WHAT GOD HATES

Jesus Christ hates sin in people and His death on the Cross is the measure of His hatred. 

Sin separates us from Holy God, twisting and perverting the crown of His creation. He hates what destroys us. That is why Jesus Christ died on the cross, receiving the just wrath of God against the sinful rebellion of humanity. The eternal debt that we owed God but could never settle, Jesus alone being fully God and fully man could pay the price for the sin of the whole world.

Sin has no ability to create. It can only distort and pervert the good gifts of God making them life-deleting rather than life-enhancing. Human sexuality, strength, wisdom, labor and its reward, friendship, and even the created order and beauty of nature round us become idols as people try and draw ultimate meaning from them. They reflect the goodness of God but can never replace the necessity of God being the sole ground of life if one ever hopes to be fully human.

Things that do not contain the wherewithal to either meet the deepest needs of humanity or bring back to Life what has been marred and broken become the actual focus of worship, idolatry. 

Sexual intimacy in the God-ordained context of Holy Matrimony is meant to be life giving one to the other. Sin perverts God-given desire into lust which turns others, made in God's image, into objectified things to be used for self-gratification and addiction that can never ultimately fulfill.

Strength is a gift when used under God's guidance to care for the weak, protect the needy and provide security for others. Perverted, it becomes a craving for power where all sense of God's goodness and providence are abandoned. People take power to rule over others and people are used, exploited, manipulated and abused to make those who wield perverted strength hold a false sense of security.

Wisdom and learning are good things until sin makes them ultimate in a person's life. We are meant to live a life of learning as God's wisdom is infinite, and as He calls humanity into relationship with Himself, the Source of all true wisdom, we might grow in understanding the world around us and our own souls. When pride in one's educative experience becomes an idol, people begin to measure their worth and that of others by what they "know", by the degrees and "letters" etched after a person's signature. One can have a BS, and then a MS (more of the same) and even a PhD (piled higher and deeper) and still be an ignorant fool. Wisdom is not equated with education. Pride in learning is a costly, alienating and demanding idol. True wisdom is known by its humility.

We were created for work, for labor using gifts and talents given by God for the satisfaction is a job well done and for the reward of one's labor to care for and build families, communities and cause human flourishing. One's chosen field of labor or expertise can become idolatrous when one's worth becomes grounded in what they can do. The CEO sneers and the maintenance team that keeps the office of factory clean and stocked. It's true that people can be exploited, but in comparing themselves to others, they can become jealous, envious, becoming consummate whiners. Work becomes a burden, drudgery and a trial. We can stop thanking God that we get to work, have skills can provide for our families and those less fortunate and find ourselves and becoming angry with our lot. Work can never supply that sense of worth that can only come from God.

You've heard that we are to love people and use things. True friendships are treasures and there is a reciprocal giving and receiving, a fellowship of life that is its own reward. The song "I've Got Friends in Low Places" is a silly and sad tune. Our friendships are meant to be blessings not a measure of status and significance derived from "who we know". Sin perverts and twists friendship into a competition and control giving birth to such demonic distortions such as narcissism.  

Even the beauty of creation in forest, mountain, valley, river, oceans, fields, flowers, crops which reflect the character and nature of God's goodness has been perverted. Rather than worshipping the God of creation, people worship and deify creation itself calling it "Mother Nature" worshipping it even to the detriment of human life. People want to save the whales while slaughtering millions of unborn human beings in the womb. Water can't reach people in need because a small fish would have its habitat altered. Deluded and deceived people destroy miles and miles of rain forest to set up a road so fanatics can drive to meet about "saving the planet". Creation becomes an object of worship itself or is destroyed in the name of progress and power. Idolatry is demonic.

Humanity separated from God has perverted life from what God intended for us and reduced it to varying degrees of decay, desperation, delusion, and deceit. Life can only be restored by the intervention of God's grace. For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son to the end that all who would believe in Him would have eternal life. God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through His Life, death, resurrection and ascension. You can be set free from your idolatry and become fully human at last in Him.