Psalm 5
You hate all evildoers.
Many well-meaning Christians have said, “Hate the sin, but love the sinner.” Is that what the Bible says? Does God say he loves those who continue to do evil? You hate all evildoers, David says.
I know why Christians repeat that phrase. (I may have even uttered those words before.) Often in self-inflated self-righteousness Christians have used someone’s sin as an excuse for cruelty or manipulation or extortion. Many poor hurting souls have been turned away as impure, unworthy, by these self-proclaimed Christians. At the exact time they needed the comfort of God’s love the most, they were told that isn’t for you.
God is love. (1 John 4:8) Jesus came to save sinners. (1 Timothy 1:15; Matthew 9:13) Those who repeat that slogan have good intentions. No sin puts a person outside of God’s saving reach. No Christian can know what God has planned for any soul. The God who saved the worst of sinners, Paul, can save you. He can save any person. However, those who say this misunderstand God, and worse, they actually diminish God’s love.
Does God love evildoers? Does God love sinners? Let’s try a little word experiment:
Hate the slave trade, but love the slave trader.
Hate the Holocaust and unjust war, but love Hitler.
Hate child abuse, but love the child abuser.
Hate greed and corruption, but love the corrupt oligarch.
Hate terrorism, but love the terrorist.
Our hearts naturally recoil over those words. We don’t think that way, nor do we want a God who is indifferent to suffering and persecution. We do not want God to be lenient with those who cause so much pain. We cannot stomach a god who has no sense of justice, a world in which those who do evil will face not consequences. That is not the world we want. That is not a god we would worship.
We are right to find comfort in these words: For you are not a God who takes pleasure in evil. With you the wicked cannot dwell. The arrogant cannot stand before your eyes. You HATE all evildoers. Sin never escapes God’s attention. When you are hurting, God takes notice. When you endure the evil of others, God’s anger burns. When you cry out for justice, God is on your side. You hate all evildoers.
Selfishly, though, maybe I should wish these words were true: God hates the sin and loves the sinner. Then perhaps, my sin isn’t so big a problem. I am not like those terrible evildoers. I am basically a good guy, at least of average virtue. I try to do the right thing. Sometimes I even go above and beyond. I could try to tell myself that David isn’t talking about me when he says, With you the wicked cannot dwell. Unfortunately, Paul disagrees when he quotes Psalm 5: There is no one who is righteous, not even one…Their throat is an open grave. They kept deceiving with their tongues…every mouth will be silenced and the whole world will be subject to God’s judgement. (Romans 3:10, 13, 19)
God hates all evildoers. No one can take an honest look at their life and think that doesn’t include them. Each person can find more than one “evils” in which they participate, many evils which they perpetuate, a pile of evil they cannot keep from them, from their hearts, from their minds, from their hands. If God cannot dwell with the wicked, God cannot dwell with me.
God is just. He will by no means clear the guilty. (Exodus 34:7) We need to know that when we see so many seeming to get away with evil. When we are enduring evil, we can take comfort in God’s justice.
Even more crucially, understanding God’s justice helps us understand God. When we understand how God hates evil, how he loathes those who do evil is to better understand hi s love.
God does not love the sinner. God loves his creation. God loves the world. He loves humanity. God loves you. God loves every soul. Paul writes, God shows his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. (Romans 5:8) Jesus died not only for those who hate him, but for those whom he hates. Jesus becomes what he hates, not by act or deed, but with his whole heart, by his Father’s declaration, God made him who did not know sin, to become sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God. (2 Corinthians 5:21) God hates the sinner, so he will put every sinner to death. Every sinner will die. Each will die, either physically and eternally when their time is over, or the sinner will die by God’s grace. All of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were buried therefore buried with him by his baptism into his death…consider yourself dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus. (Romans 6:3-4, 11) When the Psalms speak of the “righteous” they do not mean “good people” or people who do righteous things, but those who are made righteous, that is declared righteous by faith in the promise of Christ.
God hates all evildoers. Thanks be to God! In Jesus you are not counted among the sinners. You are no longer an evildoer. You are a new creation, created for good works. (Ephesians 2:10). Therefore, you can trust God’s justice, Declare them guilty, O God! Let them fall because of their own schemes. God will never abandon you to the evil of this world. But even more, as you understand God’s nature, you can rejoice all the more in God’s great love for you, But let all who take refuge in you be glad. Let them sing for joy forever. You cover them with protection, so those who love your name rejoice in you. Yes, you bless the righteous, LORD. You surround them with your favor as a shield.