It is a principle of faith that belief in God's words must be maintained
in the face of evidences which declare the contrary is true.
Thus in the Old Testament, God's actions seem to say that He did
use compelling power to achieve His righteous ends, that He did
resort to force to put down rebellion, and that He did make an example
of some by crushing them with terrible punishments that
were often fatal.
The choice of belief between the declarations of God and the appearances
of what God did in the human arena, is before every person.
The greater proportion choose to believe what they think they
see rather than what God has said. Therefore, the almost universal
belief is that God does use force, that He exterminates whole
nations who have utterly rejected Him, and that He relies on compelling
power to put down rebellion.
But the true child of God will believe what God said despite any
evidences which at least appear to be contrary. God said that He
does not use force or compelling power, so he believes that, even
though he cannot rightly understand what God really did in those
Old Testament incidents. He will simply admit to the challenger
of his faith that he does not yet understand just what God did, nor
does he have to necessarily. In the meantime, he will assure the
doubting questioner that he has the plain utterances of the Word
of God, so that he can be assured that, even though he cannot explain
it in detail, God does not do what He appears to do.
This is the way faith works. It is based on the Word of God, not on appearances.
In due time such a faithful one will discover, under God's
wise tutelage, just what God actually did in each varied incident.
When he does, he will find that God did not once act contrary to
His principles, but only in perfect harmony with them.
Behold your God (F.T.Wright)
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