Gory God?

Q: Why is there so much violence in the Bible?

A: This question comes up frequently, especially in connection with the wars of extermination in the Old Testament (see for example, Deut. 20:16-18) and the idea of an eternally burning hell (as some interpret Rev. 14:9-11). To many honest observers, passages like these appear to make God out to be little more than an omnipotent Hitler and a moral monster. Who could worship a god like that?

So how are we to understand hard passages like these? Undeniably, the Bible tells some rather shocking stories, most of which are the tragic consequences of evil in the world. But what we may call “genocidal” passages seem to lay the responsibility directly at God’s feet. How can we reconcile such pictures with the Bible’s claim that “God is love” (1 John 4:8), that “righteousness and justice are the foundation” of His throne (Ps. 89:14)?

Regarding God’s command to exterminate the Canaanites, we need to notice what else the Bible says about that situation. The preceding verses show that the Israelites were to avoid war whenever possible and, should war arise, to spare women and children (Deut. 20:10-15). Also, the nations of Canaan could have been incorporated into Israel had they, like Rahab, repented of their evil. Some of the heinous Canaanite practices included burning children alive as sacrifices to their gods, temple prostitution, incest, and bestiality. Unfortunately, although they were given 400 years to abandon the worship of their gods of sex and violence and turn to the God of Israel (Gen. 15:16), they refused, and fought against Israel. If they remained in the land, it would have hindered God’s plan for Israel to be a light to the nations. Both history and archaeology reveal how the people that remained in Canaan constituted a persistent source of temptation and apostasy.

Read rightly, the Bible indicates that the wicked will be totally destroyed, that the alternative to eternal life is not an eternity in burning torment but death.

God says, “I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way and live” (Eze. 33:11). He is “not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance” (2 Peter 3:9). “All” means all. That includes not just the Canaanites but every person who has ever lived or will live. In Noah’s day God’s Spirit appealed to earth’s inhabitants for 120 years to repent so as not to perish in the coming Flood.

Read rightly, the Bible indicates that the wicked will be totally destroyed, that the alternative to eternal life is not an eternity in burning torment but “death” as “the wages of sin” (Rom. 6:23)—what it elsewhere calls “the second death” in the lake of fire (Rev. 21:8). More amazing still, the Bible describes God as willing to lay Himself on the altar of sacrifice, dying on the cross to save us sinners (John 3:16). It is only to purge evil from the universe forever that God ultimately consents to extinguish in the fires of hell those who continue to cling to sin. There are many voices today trying to tell us what is just and good and right. But despite what critics may allege, only the God of the Bible perfectly reflects these ideals.