What Is the Wrath to Come?

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In Luke 3:7 John the Baptist warned of the wrath to come. What is John referring to? The wrath to come is actually the coming wrath. That is, it is already present, coming continually upon the children of disobedience (Ephesians 2:2; 5:6; Colossians 3:6). The wrath itself is judgment (John 3:36; Romans 1:18; cf. Romans 8:1, 5). The particular judgment that John referred to concerned the mistreatment of the Jewish nation by the gentiles, which culminated in the Jewish war of 66-70 AD.

 

From Where Did the Church Gain Rest?

Luke writes in Acts 9:31 that the churches throughout all Judea, Samaria and Galilee had rest. Rest from what? It seems to me that he speaks of the persecution that had begun in Jerusalem in Acts 8:1. Luke has this rest occur immediately following his account of Paul’s leaving Jerusalem for his own city of Tarsus in Syria-Cilicia. Nevertheless, this rest from persecution could not, as some seem to believe, to arise out of Paul’s ceasing to persecute the believing community. First of all Paul had already ceased his persecuting the Church for three years; and secondly, his persecution seemed to have been limited to Jerusalem and his going to Damascus, because the rest of the churches of Judea didn’t know him personally (Galatians 1:22). So, what was responsible for the **rest** that the Church experienced in Acts 9:31?

 

God Brings an End to the Persecution

Before I leave chapter nine of Acts, I have to stop at verse-31. Some folks think that because Paul stopped persecuting the Jewish believers that the Church of Christ had rest or peace. Notice what the Scripture says:

Acts 9:29-31 KJV And he [Saul, later known as Paul] spake boldly in the name of the Lord Jesus, and disputed against the Grecians: but they went about to slay him. (30) Which when the brethren knew, they brought him down to Caesarea, and sent him forth to Tarsus. (31) Then had the churches rest throughout all Judaea and Galilee and Samaria, and were edified; and walking in the fear of the Lord, and in the comfort of the Holy Ghost, were multiplied. (brackets and emphasis mine)