Many times when I am reading in the Old Testament, I am reminded of a childhood experience. I believe I was around four years old and I had disobeyed one of my parents’ rules. The offense was bad enough that it required more than a time-out, it required a spanking. My Dad sat me down and explained to me what I had done and why he had to punish me. As the punishment ended and my tears were flowing heavily, my Dad scooped me up and sat me in his lap. He held me and allowed me to cry as he soothed my pain. To the best of his ability, he explained to me how punishing me made him sad too.
My Dad had established rules in order to protect me from dangers in the world. But he also had rules that were meant to help me grow and mature into an adult with a good character and a strong sense of right and wrong. In my immaturity, I could not see that the rules and the punishment both served a larger purpose in my life and that both flowed out of my Dad’s love for me.
These are the commands, decrees and laws the Lord your God directed me to teach you to observe in the land that you are crossing the Jordan to possess, so that you, your children and their children after them may fear the Lord your God as long as you live by keeping all his decrees and commands that I give you, and so that you may enjoy long life. Hear, Israel, and be careful to obey so that it may go well with you and that you may increase greatly in a land flowing with milk and honey, just as the Lord, the God of your ancestors, promised you.
Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart
and with all your soul and with all your strength. These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts. Impress them on your children. Deuteronomy 6:1-7
God had rescued them from a life of oppression and slavery. His desire was to give them a life of freedom and abundance. He knew this group of people would need guidance and laws in order to thrive and build a new society. His heart from the very beginning was focused on teaching them how peace and prosperity in the new land was possible. But instead of seeing the rules as guardrails set in place to help them, the Israelites could only see them as restrictive barriers that kept them from enjoying life. They didn’t want to follow God’s ways and be different they wanted to be like all the pagan cultures around them. As Esau had once done, they exchanged their future inheritance for those things that immediately satisfied their desires. And just like Esau, they too would have to live with the consequences of their choices.
There are many verses in the Old Testament concerning God’s disciplinary punishment of His people. Often these passages are very disturbing and hard to read. God’s discipline seems harsh and severe. Our modern sensibilities can’t understand how a good God can inflict such pain and suffering upon the people he supposedly loves. There are some who can only see vengeance and wrath when they read the Old Testament. But is that really the God portrayed in the Scriptures? Or is the God of the Bible more like a good Father that punishes with a purpose? My earthly father found it hard to punish me that day. His heart hurt to see his child in pain. Yet, he chose to bear his pain in order to correct me. He knew that spanking would hurt me for a few moments, but the lesson I would learn from that spanking would last me a lifetime. God chooses to discipline because of His love not in spite of it.
For me, it isn’t the passages on His discipline that stand as I read the Scriptures, but it is the countless passages of God’s compassion. The first time I read the entire Old Testament all I could see was God’s amazing love. No matter how they treat him or how many times they reject him, he keeps offering them grace.
Jonah knew this about God. Jonah hated the people of Nineveh. They were evil and Jonah wanted God to severely punish them. However, when Nineveh repented, God forgave them! God’s forgiveness enraged Jonah.
“This change of plans greatly upset Jonah, and he became very angry o he complained to the Lord about it: “Didn’t I say before I left home that you would do this, Lord? That is why I ran away to Tarshish! I knew that you are a merciful and compassionate God, slow to get angry and filled with unfailing love. You are eager to turn back from destroying people.” (Jonah 4:1-2)
In the first chapter of Isaiah, we are given the perfect example of His grace despite painful rejection.
“The children I raised and cared for have rebelled against me. Even an ox knows its owner, and a donkey recognizes its master’s care—but Israel doesn’t know its master.
My people don’t recognize my care for them.” Why do you continue to invite punishment? Must you rebel forever? Your head is injured, and your heart is sick. (Is 1:2b,3,5)
In verses 6-15, God describes how he is fed up with their rebellious hearts and their
disobedient attitudes. He sees that often even their religious acts are merely performances. We see that in much of Jesus’ interactions with the pharisees as well. In verses 16-17, God tells them what is necessary to change their ways, “wash yourselves, make yourselves clean”; “remove your evil deeds”; “Learn to do good. Seek justice. Help the oppressed. Defend the cause of orphans. Fight for the rights of widows.”
But God knows that humans are not capable on their own of changing their behavior. They cannot make themselves clean. A rebellious, stubborn heart can only be made right by the grace and provision supplied by God. So in verse 18, we see God’s amazing grace offered to all:
“Come now, let’s settle this,” says the Lord.
“Though your sins are like scarlet, I will make them as white as snow.
Though they are red like crimson, I will make them as white as wool. Isaiah 1:18
Jesus has accomplished this for all of us so, if we have accepted Jesus as our Lord, we no
longer have to face the wrath of God as those in the Old Testament. God provided a way for me to be clean. He had no reason at all to do that except that he loved me and wanted to spend eternity with me. That is the characteristic of God I see most in Scripture.
Focusing only on the spanking in my story would be a mistake. If taken out of context, the
spanking could be seen as harsh and abusive punishment. However, as I sit here fifty years later with tears rolling down my cheeks, what I remember most was his love for me. My Dad’s character drives my perspective of the discipline. As we read the Old Testament, God’s character should influence the way we read the words.
In 1 John 4:16, it says that “God is love”. It isn’t just an action or a feeling that he has toward us but it is His entire character. Because we can trust that God is love, we can trust that His discipline is always for our good.
For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant, but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it. - Hebrews 12:11