we still want people to come to Christ. We urge them to repentance and faith. We share the gospel of Christ and give them the opportunity to hear and be changed. Of course, we all know that it is God who works in people to create a new heart in them so that they might be able to come to Christ. So, we just pray that God will bring those whom He has chosen to Himself.