A precis of chapter 10

A teenager likes loud music.  Supposing he steals records, and is severely punished by his father; that would be judicial punishment.  But supposing his penchant for loud music causes hearing loss; that would be organic punishment.

Divine punishment for sin is usually construed, in Scripture, as organic.  The destructive consequences of sin are built into the sin itself.

Except where it depicts God as violent, the Bible always describes punishment of sin in terms of divine abandonment.  God leaves us to the consequence of our sin.

The greatest blessing is the enjoyment of God’s presence and Favour (Psa 72:23).  The only real protection from enemies is to take refuge in the shelter of his wings (Psa 61:4).  God’s wrath is to be understood as the withdrawing of his presence and protection as a consequence of human sin.  For an illustration, see 2 Chron 12.

And this is so because of the kind of world God has created.  Indeed, the OT has no distinct word for punishment.  It uses, rather, the same vocabulary to speak both of sin and its consequences.  This idea is captured in James 1:14f –

‘It’s apparent that the relationship between sin and its punishment is as natural and organic as the relationship between the conception, birth, adulthood, and death of a person. God doesn’t need to punish sinners by killing them, for when their sin becomes “full-grown,” it naturally “gives birth to death.”’

See also Prov 22:8; Deut 31:17f.

Of course, there are some passages which depict God as acting violently against sinners.  But these perceptions are due to an inadequate understanding on the part of the Hebrew writers.

Taken by itself, Psa 7:12f would indicate that God punishes his enemeis judicially.  But verses 14-16 of that psalm clarifies that sin is self-punishing.  Thus the violent warrior imagery is undermined by the Spirit:

‘It turns out that God’s “sharpened sword” and “flaming arrows” are nothing other than the natural self-destructive consequences of people’s own behavior!’

See Hab 2:17.

The OT represents sin as inherently self-destructive.  The king of Tyre’s destruction comes from within him (Eze 28:18).  See also Isa 33:11-14.  Persistent sin results in self-destruction.

Consider Jesus: he never forced himself on anyone.  He never retaliated.  When people decided they didn’t want to follow him, he simply let them go.

Divine judgement on the Temple leaves it ‘desolate’.  The divine presence has departed, leaving it vulnerable to those bent on destruction (Mt 23:34-39).  Such destruction by human hands is understood by Paul to be an expression of God’s wrath (1 Thess 2:14-16).

So also in Rom 1 – God’s judgement is seen in his ‘giving them over’ to their sinful desires and actions.

Similarly, when disciplining its members, after making every effort to help them, the church is to treat them as outsiders (Mt 18:15-17).  In this, the church is following the divine pattern (Mt 18:19f).

See also 1 Cor 5:1-5, where, in reponse to sexual sin, the church turns the unrepentant person over to Satan, with a view to salvation ‘on the day of the Lord’.

Once again, it is to be noted that:

‘when God sees he must turn people over to suffer the consequences of their sin, he does so with the hope that this tough love will eventually save them.’

But does this mean that God has no control over the agents of judgement (including Satan himself)?  To be sure, the God-created moral order is such that people’s sin recoils back on them.  But this is not rigidly deterministic, but rather due to a ‘loose causal weave’.  God does not micromanage the agents of judgement, and so the outcome can be not quite what he himself had expected (Zech 1:15).

Or does this mean that God is overly passive in this conception of divine judgement?  When he withdraws, does he simply stand back and watch?  No: God continues to influence events so as to keep judgement on track, although he will never influence people in a direction that is contrary to his own character.  So, for example, when God uses a human agent to punish his own people, he does not place violent intentions in the heart of that agent that would not otherwise have been there.

We have no means today of discerning the hand of God when battles are lost and won.  We do not have Scripture to tell us.  Furthermore, Jesus rebuked people who claimed that certain disasters and afflictions came upon people because of their specific sin.  Rather, people’s afflictions are the result of the work of Satan and his minions; Jesus reveals God’s will be healing people.  When people suffer misfortune, it reflects the fact that God has endowed us will free will.  Although God graciously influences people, he never coerces them.

The God of love is willing to risk hurt (to himself, as well as to created beings) in order that people might enter into a loving relationship with him.

In conclusion:

‘The very narratives that attribute violent actions to God usually provide clues that this violence was actually carried out by other agents who were already bent on violence. Though the authors ascribe the violence involved in a divine judgment to God, the only thing God actually did is precisely what he did on the cross: with a grieving heart and a redemptive motive, he withdrew his presence to allow violent agents to do what they already wanted to do.’