Hi, Lulav, thank you so much! I'm just trying to learn as much as I can and I really like what you guys have to say.
Oh, and sure, I'll post some examples!
Exodus 4:24 when Moses didn't circumsize his child.
At a lodging place on the way, theLord met Moses and was about to kill him. But Zipporah took a flint knife, cut off her son’s foreskin and touched Moses’ feet with it. “Surely you are a bridegroom of blood to me,” she said. So the Lord let him alone. (At that time she said “bridegroom of blood,” referring to circumcision.)
Numbers 27 where Moses is denied the Promised Land after he became infuriated and made a mistake.
Then the Lord said to Moses, “Go up this mountain in the Abarim Range and see the land I have given the Israelites. After you have seen it, you too will be gathered to your people, as your brother Aaron was, for when the community rebelled at the waters in the Desert of Zin, both of you disobeyed my command to honor me as holy before their eyes.” (These were the waters of Meribah Kadesh, in the Desert of Zin.)
2 Samuel 12 where David's son died even though he repented.
Nathan answered, “The Lord has taken away your sin. You will not die. But what you did caused the Lord’s enemies to lose all respect for him. For this reason the son who was born to you will die.”
Then Nathan went home. And the Lordcaused the son of David and Bathsheba, Uriah’s widow, to be very sick. David prayed to God for the baby. David fasted and went into his house and stayed there, lying on the ground all night. The elders of David’s family came to him and tried to pull him up from the ground, but he refused to get up or to eat food with them. On the seventh day the baby died. David’s servants were afraid to tell him that the baby was dead.
Genesis 38: 8-10 The story of Onan
Then Judah said to Onan, “Sleep with your brother’s wife and fulfill your duty to her as a brother-in-law to raise up offspring for your brother." But Onan knew that the child would not be his; so whenever he slept with his brother’s wife, he spilled his sperm on the ground to keep from providing offspring for his brother. What he did was wicked in theLord’s sight; so the Lord put him to death also.
I know there is a perfectly good reason why all these things happened, this is not a challenge or obstruction to my faith in any way. I just want to understand why it seems that God was so wrathful in the OT and so merciful in the NT? Why did He let Mary Magdalene go instead of allow her to be stoned for her sin? What changed? Why doesn't He go around punishing people left and right especially since we're so much more sinful and defiant now?
Also, I'm sorry, allow me to clarify, when I say it seems as if they portray God that way, the "they" I'm referring to are the Biblical writers.