Now in Joshua

I've been busy the last few days. I've kept up the reading, but not made regular posts. The Old Testament always troubles me. God doesn't seem loving. When Achan took a robe and silver they stoned him and his wife and children as well.

Here is what I have to remind myself of:

• These people that God told the Israelites to destroy were pretty awful. The reason God allowed Israel to overtake them at the time that they did was that their sin had reached its full measure.
• I don't have God's perspective and cannot have it on this earth.
• The laws God gives the Israelites seem very gracious to the orphan, widow and alien. Those kinds of laws did not exist in any other cultures.
• This is the Old Testament. It is a world without Christ.
• The schism between God and man was terrible and it results in terrible acts between God and Man.