Wrath is not an essential
trait of Gods eternal nature. In eternity past, before the entrance of sin into
creation, God never exhibited wrath. However, in eternity past, God is love.
Wrath is a temporary expression of Gods eternal nature of love because the
goodness of His world and His image in this world has been temporarily
compromised resulting in great havoc and injustice within His creation which
was meant to reflect His goodness and love. But once God has finally destroyed
all evil and redeemed creation through the slain Lamb, His wrath will be gone
forever. This is why the Scriptures say "His wrath is but for a
moment" and the most repeated phrase in the Scriptures is "His love
endures forever." God does not just have love, but God is love itself. God
has wrath, but God is not wrath itself.
The wrath of God is
essentially negative in that the only reason it exists is because sin exists.
If wrath was an essential trait to God's eternal nature, then that means for
God to eternally exhibit this necessary aspect of His nature He would have to
eternally create things that violate Him in order to be forever angry against
them. This would mean that an aspect of God's eternal nature would rely on the
existence of evil. For Calvinist Jonathan Edwards ("Sinners In The Hands
Of An Angry God"), wrath was an essential part of God's eternal nature
just as much as love, and this was precisely why God created the predestined
damned who would be forever tormented under God's wrath in hell, so that God
would have an outlet to eternally express His nature of wrath. But not only is
this a horrifying idea, unsupported by Scripture (thankfully), but what did God
do eternally before creating the predestined damned? Wrath must be a temporary
negative expression (because of temporary sin) of His eternal positive nature
of love.
