OPINION

“Angry, vengeful God” of OT vs. “Merciful loving God” of NT

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[First posted in 2012, time for a revisit.  This is from www.thereddoorcommunity.org, authored by Jeffrey Cranford thereddoorcommunity.org, linksplayers.com.  We will use this as a springboard for another series of articles by discussing its claims and the scriptural references used to back up the claims. It appears to be a systematic presentation citing many verses from both Testaments, so it is wise to check the CONTEXT of the verses, particularly the ones from OT, if it at all connects with the NT. Reformatted for posting.—Admin1.]

 

Reconciling

the “Angry, vengeful God” of the Old Testament

with the

“Merciful, loving God” of the New Testament

New Year’s Series/ 2012

 
  • Do you struggle to understand how the Old and New Testaments could reflect the same God? 
  • Do you purposefully avoid the Old Testament because it just seems to challenge your faith and even give ammunition to those who would want to discredit Christianity? 
  • Is Christianity a radically different religion than what Abraham, Moses, King David and many of the prophets understood faith to be? 
  • By the way, what are we to do with the law? 
    • Do we keep some of them and ignore others. 
    • And, if we do, which laws are in and which laws are out? 

This is going to be challenging, and we may not all agree, but that’s just the kind of discussion I like. The depth of our faith depends on some good answers – probably more than you or I am aware!

 

The church has dealt with this question before:

  • Marcion around 144 AD (Gnostic tendencies) 
  • Dualist: created world evil and non-material world good. 
  • Maltheistic views of God (God of Old Testament hopelessly failed).
  • Jesus was not the Jewish Messiah, so we can rid ourselves of all the prophecies concerning Him.
  • Jesus was a spiritual entity sent to reveal truth by the Monad (absolute, the one), unlike the lesser creation God of the evil material world.
 

With this in place, it was easy to for (sic) Marcion to overcome the difficult questions everyone tends to ask. Some of Marcion’s strongest arguments came from Luke 5:36-38. He ignored Matthew 13:52. In fact, he eliminated the entire Gospel.

 

So, in short, you can see that these questions that concern us about our God, have been big issues in the past as well. So, how do we reconcile these two seemingly irreconcilable Gods?

 

1. Jesus made it clear that the God of the Old Testament was both His Father and the Ancient of Days (Daniel 7:13,14; John 9:35; John 3:13; Luke 19:9,10; John 12:20-26)

2. There were magnificent acts of mercy displayed by God in the Old Testament (Genesis 15: 16, Genesis 6:3, Ezekiel 18:23)

3. There were stern words used by Jesus in the New Testament regarding current realities and future judgments to come (John 8:43, 44; Matthew 10:28-36; Revelation 19:15)

4. Jesus made it clear that both Moses and Abraham saw Him on the horizon (John 5:39-47; John 8:31-59)

5. To believe Moses was to believe in Jesus. So, to believe in the Law/Torah/Penteteuch (which was penned by its author Moses), is to understand Jesus and the kingdom He was, and still is, inaugurating.

6. Are we still under the Law for righteousness? That’s a clear no! (Romans 10: 1-4, Galatians 2: 21) 7. What do we do with (Matthew 5:13-20)?

 

The Torah/ Law was given for 3 primary purposes

 

1.  Keep Israel together as a nation until the  “enabler”of the promise to Abraham appeared (Galatians 3:19).  God knew that they would not be able to keep the Law.  In fact, the Torah (read Law) prophesied that they would fail, be dispersed all over the planet and one day return to finally get circumcised hearts (Deuteronomy 29:22 – 30:6; Ezekiel 36:22-28) We will discuss what it meant when God said the Israelites would one day “...walk in My statutes, and you will be careful to observe My ordinances.”

2.   Prophecy about the Messiah who was to come

    • Through the atonement (Genesis 3:15; 12:3; Galatians 3:13,14; Exodus 12; Leviticus 13-14; 16; 23; Numbers 2; Numbers 21:6-9; Exodus 21:32) 
    • The Prophet (Deuteronomy 18:18,19; John 1:45)
    • The Star (Numbers 24:17)
    • The High Priest (Genesis 14:17-20; Hebrews 7-8)
    • All kinds of metaphors 1. 2. 3.
      • Rock (Exodus 17:6; 1 Corinthians 10:1-4) 
      • Water (Exodus 17:6; John 7:37,38; Jeremiah 15:18; John 4:10-16) 
      • Manna and Oil ( Numbers 11:1-9; John 6:48-51; 1 John 2:20,27; Exodus 30:25; Ecclesiastes 10:1)

3.  Act as a template for those who would try and navigate the waters of the “new kingdom”

    • Oxen (1 Corinthians 9: 1-14) 
    • Law viewed as the Torah narrative (Matthew 5:17-19) 
    • Separation from the nations. 

Isn’t this just racism at its core and something that perpetuates religious wars and sectarian strife?

    • The priests (Numbers 8:14; 1 Peter 2:9) 
    • The nation (Exodus 12:43; 19:6; 2 Corinthians 6:14-18; Ezekiel 37:27) 
    • The story of Phinehas ( Numbers 25; 2 Corinthians 2:11; 1 Corinthians 5:9-11)

*What did it mean that Phinehas would be given God’s covenant of peace? (Malachi 2:1-9) *Phinehas was uncompromising in his actions. We too, are to be uncompromising in our battle against the enemy of our souls – Satan himself!

    • The entire Exodus (Salvation from Egypt, through the sea, learning to walk with God in the wilderness, crossing the Jordan, conquering the land until the righteous king could be set on the throne) (1 Corinthians 10:11; Amos 9:12; Acts 15:15-18)

– Why so much warfare? (Judges 3:1-4; 1 Peter 4:12; Ephesians 6:10-20; 2 Corinthians 10:3-5)

    • Giving of the Law analogous to giving of the Spirit but with radically different results (Exodus 32:19-28; Acts 2)
    • Laws of the clean and unclean/ from the physical to the spiritual (Leviticus 11; Acts 10) 
    • Law of the trees (Leviticus 19:23-25; Exodus 23:29-30/ little by little) 
    • The twelve tribes and the twelve disciples
    • The recruitment of the 70 (Exodus 18:17-23; Numbers 11:16,17; Luke 10)
    • Strange fire (Leviticus 10:1-3; Leviticus 9:23,24; Isaiah 50:11) 
    • The two radically different covenants (Genesis 16:15; 21:2; Galatians 4:21-31) 
    • What about observing the Sabbath? (Exodus 20:8-11; Colossians 2:8-23; Galatians 4:9-11; Romans 14:4-10; Hebrews 4:1-11; Exodus 33:13-16) 
    • What about tithing? (Malachi 3?)
      • *Leviticus 27 Tithe
      •  *Deuteronomy 14 Tithe 
      • *The Tithe from the third year of the seven year cycle

In short, the New Testament seems to introduce us to these amazing realities – often hidden to those without eyes to see (Deuteronomy 29:1-4; Proverbs 25:2; Matthew 13:10-17)

 

Thanks for being kings through this series!

 

Jeffrey Cranford thereddoorcommunity.org, linksplayers.com.

 

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