Fear and Peace

"But there is also a real fear of him [God] that can coexist with sweet peace and trust in him. The key is that God himself is the one who removes his wrath from us. Our peace does not come from our removing the God of wrath from our thinking, but from his removing his wrath from us." -John Piper, What Jesus Demands From the World, p95

God is not some pansy "love everybody" God. No, he is also a God of wrath. Modern day attempts to understand God tend to overemphasize his love and minimize/ignore his wrath. I'm sure in ages past, his wrath was overemphasized, and the current state of Christianity is an overreaction to that previous overemphasis. Why can't we grasp that God is both? He is a God of wrath. He is angry with sin and sinners. He will pour his fury out on those who have spurned him, who love other people and things more than him, who disobey him. He is justified in punishing us, and this does not make him unloving; rather, it demonstrates his holiness and justice.

Why can't we understand love and wrath are not opposites. They are not like North and South where you cannot be both. You cannot walk both northerly and southerly simultaneously. No, love and wrath are more like North and East. They are complementary--not contradictory.