Emerging Africa

This is not an answer, or even an attempt to an answer. Been reading The Bible after Babel these past few days (will post a review on my blog when I'm done) and came onto an interesting thing. What will happen if we read something like Joshua through the eyes of the Canaanites? Would we see the same caring God? Or is that even possible to read a text written through the eyes of one group of people through the eyes of another hypothetical group, other than our own eyes?

blogging at mycontemplations.wordpress.com

I really struggle with this concept of holiness as it seems to be a justification of anything 'bad' that God does. God can send people to hell because he is holy, he can kill people because he is holy, he can be cruel to people because he is holy. Holiness seems like the least attractive trait I have ever come across! And it seems the churches even encourage us to become holy - does that mean that as we as Christians become more holy we start partaking more and more in similar horrendous activities??

I realise my comment is a little full of emotion (!) but I'm really frustrated by the mainstream interpretation of the concept holiness and with that the way holiness is used to justify some terrible stuff. Is there a way to understand holiness that is more in alignment with other character traits of God? Is there a way to understand God's violence in a way that is more in alignment with other aspects of his character?

Something you need to remember about the story of the Angel of death and the children is that its set within a larger story. There is a context and purpose to it. God's people (the same people through whom He was to bless the nations) was being oppressed by the nation of Egypt. God's promises to his people were not going to fail and so he acted. But please note how he acted, Moses and Aaron are sent from God to Egypt, and they patiently proclaim the will of God to Pharaoh. Pharaoh had plenty of oppurtunity to listen and respond, even after many signs given my Moses. His response? "Who is the Lord (Yahweh), that i should obey him and let Israel go? (Ex 5:2). Nine plagues later, Egypt is all but crippled, God displays for all Egypt who He is, even the nations in the Land of Canaan will hear of it. One remains, the one you have brought up. The point of this final plague, the one that finally breaks the resolve of Pharaoh that has resisted Moses and resisted God? It is God's gracious act to allow salvation for his people. How? By substitution. Of course this is but a shadow of the greater reality in Jesus (the Lamb who takes away the sin of the world Jn 1:29) which points us to the cross as Paul understood it, "...For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed." 1 Cor 5:7

Kevin... i think you like to stir the pot a little from time to time... You do it very well!
From a human perspective (ie my emotional response) I have to put my weight behind Antony who points out well that God was more than patient with Egypt before He reigned the terror you struggle to associate with.

Furthermore, some basic responses to your post - just shooting from the hip here, okay:
Firstly - Who are we to question God - and what i mean by this is simply "Lets start from a place of assuming God got it right... that His seamingly 'reprehensible' actions are probably more than justifiable and righteous, and that it is we who are having trouble understanding Him"
Secondly - and i think this is often the root of many of our troubles as Western minds, is that we struggle with the paradox that God can be both the Righteous Judge and the Gracious Father. It would seem to me, Kevin, that both you and i have significant revelation on the Gracious Father, but relatively little revelation on the Righteous Judge. The idea that He is BOTH/AND, rather that EITHER/OR is what un-does us more often than not. The point is this - somewhere in the Righteous Judgement that the Egyptians 'suffered' during Passover, was a Gracious Father manifest aswell.... and we would do well to seek Him out in that context - would probably do wonders for our understanding of who He is.
Lastly - i think that trying to 'understand' God and judge His actions by passing them through our man made concepts like "proportional retaliation", "just war theory" and the "principle of minimum force" is like trying to fit God into our box... trying to make Him in our image. The fact is, God is dangerous, unpredicatable and downright offensive many times - the problem is, this doesn't quite fit into our mould. The "Gentle Jesus meek and mild" mindset/picture we have of God is simply not true. He is the Warrior, Commander, Captian of the Host, Lion of the Tribe of Judah and The Almighty!

I hope these responses assist a little with your struggle Kevin.

You wrote "I agree God's morality is not our morality; but surely it should be better, not worse?" - and there is it... again we are eating from the wrong tree. It was the fall of Man, and continues to trip well intentioned Christians.
As long as we spend our time trying to decipher right from wrong (better from worse), we remain distracted from the Tree of Life. Eating from the "Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil" will not lead us to God, will not introduce us to Him, and will certainly not provide any light to this discussion. If you really must ask these questions, then perhaps the question should be "Does this bring/lead to life or death?", rather than "is this right or wrong?", or "is this better or worse?". This question could even be asked about the questions we ask and the topics we discuss in this forum.
A sincere attempt to assist with you quandary...

Hi Kevin - thanks for you honest reply. Instead of me trying to reason with your arguments let me rather present my own story of how I deal with the same problem you face.

Firstly I've done quite a bit of intensive study of the Old Testament and I'm fully of aware of the full frontal brutality that God dishes out on various groups. Secondly I think that people (and I don't think you're saying this) who say that God is a God of wrath and judgment in the OT but a God of love and grace in the NT aren't reading the text very clearly at all. There's a stack-load of grace and love in the OT and a stack-load of wrath and judgment in the NT - It's the same God in both.

Secondly I come from the presupposition that the Bible is a unit and is delivered to us saying exactly what God wants it to say to us through the agents of the various authors in their various contexts. I see no other document on a par with the Bible in terms of authority. I take what the Bible says as what God says - within each grammatical/historic context of the various segments of text that make up the Bible.

So how do I reconcile this OT picture then? Well for me the issue revolves around the holiness of God. As far as I can see the way the term holiness is used of God in the Bible is to really describe the very essence of who he is. And that is completely and absolutely perfect and pure in every single one of his characteristics - he's flawless.

Now when this perfectly just creator God comes into contact with mankind who themselves are the creation, and when this creation declares autonomy from God and basically shake's its fist in his face, when this happens, the results are explosive (hence much of what we see in the OT and continue to see in a world that is under the sovereign control of God). Now from the beginning God should just wipe us all out - he created us, we told him 'stuff you' - he should have obliterated us. For him to do anything else would be to deny his perfect justice. Instead we live on, we are given a chance to repent, to turn back to him - that's grace and love. How is he able to show this grace and love and yet remain perfectly just? Through the substitute sacrifice of his son Jesus in place of the entire fallen creation. His perfect justice is appeased at the cross and autonomous, rebellious people are able to be reconciled to him.

God should wipe us all out, but he hasn' because he is a God of love and grace - yet that has to co-exist with his perfect justice. The cross of Christ is the great point in world history that makes that possible.

That is the only way I can explain these things. Without this, I have no hope in this world, without this I have a mighty powerful god who changes his mind (which is a horrific thought), or a god who lies, or god who is just the figment of men's imagination.

That for me is the wonder of the gospel. That God, in his perfect character would give up his son's life in order to love me a rebellious sinner. I have no other claim.

I just have to say that when i first got saved i had a thousand questions about why God did this and that, but being a Christian is about having faith, and tehre is no pint in having faith in something you can already see-that would not be faith!!
When you surreneder your all, you choose to believe that God is real and that Jesus died for your sins and that the Bible is the living word of God. The God in the OT is the same God in the NT. It is a simple message as i mentioned on my first and only blog-Jesus dies for our sins-and we complicate things with our human minds that cannot be at rest with a simple message from our creator. It must hurt God to see our lack of faith and respect for him. HE IS GOD, HE IS HOLY, HE KNOWS ALL, HE SEES ALL, AND HE HAS PREDESTINED EVERYTHING- ehy can we not just rest in this and enjoy being his friend, his disciple. He says, "Tryst in me and lean not on your own understanding"....that makes it very clear that our ways are niot Gods ways, and that we cannot comprehend or understand his ways. Why stuggle with it. Just accept it.
I think Stephen and LittleLion have come to understand what having reverence for the Lord and his word means.

I am all for questions, Kevin, and i commend you for your search and honesty regarding how you feel and the things you struggle with - don't ever stop doing that, ask questions and be real!

Personally, i think there is far too little questioning going on. South African Christians, in particular, have for far too long just accepted what we have been fed on Sunday mornings by the 'professional christians' who we pay and send up the mountain (like Israel did to Moses) to hear God for us! This resignation on our part, results in Christians being seperated from Christ - it is an abomination, and the heart of the spirit of the anti-christ!

Anything that assists Christians to stop and think for themselves for a change has got to be doing more good than bad - hence my interest and support in this community.

Quest on!

There is a story told, I think originally by a Rabbi, that when Moses and the Israelites were having a wild party to celebrate their escape from Egypt, and God said something like "My children lie drowned at the bottom of the sea, and you are singing and dancing?"

I've found this whole discussion somewhat strange, because something seems to be missing. I'm not sure what the "traditional" teaching on holiness is, and I'm not sure what it has to do with all this.

On Holy Saturday we sing those songs in church -- the some of Moses, the song of the three children in the fiery furnace, and finally Psalm 82, and singing the last verse after every verse: Arise, O God, judge the earth, for to thee belong all nations", and while singing that as the chorus everyone bangs their feet on the floor, making as much noise as possible.

And the "all nations" is just the point. Both the Israelites and the Egyptians are invited to the party this time around.

The world lies in the power of the evil one, and God had come himself to liberate both Israelites and Egyptians, Jews and Greeks.