“hatred in and of itself is not evil. Hatred can in fact be a good thing, even a beautiful thing. We should bear in mind that indifference, not hatred, is love’s opposite. Hatred is a part of love and a sign of its vitality. Hatred is love in its ferocious and militant form. Whether it is a good hatred or a bad hatred depends on what, precisely, it is aimed at. Hatred aimed at the cancer patient is bad. Hatred aimed at the patient’s cancer is good. Not just acceptable, or admissible, but good. If you love a person, you must hate his cancer. There is no way to love someone while being indifferent, or tolerant, toward the disease that ravages him. Hatred always seeks to annihilate. So we should not want to rid the world of hatred unless we have rid it of all the things worth annihilating. Unfortunately, we have not accomplished that task and never will. There are many ugly, terrible, deadly, revolting things in our world, and we must have a raw, raging hatred for all of them—especially sin. The Bible repeatedly speaks of this holy and righteous hatred, and commands us—not merely allows us, but commands us—to have this sort of hatred in our hearts: Psalm 97: “Let those who love the Lord hate evil.” Proverbs 8:13: “To fear the Lord is to hate evil.” Romans 12:9: “Hate what is evil, cling to what is good.” Proverbs mentions seven things that God Himself hates, and in four places in the Bible (Genesis 4:10, Genesis 17:20, Exodus 2:23, James 5:4) we are told of sins so abominable that they “cry out” to Him for vengeance. A passage in Revelation is particularly interesting: “I know your deeds, your hard work and your perseverance. I know that you cannot tolerate wicked people.… Yet I hold this against you: You have forsaken the love you had at first. Consider how far you have fallen! Repent and do the things you did at first. If you do not repent, I will come to you and remove your lampstand from its place. But you have this in your favor: You hate the practices of the Nicolaitans, which I also hate.” God can find few redeeming qualities in the church in Ephesus—except for its hatred and intolerance. Those are the two things He cites positively, the two that they need not repent of. What redeeming qualities will He find in the church in America?”