by: T.C. Lo 盧天賜 (November 4, 2020)
The entire Bible contains 66 books, of which the Old Testament has 39 books and the New Testament 27 books. An arithmetic acrostic “3×9=27” may be helpful for us to remember these two numbers.
The Book of Isaiah is one of the Old Testament books that the Lord Jesus loved to quote. When the Lord first came out to preach, He quoted the book of Isaiah (see Luke 4:17).
What’s interesting is that the Book of Isaiah happens to have 66 chapters. The first 39 chapters concern with sin and judgment whereas the latter 27 chapters lay weight on the grace and glory of God and the hope of God’s children. Such loosely division of Isaiah seemingly mirrors the two images of God derived from His very character: His stern face reflects His holiness, judgment, and wrath upon mankind; and His benevolent face associated with His love, forgiveness, and grace toward His children.
Cursory reading of the Bible by some people could easily lead them to draw a misguided conclusion that the God of the Old Testament (the Father God) is stern and the God of the New Testament (God’s Son, Jesus) is benevolent.
The God of the Old Testament (specifically referring to the Father) is a violent God, He poured out wrath upon us. No small amount of cases of mass killings of people, apparently at God’s behest, are recorded in the O.T. Examples abound:
- The Flood (Genesis 6-8)
- The cities of the plain, including Sodom and Gomorrah (Genesis 18-19)
- The Egyptian firstborn sons during the Passover (Exodus 11-12)
- The Canaanites under Moses and Joshua (Numbers 21:2-3; Deuteronomy 20:17; Joshua 6:17, 21)
- The Amalekites annihilated by Saul (1 Samuel).
- etc.
On the contrary, the God of the New Testament (especially referring to God’s Son, Jesus) is the God of love and grace. In the Gospel, we see our Lord Jesus went about doing good. He was an itinerant preacher to accomplish His merciful designs, He frequently visited large and populous places, and places of public resort. Numerous examples support the claim of His kindness.
- Jesus opened the eyes of the blind; He gave hearing to the deaf; and He raised the dead (Matthew 11:5).
- Jesus did good to the souls of men. The ignorant were instructed by Him in the essential doctrines and duties of religion (Matthew 5:1, 2; Luke 19:47; John 8:2). He strengthened the weak and wavering, and comforted mourning penitents (Matthew 5:4; Matthew 11:28). Lord Jesus instructed His disciples to “put your sword back in its place” (Matthew 26:52). Jesus also instructed us to love and pray for our enemies.
Jesus’ benevolence is remarkable. Human beings may occasionally be charitable but their charity is not without impure motive. In contrary, the intentions of Jesus in doing good were pure and perfect. He was moved by the transcendent goodness of His nature to acts of kindness. Jesus persevered in doing good. He was never weary of it.
Because of this, a popular but severely distorted concept has developed. People believe that it is the Son, not the Father, who alone extremely identifies Himself with our fallen state. In our needs, the Son stands on our side and acts as our mediator to calm the Father’s anger. While the Father is ready to punish us and send us to hell, the Son intercedes, “Punish me! Let me bear your anger.”
This concept creates tension that divides the Godhead. It also seems that the Father has His own agenda and the Son asks the Father to change His mind. This view leads to a certain widespread and prevalent belief: the Son is more loving, patient, and compassionate than the Father. Unthoughtful reading of the Bible does give people this impression.
In this sense, Christians seem to have a tendency to be a “Unitarians” supporter of the Son. Although we still learn, devote, and worship the Father, we do these in terms of etiquette and fear of Him, at the core, we completely ignore Him. This is obviously a very wrong theological view.
It can be seen that if we regard impressions or feelings as truth, it can easily produce an undesirable butterfly effect (The butterfly flutters here, but a few days later it causes a tornado hundreds of miles away). These seemingly indifferent matter can greatly distort theological orthodoxy.
But the Old Testament such as in Psalm 145:8 it clearly says, “The Lord (God, the Father) is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and rich in love.” Isn’t the Father same in temperament as the Son Jesus?
The New Testament John 3:15 says, “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.” Who sent this loving Jesus into the world to save us? The answer is, of course, God the Father! Can we say that the Father is not loving?
On the other hand, Jesus did at times express righteous indignation throughout His earthly ministry:
One commentator says, Jesus clearly displayed anger during His earthly life. The primary example is His response to those who were making a profit by exchanging money and selling animals at the temple (Matthew 21:12-13; Mark 11:15-18; John 2:13-22).
On another occasion, Jesus asked the religious leaders if it was okay to heal a person on the Sabbath day. When they would not answer, we are told, “he looked around at them with anger” (Mark 3:5) before healing a man. His harshness centered on the attitudes of religious teachers who claimed to know the Law yet cared more about themselves than whether a person was healed. So yes, Jesus was angry at times, yet did not sin (Hebrews 4:15).
Therefore, advocating “strict-Father and merciful Son” is a wrongheaded dichotomy. The disposition or the character of the Old Testament Father and of the New Testament Jesus is the same. They are of the one Triune God who is in and of themselves harmonious, tension-free, and should serve as a model for us of ideal relationships.
I Posted this earlier in Chinese:
This question came up again in recent Bible study group, so I elaborate and enhance the content and rewrite it in English here.
