Is God More Tolerant than He Used to Be?

There seems to be an increasingly popular notion that God as revealed in the Old Testament and God as revealed in the New Testament are very different; not that they are different Gods, but that the way He acts is different during those two periods of history. In the Old Testament, God is seen as vengeful and quick to anger, as shown in instances when even some Israelites are sentenced to death, which is quickly carried out. In fact, sometimes God Himself suddenly (from our perspective) strikes someone down; one prominent example is Uzzah, the Israelite who died because he touched the ark of the Covenant as it was being transported on a cart; you can read the story in 2 Samuel 6:1-8. God in the New Testament, in contrast, is seen as loving, patient, and slow to anger.

First of all, in case you’re not familiar with the regulations regarding transporting the ark of the covenant in Old Testament Israel, here’s what Exodus 25:13-15 says: “Then make poles of acacia wood and overlay them with gold. Insert the poles into the rings on the sides of the chest to carry it. The poles are to remain in the rings of this ark; they are not to be removed.” 2 Samuel 6:6-7 tells us, “When they came to the threshing floor of Nacon, Uzzah reached out and took hold of the ark of God, because the oxen stumbled. The Lord’s anger burned against Uzzah because of his irreverent act; therefore God struck him down and he died there beside the ark of God.” As R.C. Sproul (now in heaven) has written, the real question is: Why was the ark being transported on a cart?! Furthermore, Uzzah was probably a Levite; more specifically, he was likely a Kohathite, having the responsibility of taking care of the sacred things, in which case he should have known better. If he wasn’t a Kohathite, then he shouldn’t have been walking alongside the ark. And again, the ark was not supposed to be on a cart in the first place, but carried by means of poles inserted into the rings on the sides.

Regardless of the reason for it, some will still say that God was capricious or unfair in striking down Uzzah when he was “just trying to help.” This is perhaps a reflection of our difficulty in comprehending the difference between living under the theocracy of Old Testament Israel and our current world. In his illuminating book Ten Lies about God, Erwin Lutzer makes this point in writing about the old covenant that God made with the Old Testament Israelites compared with the new covenant of the New Testament. Now God calls out people from every tribe, tongue, and nation, forming us into the church. In the Old Testament, the Israelites were God’s chosen people; not that He didn’t also save some people from other nations, but that His people had entered into a covenant: if they obeyed the laws God gave them, they would be blessed; if they disobeyed, they would be punished.

This brings us to another distinction that Lutzer makes: the earthly Mount Sinai vs. the earthly–and especially heavenly–Mount Zion. Mount Sinai was where God gave Moses the Ten Commandments; Mount Zion as used in the Bible is a reference to Jerusalem as a whole, and when God establishes the new heaven and the new earth, there will also be a new Jerusalem, a heavenly one (Revelation 21).

Most significantly of all, from my perspective, Lutzer makes a third distinction between immediate, physical judgment and future, eternal judgment. The Old Testament Israelites were sometimes punished for their disobedience with immediate death; when people in the New Testament era don’t put their trust in Jesus Christ, they are punished for eternity in hell. Lutzer writes: “In a sense we can say that the harsh penalties of the Old Testament demonstrated an overabundance of grace: by seeing these punishments immediately applied, the people had a visual demonstration of why they should fear God. In our day, these penalties are waived, and as a result people are free to misinterpret the patience of God as laxity or indifference. Today God allows sins to accumulate and delays their judgment.” He goes on to quote Romans 2:5: “But because of your stubbornness and your unrepentant heart, you are storing up wrath against yourself for the day of God’s wrath, when his righteous judgment will be revealed.” Notice that phrase “storing up wrath;” that should give us pause, to put it mildly. Here’s a related verse, Ecclesiastes 8:11: “When the sentence for a crime is not quickly carried out, the hearts of the people are filled with schemes to do wrong.” Just think of what our contemporary society would be like if sentences for crimes were quickly carried out!

I think it is clear that in general, God’s punishment of individuals tended to be swift in the Old Testament; however, are there instances in the New Testament where the Lord quickly judged disobedient people? Ananias and Sapphira in Acts 5 come to mind; the Lord struck them down for lying to the Holy Spirit about land they had sold. A less obvious example is some in the Corinthian church in regard to the Lord’s Supper; the Apostle Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 11:29-30: “For anyone who eats and drinks without recognizing the body of the Lord eats and drinks judgment on himself. That is why many among you are weak and sick, and a number of you have fallen asleep.” In other words, some believers in the Corinthian church died because of their sin in relation to the Lord’s Supper. As a final contemporary example, in his video series The Holiness of God, R.C. Sproul tells the story of a man who shook his fist and said, “If there is a God, let Him strike me down!” In a matter of days, God did just that.

As I think about the distinction between immediate, physical judgment and future, eternal judgment, which is worse? I suppose the answer is obvious. I think about Uzzah, for example; only the Lord knows a person’s heart, but I believe we will see him in heaven. (I don’t think this applies to all OT Israelites who died suddenly; the rebellion of Korah, Dathan, and Abiram in Numbers 16 comes to mind.) Is it going to be better in eternity for someone who lived to be 100–but never trusted Christ–than for Uzzah?

If you’ve made it this far, here are some encouraging words about the Lord’s love and patience with us. 2 Peter 3:9 tells us this: “The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. Instead he is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.” I should add that lest you think the Lord was “impatient” in the Old Testament, here’s what King David wrote in Psalm 103: “The Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love.” The Lord is indeed patient with us, wanting us to come to repentance. If that doesn’t describe you, I pray that today will be the day when you turn in repentance to Jesus Christ in saving faith. If you have any questions about how to do that, I’ll be more than happy to help you!