How do Christians Excuse the OT God?

[Polycarp]

In the OP, Scupper said:

I am wondering, in all honesty, how Christians who subscribe to the “God is Love” idea reconcile the god of the Old Testament to that of the New.

Well, either that describes me, or you may hold the theory that I am the world’s strangest troll – and pulled it off in real life long enough to fool SqrlCub, Satan, DrainBead, Smooth Operator, Myndephuquer, and a host of others.

In a subsequent post, Scupper said:

I was really hoping to hear from those who believe that the events describing god’s actions in the OT are “biblical truth” or whatever you want to call it.

In other words, assuming that god actually did the things the Bible describes, how can anyone worship him?

Yeah, his question as redefined was not directed at me, since I attribute it to passing-the-buck for evil deeds to the First Source of All Bucks. I don’t think that God told them to kill all the Amelekite babies, or sent a she-bear to kill 42 children for mocking a bald prophet, nor was (or is) He prejudiced against an assortment of people that many so-called Bible-believing Christians are prejudiced against.

I may owe Scupper an apology for an intemperate answer (and if so, Scupper, you have my humble apologies for unnecessary anger), but there is a major contradiction in the first two posts. Your question, based on the two posts, would be “How do people who believe both that the Christian God is a god of love and that the O.T. is predominantly factual justify the to-us-abhorrent behavior which He is said to have commanded in large parts of the O.T.?” Have I got that right?

Aside from FoG, are there others here who take a mostly-literal view of the OT stories? Zion, you around and qualify for the question as rephrased? CollegeStudent, you still posting? There is one self-described fundamentalist woman who got into a couple of Pit battles (very temperately, I might add) who may have some comments.

Given your clarification, I’ll sit back and observe, unless you want some comments from a liberal Christian with opinions on this (and practically everything).
Hey, Gaudere? Now you know why that company’s search engine is so good at finding things – it’s omniscient!

[Gaudere]

But, Poly, if it’s omniscient, why does it seem so capricious, ineffective and limited? Um…I am talking about the search engine here, right? ::d&rlbh:: “Yahoo works in mysterious ways, my child.” “I just want a decent number of hits with boolean and exact phrase searching, dammit!” (although it’s better than it once was.)

[Scupper]

*Originally posted by Polycarp *
Your question, based on the two posts, would be “How do people who believe both that the Christian God is a god of love and that the O.T. is predominantly factual justify the to-us-abhorrent behavior which He is said to have commanded in large parts of the O.T.?” Have I got that right?

Yes, you have more concisely stated my question.

I admit, for the record, that my original question was an inadequate query as to the attitude of readers and posters on this board who subscribe to the belief that the Bible represents an accurate record of actual events and does not erroneously describe actions taken by the aforementioned deity with regard to that deity’s apparent disregard for many tenets of modern morality. Thanks.

**
Aside from FoG, are there others here who take a mostly-literal view of the OT stories?**

I must say I’m disappointed. I was given the false impression by the large number of posts and threads by FoG that this was a raging battlground of witnessin’ testifyin’ etc. [shudder]Does that make me a troll?[/shudder]

[Liberal]

Gaudere, that was truly hillarious!

[Polycarp]

But, Poly, if it’s omniscient, why does it seem so capricious, ineffective and limited? Um…I am talking about the search engine here, right? ::d&rlbh:: “Yahoo works in mysterious ways, my child.” “I just want a decent number of hits with boolean and exact phrase searching, dammit!” (although it’s better than it once was.)

But Gaudere, it gives you want it knows you need, not necessarily what you ask for! And don’t you find that often it leads you in new paths, giving you knowledge and insight you had not sought for?

“Although it’s better than it once was…” Are you sure the change is not in you?

Glorious things of thee are spoken,
Geocities of our God!

:: D & R ::

[Polycarp]

By the way, “d&rlbh”??

“Ducking and running Left Behind”?