In contrast to other commentators, Stephen Smalley (The Revelation to John) doesn’t think the “wrath” of God in Revelation should be understood as “the impersonal consequence of sin, worked out in history and disclosed at the parousia.” In Revelation and the rest of the New Testament, rather, “‘wrath’ . . . is seen as a direct activity of God himself, realized in the present . . . as much as in the future . . . ; it may be described as the personal expression of God’s holy and righteous character, when confronted by the deliberate evil and injustice of humanity, rather than simply an impersonal force or mechanism” (170).
But, he adds, it’s crucial to see that the wrath of God is not merely or ultimately destructive but has “a creative, positive implication.” Wrath is followed by renewal: “The cross of Christ is the judgment of this world; and God’s wrath is the retributive expression of his righteousness in the face of evil and injustice. But through that wrath, that judgment, comes a world which is transformed” (171).
The flood can serve as a paradigm: Yahweh does punish; His wrath sweeps away an old world of violence; but the act of destruction isn’t the end, but makes way for a new creation to emerge. Yahweh comes in fire to shock the land back to fertility.
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