"For they themselves report concerning us the kind of reception we had among you, and how you turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God, and to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, Jesus who delivers us from the wrath to come."
- 1 Thessalonians 1:9-10

What does it mean to say that God is full of wrath? Theologian Arthur W. Pink wrote, "The wrath of God is eternal detestation of all unrighteousness. It is the displeasure and indignation of Divine equity against evil. It is the holiness of God stirred into activity against sin. It is the moving cause of that just sentence which He passes upon evil-doers." So when the apostle Paul writes to the Thessalonians that Jesus delivers us from the wrath to come, he's saying that the Son of God delivers us from God's intense anger towards sin and sinners themselves. When Jesus died on the cross, he did so as our substitute and bore the penalty we deserved for our sins so we might never have to.

So what does this mean for your life today? Have you turned to Jesus Christ by faith for deliverance from the wrath to come? Make no mistake about it. There is coming a day when God will judge all people through Christ for all of their sins. For those who trust in Jesus by faith, the wrath of God has been satisfied as their penalty has been paid for in full and forever. Will you be among this number on judgment day? Have you changed the direction of your life from sin to Jesus? To put it in New Testament terms, are you "in Christ"? Are you united to him by faith in such a way that your past is hidden in him? Here's the amazing truth for all who place their confidence in him: "as far as the east is from the west, so far does he remove our transgressions from us" (Psalm 103:12). As the famous hymn proclaims, "til on that cross as Jesus died, the wrath of God was satisfied, for every sin on him was laid, here in the death of Christ I live." 

For Jesus,
Pastor Mark