Ah, and here we have it: the picture of the cross and its effects. When Haman died on the wooden gallows, the wrath of the king subsided. And while this "foreshadow" is incomplete (as all shadows are), it does show that the hanging of the man on the wood satisfied the wrath of the king, which points forward to how God would be "propitiated by His blood" as recorded in Romans 3:25. In the story of Esther, the wrath of the king against Haman subsided when Haman died on the gallows; in the gospel, the wrath of the king against all believers was fully propitiated when Jesus Christ died on the cross. If you are a believer, look at the cross and see that God will never be angry with you for His anger and wrath was fully exhausted at the cross. Jesus "saves us from the wrath (for unbelievers) to come" (1 Thessalonians 1:10).
“In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.” 1 John 4:10
“Must a guilty man remain under the wrath of Almighty God? Is the wound of sin forever incurable? No, there is a Savior provided for us in Christ. Matthew Henry says, "This is the righteousness of God; righteousness of his ordaining, providing, and accepting.” “Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us - for it is written, "Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree...” Galatians 3:13
It is in the seeing of this Savior receiving the wrath of God that produces hymns like Alas! and Did My Savior Bleed with verses like this:
Thy body slain, sweet Jesus, Thine,
And bathed in its own blood;
While all exposed to wrath divine,
The glorious Sufferer stood.
https://hymnary.org/text/alas_and_did_my_savior_bleed
I don't know about you, but right about now, I don't know whether to cry my eyes out or shout, "Hallelujah!" The fact that the wrath of God against us for all our grievous sins has been fully exhausted in Jesus Christ on the cross should make us want to weep with joy and relief, and the truth that there is no wrath left for us should make us want to shout "Hallelujah"! Jesus took all the arrows of God's hatred in our place. It should break our hearts and then fill them with songs of rejoicing to know that God poured out wave after wave of His wrath upon His Son until finally, the flood subsided entirely. There are no more arrows or waves left for us. While we were "at one time, objects of wrath" (Ephesians 2:3) we are now "vessels of mercy" (Romans 9:23) for the wrath of God is fully spent on Christ, and God "made us alive" (Ephesians 2:5) and "raised us up" (Ephesians 2:6). "There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus" (Romans 8:1). Praise God!
And God, in all this, declares His righteousness. We can understand that God hates sin when nothing less than the blood of Jesus Christ could pay for it.
So, we have seen that the cross displays and reveals the wrath of God, and the righteousness of God. Now let us examine how it shows the power of God:
“For Christ did not send me to baptize but to preach the gospel, and not with words of eloquent wisdom, lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power. For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.” 1 Corinthians 1:17-18
Question 7. According to 1 Corinthians 1:17-18, what would have happened had Paul preached baptism as a way of salvation rather than the cross?
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Question 8. According to 1 Corinthians 1:18, what is the cross to us who are being saved?
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