Why does God seem different in the Old Testament?

Answer 1

Because He came to fulfill the law that His Father, the "God of the Old Testament", established for the Israelites safety and purity. Those laws today are still good to follow, but are not mandatory anymore. (See verses below.)

There was a man named Nicodemus, a Jewish religious leader who was a Pharisee. 2 After dark one evening, he came to speak with Jesus. "Rabbi," he said, "we all know that God has sent you to teach us. Your miraculous signs are evidence that God is with you."

3 Jesus replied, "I tell you the truth, unless you are born again,[a] you cannot see the Kingdom of God."

4 "What do you mean?" exclaimed Nicodemus. "How can an old man go back into his mother's womb and be born again?"

5 Jesus replied, "I assure you, no one can enter the Kingdom of God without being born of water and the Spirit.[b] 6 Humans can reproduce only human life, but the Holy Spirit gives birth to spiritual life.[c] 7 So don't be surprised when I say, 'You[d] must be born again.' 8 The wind blows wherever it wants. Just as you can hear the wind but can't tell where it comes from or where it is going, so you can't explain how people are born of the Spirit."

9 "How are these things possible?" Nicodemus asked.

10 Jesus replied, "You are a respected Jewish teacher, and yet you don't understand these things? 11 I assure you, we tell you what we know and have seen, and yet you won't believe our testimony. 12 But if you don't believe me when I tell you about earthly things, how can you possibly believe if I tell you about heavenly things? 13 No one has ever gone to heaven and returned. But the Son of Man[e] has come down from heaven. 14 And as Moses lifted up the bronze snake on a pole in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, 15 so that everyone who believes in him will have eternal life.[f]

16 "For God loved the world so much that he gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life. 17 God sent his Son into the world not to judge the world, but to save the world through him.

18 "There is no judgment against anyone who believes in him. But anyone who does not believe in him has already been judged for not believing in God's one and only Son. 19 And the judgment is based on this fact: God's light came into the world, but people loved the darkness more than the light, for their actions were evil. 20 All who do evil hate the light and refuse to go near it for fear their sins will be exposed. 21 But those who do what is right come to the light so others can see that they are doing what God wants."

John 3:1-21

(Taken from Bible.com [New Living Translation])

Answer 2

A:The early Christian Gnostics asked this question. They simply could not reconcile the harsh and unloving God of the Old Testament with the loving God of the New Testament, and decided there must be two Gods. There were different sects within the Gnostic branch of Christianity, but the common definition was to use the name the Demiurge for what they believed was the lesser divinity of the Old Testament.

It is part of the evolution of religions everywhere for the gods to evolve from controlling, threatening beings to benevolent one, and arguably that is the case here.

Answer:

It's mainly because of errant, deceptive human perception.

"For I AM the Lord, I CHANGE NOT; therefore ye sons of Jacob are not consumed." (Mal.3:6)

Both God's intolerance for evil, tempered with His "mercy," is evident throughout the Bible... in both testaments... even in His Commandments:

"...for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of THEM THAT HATE ME; and shewing MERCY unto thousands of THEM THAT LOVE ME and KEEP MY COMMANDMENTS." (Ex.20:5-6)

Jesus Christ is revealed in the Bible to be that "harsh Creator God of the Old Testament":

"All things were made by Him; and without Him was not any thing made that was made." (John 1:3)

"He was in the world, and THE WORLD WAS MADE BY HIM, and the world knew Him not." (verse 10)

He's the same in the Old Testament or the New. He changes not.

"Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and to day, and for ever." (Heb.13:8)

Yes, He sacrificed Himself for His creation in the New Testament when He came in the flesh, for that purpose. But His judgments are no less harsh in either testament, to those who disobey and HATE HIM. And no less merciful to those who LOVE HIM... Old or New Testaments.

Much of modern professing Christianity is under the false impression that the God of the Old Testament was Jesus' "doddering old" Father who botched everything up... and that His Son had to come along later to do away with all those harsh laws that kept getting in the way of men being allowed to do anything they wanted.

Modern professing Christianity paints a false picture of the New Testament Jesus as being more of a push-over than the Jesus of the Old. But it's just not true. Whenever He confronted those who hated Him in the New Testament, He wasn't above "letting them have it."

"...woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, HYPOCRITES!... " (Matt.23:13-15).

"...woe to you, ye blind guides... ye fools and blind..." (verses 16-17).

"...ye serpents, ye generation of vipers, how can ye escape the damnation of hell?" (verse 33)

The God of the Old Testament became "harsh" and angry in the New after He became flesh and blood. Remember His wrathful "cleansing of the Temple?" Remember His rebuke of Peter: "...GET THEE BEHIND ME, SATAN: for thou art an offense to Me..." (Matt.16:23).

And when He returns to gather to Him those who LOVE HIM with His army of angels, making war [Rev.19:11] upon those who HATE HIM... the world is not going to recognize their reputed loving, merciful, "push-over Jesus" whose servants they have been persecuting and killing the past several millennia.

They are going to see the same God of the Old and New Testaments in His wrath.

The Jesus that "seems" to be so much milder and laid back than the Old Testament God [who is really the SAME GOD] is going to surprise all those who don't really know Him... those who HATE HIM. Those who survive His initial assault on man's armies gathered at Armageddon, bent on repelling Him:

"These shall make war with the Lamb, and the Lamb shall overcome them: for He is Lord of lords, and King of kings: and they that are with Him are Called, and Chosen, and Faithful." (Rev.17:14)

They're going to witness the perceived harsher "Old Testament Jesus." And those deceived remnant nations who remain alive to see Him seated on His throne will hear Him say:

"...those Mine enemies, which would not that I should reign over them, bring hither, and SLAY THEM BEFORE ME." (Luke 19:27)

He won't "seem so different" then from how He was deemed in the Old Testament to those who once perceived Him otherwise.

The two Gods of the Old and New Testaments are the same person. If there's anything "different" about Him... it's only in the different ways He handles those who hate Him and those who Love Him.