Marco from Reading, Pennsylvania writes in to ask this question, "Pastor John, what do you make of the saying, 'God loves the sinner but hates the sin'?" The problem with the statement, "God loves the sinner but hates the sin," is that it's misleading. It's not a false statement. And what's misleading about it is the word "but." "But" hates the sin because "but" should be "and." God loves the sinner and hates the sin because "but" implies He doesn't hate the sinner.

That's not true. God does hate sinners. Psalm 5 verse 4, "You are not a God who delights in wickedness. Evil may not dwell with you. The boastful shall not stand before your eyes. You hate all evildoers." Or Psalm 11 verse 5, "The Lord tests the righteous, but His soul hates the wicked and the one who loves violence." So it's just not true to give the impression that God doesn't hate sinners by saying He loves the sinner and hates the sin.

He does hate sinners. His wrath is real. It's not something He pours out on people He approves of. This infinite disapproval is what the Bible means when it says God hates sinners. He infinitely disapproves of them. Sin is not sinful except as committed by sinful hearts. Sin is an expression of anti-God human corruption, human hearts.

Sinful volitions are owing to sinful hearts. Sin doesn't just hang out there with its own existence. It is in hearts, or it's nothing. Sins do not suffer in hell. Sinners suffer in hell. I wonder what people who say that believe about hell because He's not punishing sin in hell.

He's punishing sinners in hell. He hates, and here's the paradox, and He loves at the same time. "For God so loved the world that He hates." Hate and love are simultaneous as God looks upon hateful, rebellious, corrupt, loathsome, wicked, God-dishonoring sinners. Now, here's the distinctions we need to make.

This is just so crucial. I hope people will listen carefully. Hate and love both have two meanings each. Hate can be intense loathing of a quality, or hate can be beyond that, the intense intentionality to destroy. Love, similarly, can be an intense delighting in a quality, and it can be an intense intentionality to bless, even in spite of the presence of some unsavory quality.

So, in any given text in the Bible, we have to ask, "Is the hatred being spoken of here only an intense loathing of a quality of a person, or is it also the intent to destroy?" And it's different. If you went over to Malachi 1, you'd find the latter, and I think some of those texts in the Psalms refer to the former.

Same with God's love. God's love moves Him to save millions of people who, in and of themselves, are loathsome to Him. Now, here's why this matters. If we don't understand that God finds us hateful and loathsome in our ugly sin, we won't be as stunned by what love is for us.

God saves millions of people who, in and of themselves, are loathsome to Him until He saves them and makes them the apple of His eye, which makes salvation stunningly more. Stunningly more, if you get that. That God comes to us not in our attractiveness, like "Oh, I really love this person and just hate their sin." No.

He finds me reprehensible because of my rebellion, just like we find certain wicked people reprehensible because of their sin. And He's coming to us, and He's dying for us in order that He might make us into the apple of His eye. So God can love us with the intent to save us, even while He's hating God-despising rebels like us.

And then when He saves us, He transforms us so that now He not only loves us with the intent to bless us forever, but He loves us with an ever-increasing delight, I think, in helping us make much of Him. Thank you, Pastor John, and thank you for listening to this podcast.

Please email your questions to us at AskPastorJohn@DesiringGod.org. At DesiringGod.org, you'll find thousands of free books, articles, sermons, and other resources from John Piper. I'm your host, Tony Reinke. Thanks for listening. Desiring God.org Page 1 of 8 Desiring God.org Page 1 of 8