There is a song I really, like. It is Stuart Townend’s “In Christ Alone.” But one verse troubles me—where the lyrics include the line “The wrath of God was satisfied.” Was the Father actually angry at the Son?

I confess that my sentiments are the same. I love the song—every verse—except for that one line, which unpleasantly reminds me of the famous Jonathan Edwards sermon, “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” (1741). The complete verse goes:

In Christ alone! – who took on flesh / Fullness of God in helpless babe.
This gift of love and righteousness / Scorned by the ones He came to save:
Till on that cross as Jesus died / The wrath of God was satisfied –
For every sin on Him was laid / Here in the death of Christ I live.

Divine wrath against sin is biblical, but isn’t that a different matter than the Father’s anger against the Son—for our sins? This notion is reinforced when some versions translate hilasterion as propitiation—as though the Deity, seething with wrath, must be placated. Certainly verses like 2 Cor 5:21 (Jesus becoming a sin offering) and Gal 3:13 (the curse of being hanged on a tree) point to the seriousness of sin. Yet divine anger is not necessarily inherent in these passages.

Let’s take a look at a few of the more popular translations of the key phrase in Rom 3:25:

  • A propitiation by his blood (ESV)
  • A propitiation through faith in his blood (KJV)
  • A propitiationin His blood(NASB)
  • The mercy seat (NET)
  • A sacrifice of atonement, through the shedding of his blood (NIV)
  • An expiation by his blood (RSV)
  • A mercy seat, through faith in his blood (YLT)

The word hilasterion appears only one more time in the NT (Heb 9:5), rendered there as “mercy seat.” It is also the Septuagint (Greek) word for mercy seat, translating the term in Exod 25:21-22: the cover over the Ark of the Covenant, the place where God meets man. Hilasterion suggests both the place and the means of atonement. When we realize the OT background of the term, we realize here is no need to import pagan concepts of buying off the god through sacrifice.

Expiation is an acceptable translation, although mercy seat is the most literal version. The NIV’s “sacrifice of atonement, through the shedding of his blood” works, although of course this is a paraphrase, not a translation. The versions rendering hilasterion as “mercy seat” are the most literal and accurate. While the Greek could be rendered mercy seat or atonement, it makes sense to me to translate it with the same phrase as that in Heb 9: mercy seat. For more translation comments, please consult the helpful notes b and c with the NET translation.

In short, Paul’s emphasis in Romans is not that and angry God needs placating. Rather, it’s that we need forgiveness. We need a Savior!

I agree with White: “Jesus died to cleanse us from sin. He also took away our sins like the scapegoat did on the Day of Atonement. God now freely forgives our sins and gives us the Holy Spirit, which empowers us to live lives free from the bondage of sin and Satan. This is a free gift based on faith” (Chris White, The Deformation: Examining Reformation Theology Through the Lens of the Early Church [CWM Publishing, 2026], 63.

White sums up very nicely: “In the new covenant, Jesus is both the giver of the blood, the high priest himself who enters the Holy of Holies, and the place where the blood was sprinkled. He is the full picture of the Day of Atonement in Leviticus” (Deformation, 61).