Wrath; Vengeance or punishment as the consequence of anger.
Back in the 80's there was a Star Trek movie called "Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan".
It has a ring to it doesn't it?
Khan wouldn't have sounded nearly as threatening if the title was "Star Trek II: The anger of Khan", or "Star Trek II: Khan is really mad now".
That just doesn't work as well. That's because the word "Wrath" has some weight behind it.
When we hear the word, we get a picture in our minds don't we?
Wrath is something that we fear from others, but we fantasize about those that have wronged us, suffering under our wrath…….maybe that's just me.
So why is wrath considered a deadly sin? If someone has wronged you then they deserve your wrath right?
Well, there are a couple of problems with that.
1.) In the Bible, God says, "Vengeance is Mine". That's fairly self-explanatory.
2.) When Jesus was asked how many times we are to forgive someone who has wronged us, His answer was 70 times 7 (That's 490 times). Nobody has ever wronged you more than that……deal.
3.) When we seek vengeance on someone who hurt us, we never truly seek to just get even, it's always done with the intent of hurting them slightly worse than they hurt us just so they are certain that we got the best of it.
God tells us that He is just and He will deal with people on His terms. Wrath tells God that we have a better way of handling it than He does.
Do you see the danger?
If God created us (and I believe He did), then where do we get off telling Him that we have a better way of handling those that have wronged us. He created us. I think He should probably have the say so on vengeance.
What if you baked a cake and you made it exactly how you wanted it, and when you put the cake on the table it stood up and started telling you that you didn't mix the ingredients correctly, and the oven heat wasn't set right.
The first thing you should do is call a psychiatrist, but after you hung up the phone you would smash that cake and throw it in the garbage.
"No cake I made is gonna talk to me like that"!
I know it's a crazy example but it truly is the same thing when we tell God that our wrath is just what the doctor ordered.
Let's let God be God and we can just spend our time forgiving those who have wronged us, and trying not to wrong anyone else.
Wrath is a heavy word…….and I just don't think we have the strength to support it.
Forgiveness.
That has a pretty good ring to it as well.
