Interesting! Never heard anything like this preached before...but I think what MD says is actually true - although I ams lightly stunned by his brutal honesty, but it's what we need!!! He's right when he says that we take one attribute of God and focus on it - God is love, or God is rightoues - both of which are true, but not just stand alone statements. God is so much more, and sometimes we can do more harm than good by just saying 'God is good' and leaving other important parts out, like His justice, His wrath, His hatred of wickedness. Of course God hates us.... until we saved we are not covered be the blood of Jesus - I am saved by grace, not because of anything I have done. I don't deserve my salvation, but God, in His mercy, has let me off! Phew! I know now when He sees me He sees Jesus' blood covering me, because otherwise God would not be able to look at me, to be in relationship with me, to be reconciled with me. I will never be a 'good' person as sin in totally my nature - MD says that when we're at our worst, that is actually who we really fundamentally are - and I don't know about you, but that hurt... That broke my heart. Oh I know it's true but I don't like to be reminded of that... who does?! Only I know - and probably my husband knows too- what I am really like in my worst moments and sometimes - regularly - I stand before God broken, ashamed of who I am to the core of my sinfilled, blackened heart, and in tears. Yes folks, that is who I am. But I am so thankful, grateful, amazed, hopefuly because of what Jesus has done for me in reconciling me to my wonderful and beautiful and just and loving Father - and I am eternally grateful that forgiveness keeps coming - there isn't a limit to how many times He will forgive me. The price for my sin has been paid; I am free. I am saved. By grace. Thank you Father for saving me! :-)

MD makes allusion to Ephesians 2:3, calling us "objects of wrath", shame that he didn't continue on to the next few words - "but, because of his great love for us".

I can see that he's trying to make a point, and that he's trying to shake people out of their comfort zones - but pulling part thoughts out of context isn't the way to do that.

Like the previous comment I agree that the "in our worst moments is the truest revelation of who we are" sentiment is just plain wrong.

Just out of curiosity, why is when Driscoll pulls things out of context and takes liberties with Scripture is his message still seen by and large as good, helpful, a needed corrective, but when other preachers do the same thing, such as preachers from holiness traditions, Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, Emergent and others that emphasize non-Reformed hermeneutical conclusions, are they considered heretics?

Reformed is a slice of the Christian pie, a very small slice when you consider Christianity either globally or historically. "Jesus is the way, truth, and life" is not synonymous with "Reformed theology is inerrantly correct". Reformed theology is not the exclusive, monolithic, exact explication of full Christian orthodoxy.

Driscoll said God hates people. Wrath is a response not a static attribute. Love and hate are fundamental presuppositions and world views. To equate wrath with ubiquitous hate is not only a misuse of the Hebrew and Greek, but a misunderstanding of English as well.

Last, it's interesting that Jesus never said He hates us, nor that God hates us, nor that the Holy Spirit hates us.

We all make God in our image. But an even greater myth than those constructed of the God-we-make-in-our-image, is that we can ever objectively grasp God. To objectively grasp Him would make us the subject in theology; that is, the very enterprise of objective thought assumes a supremacy and mastery by subject (in this case us as theologians) over the object (in this case God b/c He is the one about whom we are thinking). Taking seriously Christian revelation means that all our theology is subjective because it begins with the confession that we are not in control, we do not have the answers, and God as acting, authoritative subject must dictate the terms of the conversation and understanding of Himself to us.

At no point did God ask us to do theology in a vacuum, and they only way to approach Him rightly will be in (prayerful) conversations with our Christian community - those groups constituted by Christ and fully reliant upon His Spirit to guide all life, groups that must include both our ancestors and our contemporaries; and not simply be constituted by those with whom we agree (i.e., Reformed theologians).