God's Wrath and Evangelism

Courtesy of Sovereign Grace Church - Pastor Bill Cain

Purpose: To see the necessity of "Hellfire and brimstone" as a Gospel message.

Then said he to the multitude that came forth to be baptized of him, O generation of vipers, who hath warned you to flee from the wrath to come? ~ Luke 3:7

Elements of evangelism from this question:

1. God is angry;
2. This anger is simply God’s righteous reaction to our sin;
3. This bad news is the prerequisite for the Good News;
4. This is bad news about ourselves;
5. The bad news of our sin tells us that only God can remedy the problem;
6. This is something about ourselves, then, which we cannot simply undo, erase, or recover from;
7. A day is established when God will deal with man in His just anger;
8. This coming day is part of our appeal to men;
9. Baptism is held forth as a symbol for those who desire inner cleansing;
10. A man's motives in responding to a call to repentance are not safely assumed to be altogether sincere; and
11. It is God who must warn us of the coming vengeance.

Conclusion: God's wrath is unpopular today, even in the Church.  We deemphasize it as a trait less worthy of the God we love. We thereby cripple our fear of God and introduce men to a God they cannot fear.  Can this ever be the real God-the One who wrote the Bible?

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