A: One does not have to go searching very far on the Internet to find people who are taking the writings of the Old Testament out of context and finding fault with the words of God. People will go to any extreme to rule out the need for God and His laws. The issues that people take umbrage with range from murder, sacrifices (including human sacrifices), slavery to rape, just to name a few. Some say that the Old Testament was harsh in its exacting. But they fail to realize it was mainly dealing with people’s hardness of heart.
Quoting from our Q&A: “God revealed the law of the Ten Commandments to the people, but since they did not have the Holy Spirit, they were unable to keep the spiritual intent of the law. However, God expected them to keep at least the letter of the law, but they were also disobedient in that regard. They sinned gravely, and sin is the transgression of the spiritual law (1 John 3:4). Because of their sinful conduct, God introduced a sacrificial system of ritual laws and regulations to remind them of their sins and to make physical amends (Hebrews 10:1-4). This system of ritual laws was only temporary (Hebrews 10:8-10). It included the laborious task of offering animal sacrifices, and sometimes it included very rigorous physical penalties, such as death by stoning. Dealing with carnal human beings, God knew that only harsh measures could prevent them from totally rebelling against Him and from living a terrible life of depravity and violence (compare Ecclesiastes 8:11). Nevertheless, even those measures did not help, and they ultimately became totally and completely corrupt (Ecclesiastes 9:3).
“It was never God’s desire to ‘force’ people to obey Him. It was never His desire to introduce harsh physical penalties for disobedience. He never wanted a sacrificial system. He did not desire animal sacrifices, but rather, that men lived in a way that such sacrifices [and penalties] would not be necessary (Psalm 40:6; 50:8-14; 51:16-17).
“God had created man as free moral agents, with the faculty of deciding for himself whether or not to follow God’s rules. God had offered Adam and Eve the gift of the Holy Spirit (symbolized by the Tree of Life), but they rejected that gift and ate instead from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, representing the concept of determining and deciding for themselves what seemed right to them. The consequence was that man began to call good evil, and evil good (Isaiah 5:20), ending up in his unspeakable depravity and his destruction in a worldwide flood (Genesis 6:5-7).“
We can easily see that many of the things that happened in the Old Testament were not what God wanted. When trying to discredit the Bible, people don’t and cannot see the entire plan of God laid out. They have no clue that God is the same yesterday, today and forever (Hebrews 13:8; 1:8-12). God doesn’t change. He still expects the Ten Commandments to be followed, both in the letter, but more importantly, in the spirit. For instance, Christ made clear that it is not only wrong to murder someone, but hatred is equally forbidden.
Nor do people realize that there is a distinction between the ritual laws introduced in the Old Testament, which had reached their finality and were abolished when Christ died for us, and the spiritual law, which is still in place. Christ did NOT come to abolish the entirety of God’s Law, but rather, Christ came to magnify the Law through the Holy Spirit. (For more detailed explanation, please read our free booklet, “Old Testament Laws Still Valid Today?”). For the last 6,000 years or so, man has been allowed to reap the rewards of his own choices. The Old Testament helps to show that the ways in which people chose to act and the things that they chose to do were not necessarily right. 1 Corinthians, chapter 10, speaks about the warnings to Israel. Verse 11 says: “Now all these things happened to them as examples, and they were written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the ages have come.”
In some cases, God expressly condemned certain conduct, such as human sacrifices. In other cases, the Bible just reports the events without specifically stating that the particular human conduct was wrong, but the reader is supposed to know that it was wrong, when it clearly violated the Ten Commandments and the statutes and judgments, defining the Ten Commandments even more (for instance, when people lied). Sometimes, the Bible may give us additional information or hints, when stating that there was no king in Israel and everyone did what was right in his own eyes. God had simply permitted human beings to make their choices, without intervening and preventing them (for instance, in the case of polygamy or slavery). In still other situations, God even used wrong choices (such as warfare) to bring about His specific purpose (for instance, to fulfill His unconditional promise to Abraham to bring his descendants into the Promised Land).
People fail to see that when the children of Israel in the Old Testament obeyed and heeded the teachings of God, they were blessed, healed, and taken care of all around. For instance, look at King Solomon who had peace in his kingdom. There was no reason for war and all the atrocities that come along with war, because God kept it peaceful.
But then the opposite is true as well. Hebrews 3:9-11; Isaiah 53:6; and Jeremiah 4:16-22 are just a few Scriptures, outlining the problems that ensued because of Israel’s and Judah’s lack of following after the laws of God.
In 1 Peter 3:15 we are told that we must be able to give an answer for the things we believe. If we don’t know the answer to some of these errors, then we could be led away from the knowledge of the Truth. It can be easy to be swayed by people who sound like they know what they are talking about. Many arguments against the Bible found on the Internet are attempting to disprove and discredit the Bible in any perceivable or dishonest way, without showing any understanding of the Scriptures (compare Jeremiah 23:36; 2 Peter 3:16). Matthew 24:10-12 points out that this type of conduct will increase as we move towards the end of this age. Notice that because of the growth of wickedness or lawlessness, the love of many will grow cold. This love for the Truth is quickly replaced with hate, iniquity and vileness.
It is the responsibility of God’s true Church to teach the Truth to its members and to others in general, as we read in Ephesians 4:11-15:
“And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints… till we all come to the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God… that we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness by which they lie in wait to deceive, but, speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the Head—Christ…”
At the end of the day, we must accept the guidance of God’s true ministers when they explain to us the Word of God in the light of the Scriptures (compare Acts 8:31; Romans 10:14-15) , and we all must individually study the Word of God for clarity and understanding in the matters mentioned earlier in this Q&A. We must understand where we stand individually in relation to God’s words and commands. 2 Timothy 3:16-17 shows us why we must make the effort to study. If we truly claim to be Christians and say we believe the Bible, we must understand what the Bible says in many different areas of life and be able to back it up with Scripture (2 Timothy 2:15).
Lead Writer: Kalon Mitchell
