Wesley Corpus

So it seems the wrath of God in Scripture means no more or less than the wrath of the devil I However, this argument will not prove it. The joy of saints (not of angels, that I remember) is styled the joy of their Lord, because He prepared it for them and bestows it on them, Does He prepare and bestow the rage of devils upon them ‘(5) His wrath and His vengeance are no more in God than what the Psalmist calls His ice and His frost’ (page 74). There is nothing parallel in the case. We cannot take the latter expression literally without glaring absurdity: the former we may. ‘(6) “The earth trembled because He was wroth.” No wrath here but in the elements.’ Nay, if so, here was no wrath at all. For we are agreed ‘only spirits can be wrathful.’ (7) One more text, usually cited against your opinion, you improve into an argument for it: ‘“Avenge not yourselves, for vengeance is Mine.” This is a full proof that vengeance is not in God. If it was, then it would belong to every child of God, or he could not “be perfect as his Father is perfect.”’ (Page 76.) Yes, he could in all His imitable perfections. But God has peculiarly forbidden our imitating Him in this. ‘Vengeance,’ says He, ‘is Mine,’ incommunicably Mine; unless so far as He delegates it to those who are in authority. This, therefore, clearly shows that God executes vengeance; though justice, not vengeance, is properly in Him. Having now proved (as you suppose) that God has neither anger nor justice, it remains only to show (which, indeed, follows by easy and natural consequence) that He never did nor can punish. ‘To say Adam's miserable state was a punishment inflicted upon him by God is an utter absurdity’ (Spirit of Prayer, Part I. p. 24). ‘His sin had not the least punishment of any kind inflicted upon it by God’ (page 26). This is flat and plain. But let us see how far this account agrees with that which God Himself hath given: --