I haven’t read the book, only the excerpt and your analysis. However, I do have a question I’d like to ask.

Is it possible that the problem is more with the way Christians explain God’s wrath than with the concept itself?

The driving force of McLaren’s analysis seems to be that because God’s love is primary in his self-definition, therefore the thought of his extreme, unmitigated judgement is problematic:

‘God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life,’ we say, ‘and he’ll fry your butt in hell forever unless you do or believe the right thing.’ ‘God is a loving father,’ we say, ‘but he’ll treat you with a cruelty that no human father has ever been guilty of – eternal conscious torture.’

I realise this is intended as a caricature of what people say, not an exact representation (and that by a fictional character, not McLaren himself). Even so, it seems to claim a fundamental tension between God as extremely loving and God as extremely punishing which I can’t see.

McLaren (through the character of Neil) points out that ‘no human father has ever been guilty’ of the extreme, unmitigated punishment that God is claimed to enforce. But then no human father has been sinned against as God has. It stretches the ‘Father’ analogy too far to imagine that it extends to how God has been sinned against and how he should respond in judgement. No human father has ever created a universe and given a particular race the privilege and responsibility of leadership within that universe, only to have that race reject him outright and wreak violence against their fellow creatures as a result. The response in judgement is radically different between God and human fathers because the crimes which are committed by children against their human fathers are not deserving of anything like the punishment which humanity truly deserves for rejecting our creator.

In fact, God’s love can’t be understood without first understanding that we deserve extreme, unmitigated punishment. Only then do we realise the enormity of the claim that ‘God demonstrates his own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us’ (Rom 5.8). There is no tension between the claim ‘God is the most loving of all beings’ and ‘God is most just, extreme punisher of evil there is’. The love is shown in the fact that, even though we deserve extreme, unmitigated punishment, God was prepared to take that punishment himself in Jesus’ death on the cross. For those who accept Jesus’ death on their behalf there is no more punishment, but for those who do not, the punishment which is theirs for rejecting God still awaits them (John 3.36).

I don’t think there’s a problem with telling people that God is both extremely loving and extremely wrathful. We just need to explain to people why he is wrathful instead of just telling them that he is. Then we can truly explain how God is loving, instead of just telling people that he is. I think the Two Ways to Live gospel outline aims at doing this.

There might be some room for movement regarding whether the punishment will be eternal or not. Some passages are ambiguous as to whether people who are not in Christ will be raised to face ‘ongoing torment’ or to face ‘complete destruction’ (e.g. what does 2 Thes 1.9 mean by ‘everlasting destruction’?). But either way, the teaching of Jesus and his apostles was clear: everyone who has not accepted Jesus will be raised in order to be actively punished by God for their rebellion against him.

I don’t accept this teaching lightly. It concerns the fate of my closest friends and relatives. But I can see why it’s just. And, in combination with the fact that God’s love is so great, it’s God’s terrifying justice that spurs me on, pushing me out of my comfort zone, to gradually let people know more about Jesus (2 Cor 5.11,14).

Does this response misunderstand what McLaren is trying to do? Perhaps I should actually read his book :-)