But what we may not see is that God’s use of physical force in the Old Testament, His use of anything we might consider ‘taboo' or un-loving, was done out of His perfection in order to perfect and protect His people. When God took up a sword, it was the sanctified action for that circumstance. When He opened the earth and swallowed Korah, it was the holy and righteous response for that circumstance. If we try to judge God’s actions according to our cultural norms, or through our limited understanding of Him, we may wind up recreating God into our own image of Him – and that’s called idolatry! The simple fact is that God is perfect – and what He says and does in any circumstance is perfect.
The glory of the Old Testament is that it physically happened just as it’s written, but it’s also a spiritual example for us today. 1st Corinthians 15:46 tells us that natural things happened and the spiritual followed. The first man, Adam, was a natural man, but the second man, Jesus, is a spiritual man - this is the story of our lives, also. We are born of the flesh, but reborn of the Spirit.
What happened in the Old Testament, in the natural, is very often a spiritual example for us. It teaches us to rid ourselves of the ways of the flesh through the Spirit of God, not through physical means. We are not living life today by physically changing the circumstances around us more than being changed by the Spirit of God inside of us.
The examples of the Old Testament take on great meaning for us today when we see them as spiritual battles. We are not battling against flesh and blood, but against principalities and wickedness in high places. Through God’s Spirit in us, we annihilate anything that sets itself up against God's dominion in our lives.
This life we live is a spiritual life which overflows into the physical – all for the glory of God!
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