The Cross and the Wrath of God.

This relational understanding of the wrath of God helps us understand how divine punishment is at the same time both the normal consequence of the evil deeds committed as well as an act of God. Though it is true that the final, eternal punishment is God’s abandonment of the sinner that results in destruction, this abandonment is the result of the sinner’s previous abandonment of God. Notice both aspects in Isaiah’s lament: “Why, O Lord, do you make us wander from your ways and harden our hearts so we do not revere you? Return for the sake of your servants, the tribes that are your inheritance. . . . No one calls on your name or strives to lay hold of you; for you have hidden your face from us and made us waste away because of our sins. (Isa. 63:17; 64:7, italics supplied). Therefore, God, by destroying sinners, honors the liberty of people in choosing to be without Him forever. Death is the penalty for sin (Rom. 6:23) because it separates from God, the source of life, those who have separated themselves from Him