[MadPoet]

Originally Posted by Annoni

I think people focus way too much on how just He is and that scares people off because they never hear the forgiveness.

But God isn't exactly being forgiving when he would order people to be stoned. He isn't exactly being kind and just when he has the POWER to stop some of the things that are hurting humans today, that are beyond their own power to stop, yet refuses to. He isn't being kind when he sends homosexuals to Hell but allows repenting mass murders enter Heaven. I know that God is supposed to be perfect and never make mistakes, but commanding someone to stone another human being is far from perfect, because when God did that he was going against his very OWN ten commandments. So my question is, why would God do something like that to begin with...?

Perhaps the better thing would not be to not believe in the God in the Old Testament whatsoever, because clearly, God must have undergone a severe personality change between the time of the old testament and the new. The problem is that I entered the Christian faith being taught to believe that God was exactly those things you listed - king, forgiving, etc. But then imagine my shock when I realized that God KILLED every single living thing on his earth in a great flood, because they weren't perfect like him. It doesn't make sense to me. Why would I want to worship a murderer? Because judging by the new testament, it wouldn't be hard to assume that He's exactly that.