And while God’s people repeatedly forsook and betrayed Him, over the centuries God continued patiently to bestow compassion beyond all reasonable expectations (Neh. 9:7-33), thus demonstrating the unfathomable depth of His longsuffering compassion and merciful love. Indeed, according to Psalm 78:38, God “being full of compassion, forgave their iniquity, and did not destroy them. Yes, many a time He turned His anger away, and did not stir up all His wrath” (NKJV).
References to God as “long of nose,” then, convey that God is slow to anger and longsuffering. While it does not take long for humans to become angry, God is exceedingly longsuffering and patient, and bestows grace freely and abundantly, yet without justifying sin or turning a blind eye to injustice. Instead, God Himself makes atonement for sin and evil via the cross so that He can be both just and the justifier of those who believe in Him (Rom. 3:25, 26).
Elsewhere, when the Pharisees waited to accuse Jesus of breaking the Sabbath by healing on it, Jesus asked them, “ ‘Is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do evil, to save life or to kill?’ ” (Mark 3:4, NKJV). He “looked around at them with anger, being grieved by the hardness of their hearts” and then proceeded to heal the man (Mark 3:5, NKJV). Christ’s anger is associated here with grief at their hardness; it is the righteous anger of love, just as the anger attributed to God in the Old Testament is the righteous anger of love. How could love not be upset by evil, especially when evil hurts the objects of that love?
Many other judgments that Scripture describes as brought about by God are explained as instances where God “gives” the people over to their enemies (Judg. 2:13, 14; Ps. 106:41, 42), in accordance with the people’s decisions to forsake the Lord and serve the “gods” of the nations (Judg. 10:6-16, Deut. 29:24-26). God’s anger against evil, which will finally culminate in the eradication of all evil once and for all, stems from His love for all and from His desire for the final good of the universe, which itself has a stake in the whole question of sin and rebellion and evil.
While God eventually brings judgment against injustice and evil, Christ has made a way for all who believe in Him. Indeed, it is “Jesus who delivers us from the wrath to come” (1 Thess. 1:10, NKJV; compare with Rom. 5:8, 9). And this is according to God’s plan: “For God did not appoint us to wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Thess. 5:9, NKJV). Divine wrath is not nullified, but those who have faith in Jesus will be delivered from such wrath because of Christ.
“Love no less than justice demanded that for this sin judgment should be inflicted. . . . It was the mercy of God that thousands should suffer, to prevent the necessity of visiting judgments upon millions. In order to save the many, He must punish the few.”—Ellen G. White, Patriarchs and Prophets,pp. 324, 325
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