Three Crucial Truths When God’s Judgment Seems Too Severe

How many times have you winced at a story of God’s judgment in the Bible, unsure of how to respond or what to make of it?

Stories of God’s Judgment in the Bible can be difficult to swallow. In response to reading them, Christians often tend to avoid discussing these stories or thinking too deeply about them. Sometimes, like with the flood in Noah’s day, they have even been turned into sing-along songs or bright and colorful children’s books. But let’s face it: The Flood of Noah isn’t a happy story of an old man with a beard upon a floating petting zoo. It’s a story of God’s severe judgment.

How can Christians continue to believe that God is good when God’s judgment seems so outrageous? After many hours studying and wrestling with the judgment of God, I have found three crucial truths most helpful.

God’s Judgment in Light of God’s Character

The first truth when thinking about God’s judgment is this: The Bible tells us plainly and repeatedly that God is good. For example, 1 Chronicles 16:34 says, “Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good!” Psalm 25:8 says, “The LORD is good and does what is right.”

Related: Why Would God ask Us to Fear Him?

I recognize the skeptic inside of you may be asking, “So what? Couldn’t the Bible be wrong?”We have many other articles on josh.org showing why we can trust the Bible, but my point in mentioning this first crucial truth is that if this: People often worry that if all these stories of God’s judgment are true, then God must be a horrible person. But if the Bible is true, then God is always good even if we don’t understand how God could be good in light of His judgments.

If the Bible is true, then however we understand God’s judgments, we cannot conclude that God is not good. Those conclusions have already been made for us in the same Bible that tells of God’s judgments. When we (or others) conclude differently, we must have misunderstood something about God, goodness, or the context of God’s actions. And that leads us to our second truth.

God’s Judgment in Light of God’s Highness

I often put it this way: A spider does not understand the deep things of a dog, a dog does not understand the deep things of a human, and a human does not understand the deep things of God. Consider Isaiah 55:8–9:

“My thoughts are nothing like your thoughts,” says the LORD. “And my ways are far beyond anything you could imagine. For just as the heavens are higher than the earth, so my ways are higher than your ways and my thoughts higher than your thoughts.

When it doesn’t make sense how God can be good in light of Noah’s flood, the warfare in Joshua, or even the doctrine of hell, don’t panic. God’s ways are higher than ours, so it makes sense that it doesn’t make complete and total sense to us. Consider this: if you have a disagreement with the author of knowledge, who do you suppose is the one confused here?

Don’t misunderstand me. I am not saying that the judgment of God is one big mystery, and we have to rely on blind faith against our natural intuition. I wrote Why Did God Do That? specifically to show how God reveals his goodness in the hard passages of Scripture. When you really study the Bible and dig into the context, you find answers. Good ones. Yes, challenges remain, but we can know enough to trust God is good even when things still don’t make complete sense.

A good God has good reasons for his acts of judgment in the Bible. Even still, something is missing from the equation. 

God’s Judgment in Light of God’s Mercy

Whenever we see stories of God’s judgment in the Bible, we may view God as an angry tyrant or a vengeful dictator. Not so! Lamentations 3:32–33 says, “Though [God] brings grief, He also shows compassion because of the greatness of His unfailing love. For He does not enjoy hurting people or causing them sorrow.” Similarly, Ezekiel 33:11 is a heartfelt cry from God pleading with His listeners to repent because “I take no pleasure in the death of wicked people.” We must take these verses with us when we journey to the difficult stories of judgment in the Bible. They show that just as a good judge does not enjoy locking people away, God does not relish executing judgment. God delights in showing mercy.

Related: Why does God Keep Satan Around?

Consider this: God’s laws in the Bible were intended to bring life and fulfillment. But something went wrong. All throughout history, people have chosen not to follow God’s ways. The Biblical word for this is “sin.” Since God is perfectly just, He must punish sin. So God came down in human form and took the punishment of sin Himself when he died on the cross. It’s as if God looked upon the judgment before us and said, “Over my dead body!” The difference between the expression and reality being that Jesus Christ then defeated death and rose from the grave.

Take the Dare

Many people think the Bible is a scary place, and anyone who takes it seriously will give up on Christianity. This is simply not true. The Bible teaches God is good, His understanding is higher than our understanding, and God’s heart is to show mercy. So press into those challenging stories of judgment, like the flood of Noah, the plagues of Egypt, or the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. I dare you. Properly understood, you will find that God reveals Himself as good even in those difficult stories, and you will be ready to share that with others who continue to struggle.

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