Why does God seem different in the Old and New Testaments?
God of the Old Testament burns Sodom, drowns Egypt's army and orders whole nations destroyed; God of the New Testament forgives His killers from a cross. Many readers wonder whether these can be the same God — and the writers below say yes, but insist that what changed was not God's nature, but the ground on which He was dealing with man.
One God, Two Ways of Speaking
The question is old, and it is not only asked by opponents of the Bible. One writer meets it head on:
J T MawsonThere are no contradictions between God's words in the Old Testament and in the New... But there are others who are not enemies who are puzzled when they consider the contrast between law and grace, and they ask, Can it be the same God who gave the law in the Old Testament who has revealed His grace in the New? Yes, the very same.
The difference lies in the relationship God had taken up at each point. A ruler sending an army against rebels is not acting as a parent — and it is the same person in both roles:
William KellyAt Sinai there was a nation, God's rebellious subjects; and He was laying down in thunder and lightning, and with a voice more terrible than either, what He could not but require from guilty Israel. But when God, who spoke thus terribly, speaks now, how is it? By His Son. It is the same God, but His voice how different!
Law Was Never Meant to Show Us God
The two Testaments have two different subjects. The law put a demand on man; grace displays God:
A J PollockThere is an immense difference between law and grace. The law demands everything, and gives nothing; while grace gives everything, and demands nothing... The law was given to show what man was. Grace has been put into exercise to show what God is.
So the long, hard centuries had a purpose. They were not God in a bad mood; they were a test being run to its conclusion:
J. N. DarbyGod allowed ages to pass (the different distinct periods in which man has in various ways been put to the test, and in which he has had time to show what he is) without yet accomplishing His work of grace. This trial of man has served to show that he is bad in nature and in will.
The Hardest Part: God as a Warrior
The commands to destroy Israel's enemies trouble readers most. One writer traces the difficulty to a failure to tell the periods apart:
C. H. MackintoshHow wonderful to think of the Lord as a Man of war!... Some find it very hard to take in the idea — to understand how a kind Being could act in such a character. But the difficulty arises mainly from not distinguishing between the different dispensations. It was just as consistent with the character of the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob to fight against His enemies, as it is with the character of the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ to forgive them.
Commentators differ on how far to press this. One warns against flattening the two eras into one, since earthly righteousness and heavenly grace are not the same thing — while insisting the older way was "excellent in its season, the latter perfect for eternity" (William Kelly).
Grace Was Already There, Wrath Is Still Here
The neat split — harsh God then, kind God now — does not survive a careful reading. Kindness appears on the Bible's third page:
C. I. ScofieldLaw, in the sense of some revelation of God's will, and grace, in the sense of some revelation of God's goodness, have always existed... grace was most sweetly shown when the Lord God sought His sinning creatures and clothed them with coats of skins (Gen. 3:21).
And the severity did not vanish after Malachi. The New Testament speaks of judgment as plainly as the Old:
Morrish Bible DictionaryThe wrath of God against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men is plainly declared in scripture, and will surely fall upon the children of disobedience. Rom. 1:18; Col. 3:6... How vain then for false teachers to speak only of the love of God, and to say that because "God is love" there will be mercy for all eventually. There is grace for all now, but there is as surely a day of wrath coming, for God is righteous.
Why He Looks Clearer Now
If God seems warmer in the New Testament, it is because He has come out into the open. Before Christ, we had messages about Him; in Christ, we have Him:
Walter ScottThe Old Testament is the record of God's actions in government; the New Testament unfolds God's ways in grace. In the Old we have revelations from God; but in the New we have God Himself revealed. In the Old we have the veil unrent — that is, God in light and man in darkness, morally apart; in the New the veil is rent — that is, God is revealed, and man brought near to God.
Both halves of the truth arrived together at the cross:
J Wilson SmithBut if, in the Old Testament, the full character of man was not disclosed, neither was that of God; both are declared fully in the New — the total depravity of man, the absolute love of God.
Summary
- Same God. The contrast between the Testaments is real, but it is a contrast of dealings, not of character: "It is the same God, but His voice how different!"
- Law tested. Sinai was God putting man on trial to show what man is — a fair test run to its end over long ages.
- Grace reveals. Where law demanded and exposed, grace gives, and it shows what God is rather than what we are.
- Both, always. Grace clothed Adam in Genesis; wrath is still declared in Romans and Revelation. Neither Testament holds only one half.
- Christ unveils. The Old gave revelations from God; the New gives God Himself revealed — and "we change, dispensations change, but not so God" (J Wilson Smith).