102-Instructions on Hating Evil: A Sermon on the Scriptural-based Context of Self-Abhorrence, Self-Hatred, and Self-Loathing Concerning the Radically Depraved Nature

Dr. MA Petillo

Jehovah reigns; let earth be glad,
And all the isles their joy make known;
With clouds and darkness he is clad,
On truth and justice rests his throne.
Consuming fire destroys his foes,
Around the world his lightnings blaze;
The trembling earth his presence knows,
The mountains melt before his gaze.
The heavens his righteousness proclaim,
Through earth his glory shines abroad;
From idol worship turn with shame
And bow before the living God.
Thy church rejoices to behold
Thy judgments in the earth, O Lord;
Thy glory to the world unfold,
Supreme o'er all be thou adored.
All ye that truly love the Lord,
Hate sin, for he is just and pure;
To saints his help he will accord
And keep them in his love secure.
For good men light and joy are sown
To bless them in the harvest time;
Ye saints, your joy in God make known
And ever praise his name sublime.  (TH, 59).

1.  True Christians are called to hate the sinful nature.

2.  True Christians are not called to love the sinful nature.

3.  Christians are called to self-love touching the new nature by God's Spirit in them in spiritual rebirth that manifests itself in the fruits of the Spirit, but to hate the works of the flesh due to remaining corruption after justification by faith alone.

4.  God calls us to hate the radically corrupt nature of our sinful flesh, but self-abhorrence does not equal the self-murder of suicide.

5.   God calls us to self-hatred regarding our evil nature, but it does not mean the Roman practice of meritorious torments in this life in the old misunderstood practice of self-flagellation.

6.  Do you dare to think God is not just?  Christians are to self-loath themselves concerning the love of sin, but to love the new nature given in God's free choice in spiritual rebirth and that Christians are made in God's image as reasoning creatures.  Being made in God's image, adds nothing to Christ alone.   Saving knowledge is a divine gift of the Spirit revealed in His written Word.

7.   Christians are called to self-love, "Love thy neighbor as thyself."

8.  Christians are not called to love the practice of the works of the flesh, because practicing sin means a love of self that is contrary to the love of the Spirit-given nature in regeneration and of Christ.

9.   Self-love does not mean indulging sin through reckless license of the sinful nature.

10.  Self-hatred does not mean to physically harm the body, but to mortify and crucify the sinful nature through a God-declared pronouncement in legal terms of dying to sin and living for Jesus.

11.  Self-loathing also does not mean to do harm to yourself, because a holy God calls us to mortify the sinful flesh through constant repentance unto life and remission of sin.

12.   Mortification means not some strange obsession with physical death, but to spiritually die to sin.  That is, to put away the deeds of the flesh through repentance unto life and live unto Christ in victory in a repentance through Christ crucified that brings forth the conquering power of the Cross alone in forgiveness, cleansing and grace.

13.   Dying to sin and living to Jesus is the work of God alone through those He has chosen unto His loving-mercy for those intended to be redeemed by the Cross of Jesus Christ alone.

14.  Christians are to practically live for Jesus by being a devotion for God through a mind-set that is set apart (holy) of the love of the Trinity and love of their fellow man.

15.  Christians are called to hate false doctrine, but we are called to love the sinner (not to hate the sinner), because while we were yet sinners, Christ died for the ungodly.

16.  Self-loathing should extend toward the evil of this world.  That is, do you love the dark evil of this fallen world?  I am not talking about the beautiful trees, valleys and sun-sets (although all creation groans because of a fallen world and everything is headed for disorder).

17.  Who is your First love?  It must be God the Trinity.  That is, we are called to place Him above all things and also not add things to Him in how we are right with God.  Every work of God is in the Trinitarian sense, because They never act apart from the unity of the Three Persons in redemption, creation and salvation.

18.  Self-hatred should also extend toward the darkness of this world and the evil mission of demons and Satan.

19.  By nature, sinners hate God and love Satan.

20.  God hates the unregenerate sinner and He is angry with them everyday through righteous damnation unto eternal punishment unless God changes it in time and space (not through obligation but through His graciousness) for His glory alone unto everlasting mercy through His Son alone in His a set apart choice alone for His glorification alone.

21.  Christians are called to love those who hate them, but we are not called to love Satan and demons.  That is, we are called to hate them with HOLY HATRED for there is no compromise with the wicked angels who are damned forevermore through God's all-powerful choice before creation began due to His all-availing, predestinarian plan for the good of His people that are called according to His purpose and the glorification of the person and work of God the Son alone in becoming man to conquer Satan and bring salvation to His people alone.

22.  It is true that no true Christian should love Satan, but it is also true that we cannot stand against him without the protection of Christ.  That is, Christ is all-powerful and we are not.  Satan has creaturely power but he is not all-powerful, all-wise or everywhere.  His demons are present at different heavenly realms in his evil plan.

23.  Christians partake of His power through the armor of the Holy Ghost (but this does not add to how we are right with God because we seek the glory of Jesus Christ alone through the Father's plan), but Christians are called to love God in Christ. 

24.  Christians are frail and feeble and fallen creatures, but Jesus is able to use us when we are attacked through the invisible work and means of angel armies and the His ultimate divine protection; for Scripture says "he cannot touch us."  No true Christian can be possessed by Satan or any demon.  God loves us as much as Jesus because He loves us through Jesus' person and work alone with no additions.  No devil can undo this divine love of the Spirit's application in spiritual rebirth. 

25.  Satan will attack at an opportune time.  That is, it does not mean God stops the activity of wicked angels against His people (however, He can if He desires too but the wicked angels operate upon God's premission in the outworking of His purpose), but it means that Satan cannot undo us.  Jesus lived in our behalf through satanic temptation in His perfect life so we would spiritually and positionally avail in a cosmic and eternal sense to stand before the Father in His matchless robes through His only Son.  It means Satan has already been defeated through the person and work of Jesus alone.

26.  Satan's hatred of God, His people and His elect angels is a cosmic and violent hatred toward God without cause.

27.  The damned sinners in eternal hell hate God without reservation, but there is a all-unconsuming consuming fire that punishes the eternal damned: where the worm does not die and eternal death is forever.  That is, it is the eternal second death.  There is no more worser punishment than hell for a lost sinner.

28.  Elect angels have the love of God and His people, but they also take vengeance upon sin at God's command in their immediate obedience with remembrance of mercy in light of judgment.

29.  Everyone who does not have a Spirit-born love of Jesus Christ is accursed and bears God's eternal condemnation.

30.  The way to enhance love of Jesus in advancing spiritual degrees is through learning God's written Word, because the infallible Scriptures are eternally inexhaustible.  That is, the study of God's Word surpasses eternity (a divine hyperbole).  An hyperbole is an exaggeration but in this case a legitimate one.

31.  The elect angels hate the wicked angels, but the wicked angels hate the elect angels.  That is, as far as I know they are mortal enemies without compromise.  God's people in Christ are also enemies with everyone outside of Him.  That is, those who obey not the gospel of God through the obedience of faith.

32.  King Jesus loves His elect angels, but Satan loves his fallen angels.  The elect angels obey Jesus, but the fallen angels obey Satan.  

33.  Christians are called to love and obey God like glorified angels.

34.  Christians are called to love the infallible purity of God's written Word, but if we catch ourselves hating God's holy Word we must immediately repent of this cosmic treason.  God surely forgives but only through His Son.

35.  No one should hate the love of God.  The Cross to many is a great offense, because He forgives freely without reservation the most abominable corruptions of a cosmic sinner without the slightest contribution to His matchless death at Cavalry.

36.  The love of God through His Son has no limitations.

37.  The love of God through Jesus has no limitations, but sinners should not use it as a cover-up for wickedness.  The unlimited forgiveness of the Cross is suppose to be a motivation for holiness.   

38.  Behold, the problem of the Cross in view of sinners:  He forgives over and over again.  It does not mean, He is wrong to do so, but that His love is eternal.  I suggest to you that every sinner who understands the limitlessness of God's mercy at His Cross have abused God's grace through lawlessness, but license of sin can still be forgiven.  Satan may try to abuse the Cross and say "He still forgives.  Why not take my offer of sin?"  The question is, what is it that you seek?  If you do not seek the honor of Christ, he will get you to sin  If you seek the honor of Christ, you will defeat him. 

39.  If you place limitations on His love, you will probably find yourself outside of His love.  There is no telling what sin the sinful nature will take a genuine Christian (if God's hand is not upon you to keep you from sinning).  I am referring to God's restraining grace.  If a sinner sins, it is not God's fault but man's, but He is in control of all things.
 

40.   No sinner who is born again will ever out live God's love.  The Cross is not a prescription for lawlessness, but a way to be holy and pure and complete.  

41.  God will never stop forgiving you if you come on His terms.  God has provided a way to forgive sinners through His Cross no matter what.  Hence the offense of the Cross among sinners.  

42.  Christians are to love the all-conquering power of the Cross.  The Cross teaches us even in those who sin with license that you must give up your sin for the honor of God.  Honor God and He gets the glory alone.  Dishonor God and He chastens.  Do so well that He does not need to chasten you.  

43.  Christians should hate that their sin brought Jesus to His death, but that He freely laid down His life and He was able to take it up again.  God's used the second cause of sinners to place Jesus on His Cross, but God foreordained all to come to pass.  This is probably best understood as "high compatiblism."  That is, the Father has saved His people through His Son by even using the plan of Satan to kill Jesus to cause redemption.  It was not the plan of Satan to bring redemption, but to destroy God's eternal Son.  The death of Jesus brought death to the second death for God's people and the conquering resurrection brought destruction to death.  That is, victory for His people by Christ alone.

44.  Christians should love the God of predestination, because He turned the wickedness of man on its head at the Cross of Jesus.  The Cross of Jesus redeemed sinners with no additions.

45.   The gates of hell (the essence of the cosmic and eternal hatred of God) have fallen because of the life and death of Christ alone.  He is the Awesome Victor.   That is, He is Incarnate Victory for His Father's glory.  It does not mean people do not go there, but it means Jesus has provided a way of escape and defeated all of hell.

46.  The Father loves the Son and the Son loves the Father, and the Father and Son love the Holy Spirit, and the Holy Spirit loves the Father and the Son.  

47.   The love in the Triune Godhead is the best kind of love.  That is, it is a eternal love that only God manifests.  We are called to take His example and love.

48.  What kind of love do you suppose God loves His people with?  God loves His people like He loves His Son.  This does not mean we become Jesus, but that we are loved like Jesus by the Father through the Son alone. 

49.  Nothing can bring division between the Father and the Son.  If this is true, how much more can there be no division between the Christian and His Lord?  That is, I am not saying sinners in Christ do not sin, but that the love of God is eternally unbreakable for His people who have child-like faith born of heaven in their hearts and minds.

50.  Christians are called to be a "little Jesus" to all people.  We are called to love fellow Christians and enemies of the gospel.

51.  God loves all people touching general benevolence (that is the air we breath for the elect and non-elect), but so-called "common grace" is not redemptive grace.  In terms of redemptive grace, He loves only His elect, but He does provides rain for the elect and non-elect.  

52.   I suggest to you in this sense God has a universal love.  Once more, in terms of redemptive love He only loves those He chooses unto mercy through His Son.  It is not every single person. It may also be true that sinners renounce God's right over them and submit to Satan so that he grants the interests of men against the interests of God.  God is working out everything according to His good will.

53.  God hates those He chooses unto damnation.   This is true because God is God and sinners are sinners.  No sinner can make himself sinless or let alone be born again.  

54.  It was said by many that we should not be shocked that God damns sinners, but that He even saves anyone due to cosmic sin.  We have offended the holy innocence of God without cause.  That is, in the end God is the injured party, but He finds a way to bring salvation even at the climax of pain for His own dear Son.  Hence who are you O man to reply back to God?

55.  God loves the glory unto mercy for His chosen people alone.

56.  God loves the glory unto justice for those that He damns (because He never fails to do what is right in that He punishes sin), but He takes no pleasure in the death of the wicked (yet His own purpose for the wicked is for the day of evil for God's glory unto justice)!

57.  God loves all of His people alone touching redemptive mercy.  For God's people, it is a Day of Joy.  For the damned, it is Day of Doom.  How do you take it for yourself?  Is it a Day of Wrath or a Day of Unspeakable Joy?  It cannot be both.

58.  Upon what basis do you believe it is a Day of Joy?  In the outcome of your theology, who gets the glory?  God is jealous to get all glory, because He loves what is right.

59.  A holy God loves righteousness all the time, but a wicked people love a way of a demi-god to do "evil that good comes."

60.   God hates the doctrine of godhood.  Sinners cannot even save themselves, how much less to be a god?  It is a pursuit of spiritual madness after the working of Satan.   God and Satan do not agree that men should be gods.  In the end, God calls His people alone to be kings and priests.

61.  The hatred of Satan toward God is a hyper-extreme hatred and love of darkness, destruction and damnation.

62.  Every sinners loves their sin, but God's people are called to love Christ more than their sin.

63.  Sinners love justification by death more than honoring God through the exclusivity of belief in Christ alone.

64.  Sinners love universalism and a rejection of eternal hell, because they want immediate comfort over the choice of eternal life and damnation and assurance of no eternal punishment.

65.  Jesus will love all of the pre-converted elect who come to Him by faith.  He will never ever cast them out because of the will of the Father and the work of the Spirit and the Word.

66.  The Bible teaches us to hate sinfulness, but to love holiness.

67.  The Bible teaches us to hate some other way to God or additions to God than the only way of Christ alone.

68.  All sinners by nature are children of wrath.

69.  It is true that Satan's plan is the interests of men, but in the final analysis he wants to have company in eternal doom.  He totally blew it when he rebelled against a holy God.  We may learn from his fall that we must be ready to stand before a holy God and give an account of everything we have done whether good or bad.  If we are asked to state our condition, we ought to say, "Here by the robes of the unified grace of Christ alone; I stand."

70.  Out of love, Jesus is writing our biography of good deeds.  We do not need to be concerned about writing our good deeds.  Remember we are not saved by our good deeds.  Rather we are saved by Christ alone.   

71.  Our story is being written by Jesus and we ought to give Him the most glory through a living faith in abundant good works.

72.  Out of love, Jesus is preparing a place for us.  What is it that you seek?  Do you seek something other than God?  God, not streets of gold, should be your ultimate reward.

73.  Christians should love God as their ultimate, central and eternal reward.  There is no glory in works of civil goodness of filthy rages.  The only glory of God is God's outworking of goodness.  

74.  If Christ alone is sufficient, why the love any additions?

75.  Today is the Day of Salvation.  Take a care, would you love God today by prayers, words of instruction and deeds of practical righteousness IN Christ alone to demonstrate your obedience?

76.  God's Spirit loves to work with God's Word, and God's Word is meant to work with God's Spirit.

77.   Why do you love your cosmic treason over the holiness of God?  Do not be deceived!  Sin is so elusive and seductive that it wants to please its former Master.  You can only master it if you have God's Spirit and the power of God's Word in discerning set apart discipline.

78.  God loves the supremacy and centrality of the Word preached.

79.  The written Word preached is the divine presence of Christ where hearts and minds are changed forever.

80.  Sin by nature hates you and wants to take you to hell.  It so easily deceives you that it will take you to hell without your permission.  It is also true in some sense that sinners want to experience the torment of justice in hell.  That is, they hate themselves to the point of eternal doom.   God providentially awakens people to know His truth and its through His mighty Hand that men come to realize that they must escape the reality of hell.  The only way of escape is Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior.

81.  Many sinners plan to escape hell through a particular scheme.  Hell wants to take you down to its bottomless abyss.  No mere scheme however detailed will avail before the holy presence of Christ.  Only the clear testimony of Scripture avails!  That is, His life and death alone in how someone is right before God.

82.   Civil love will not save anyone, because civil love is not equal to the indescribable love of Christ in His life and death alone.  

83.  Jesus Christ loves all the unborn babies that are brutally murdered at any stage of their unborn life and they are brought safe and sound to heaven in the presence of God and His holy angels.

84.  What do you love?  Do you love a person because of something he is able to do?  Or do you love a person because they have a godly heart?  Do not place man-made things over godliness.

85.  There is a support for a just war.  That is, war among nations.  The only way wars will cease is by the peace of Jesus in the hearts and minds of sinners.  The question is, do you really know Jesus?

86.  The war between God and Satan will never end until he is cast into everlasting hell for his rebellion.

87.  God could cause all sinners to love Him if He choose, but He saves a particular people according to His holy wisdom.  

88.  God loves the little flock that becomes the innumerable multitude in the final outcome described in the Book of Revelation.

89.  This evening you may find yourself at war with God, because of your great filthiness of filth.  If you have sinned without regard for Christ alone, you may find yourself at war with a holy God.  If you have Jesus, the war is ended.  There is peace with God.

90.  Learning brings grief if its not from the Spirit of God.  That is, those eyes that are blessed that see what God sees in His Word about Jesus as the only way have the very love of God in the heart because of God's work.

91.  God's hatred of sinners is manifested in His work of blinding men unto judgment and hiding the gospel from the worldly-wise men, but He reveals it unto mere babes according to His supreme choice in His outworking redemptive mercy.

92.  A babe is a pre-converted elect sinner.  Before God-appointed salvation, the pre-converted sinners spent time under God's condemnation.  The only way damnation can change is not through anything of this world.  Rather it is through God's choice alone that is clearly accomplished in a time and space.

93.  Christians are called to pray for all those sinners God still hates because of original sin and actual iniquity, because God does not save apart from prayer but not because of prayer.  The reason God saves is because of Christ alone.  He alone is the answer!

94.  Jesus alone lived a perfect life and death because He loves His people alone.

95.  Jesus alone rose bodily from the dead because He loves His chosen alone.

96.  Jesus alone intercedes for His people to the uttermost without additions because He loves with an everlasting and undying love.

97.  Jesus never intended the love of the Cross to save the once and for all damned like king Saul, but the Cross of Jesus can still influence damned sinners for a civil goodness (like the inconsistency of morality among atheists).  That is, it has no rational purpose to be there apart from God's providential care in granting civil goodness among atheistic sinners even if they cannot explain in rational terms why they are moral. 

98.  The love of Jesus is the highest kind of love there is.

99.   The love of Jesus cannot be fully explained by mortal men, because it is eternally incomprehensible.  

100.   Everyone in heaven has perfect love for God and their neighbor.

101.  Everyone in hell hates God and their neighbor.

102.  God and the elect angels hate those who are in hell because they stand in God's presence where the damned are tormented with fire brimstone unto outer darkness forevermore.

I am so glad that our Father in heav'n
Tells of his love in the book he has giv'n:
Wonderful things in the Bible I see;
This is the dearest, that Jesus loves me.
I am so glad that Jesus loves me,
Jesus loves me, Jesus loves me,
I am so glad that Jesus loves me,
Jesus loves even me.
Though I forget him, and wander away,
Still he doth love me wherever I stray;
Back to his dear loving arms do I flee,
When I remember that Jesus loves me.
O if there's only one song I can sing,
When in his beauty I see the great King,
This shall my song in eternity be,
"O what a wonder that Jesus loves me."  (TH, 647).