No Mercy

The other day I was asked this question, a question that has been asked many times by many people … "Why did God show no mercy and kill everything that breathed, when the children of Israel took the Land of Canaan?"

Here are God's commands to Israel …

Deuteronomy 7:2-6 … "And when the LORD thy God shall deliver them before thee; thou shalt smite them, and utterly destroy them; thou shalt make no covenant with them, nor show mercy unto them:
Neither shalt thou make marriages with them; thy daughter thou shalt not give unto his son, nor his daughter shalt thou take unto thy son.
For they will turn away thy son from following me, that they may serve other gods: so will the anger of the LORD be kindled against you, and destroy thee suddenly.
But thus shall ye deal with them; ye shall destroy their altars, and break down their images, and cut down their groves, and burn their graven images with fire.
For thou art a holy people unto the LORD thy God: the LORD thy God hath chosen thee to be a special people unto himself, above all people that are upon the face of the earth."

The caution is against any communion with idolaters as well as idolatry itself.

Deuteronomy 7:16 … "And thou shalt consume all the people which the LORD thy God shall deliver thee; thine eye shall have no pity upon them: neither shalt thou serve their gods; for that will be a snare unto thee."

This relentless doom of extermination which God denounced against those tribes of Canaan cannot be reconciled with the attributes of the loving character of God ... except on the assumption that their gross idolatry and enormous wickedness left no reasonable hope of their repentance from their sin.

If they were to be swept away like the people of Noah's day or the people of Sodom and Gomorrah ... wicked sinners who had filled God's measuring cup up to the top with their iniquities ... then it mattered not in what way God wiped them off the face of the earth. The judgment was inflicted; and God, as Sovereign, had a right to employ any instrument He pleased for executing His Holy judgments.

Everything … used, touched, owned, or born to them, was tainted with the sin of idolatry and had to be destroyed … God's Holiness demanded it.

The people of these abominations must not be mingled with the holy seed, Israel ... lest they corrupt them. It was better that all these lives should be lost from the world, than the true worship of God, should be lost to Israel.

As for the infants, they were guilty of the original sin brought in by Adam; they had a sin nature and was therefore at the disposal of their creator; but even being innocent infants, it was really a great favor to them to be taken in infancy, rather than reserve them, had they lived, unto the judgment of the sin of idolatry, which their parents were sure to lead them in.

God … knowing that the sin of these other nations would be like a "cancer" to Israel; the only way to keep it from infecting His people was with the total destruction of everything in the Land of Canaan that breathed … man, woman, child, infant and animal. The cancer had to be removed.

I also believe God was using this as a warning, as an example to Israel; do not follow the way of the Canaan idolaters or the same fate awaits you.

God is Love … but … God is also Holy.

I was also asked this follow up question. "Sin is still in the world today; so why doesn't God do the same thing today?"

Because of Jesus.

God poured out all of His wrath against man's sin upon His Son on the cross. Jesus paid the full price for sin. Nothing more will be added or needs to be done about sin. There will be no other sacrifice.

It's Jesus or nothing. God is satisfied … no more blood is to be spilled.

The blood of Jesus was sufficient.



Comments welcome.