Mercy Before Judgment: Is the God of the Old Testament a Harsh God? w/ Dr. Gary Yates

What if the Bible’s clearest portrait of God starts with compassion, not condemnation? We sit down with Dr. Gary Yates—professor and pastor—to trace a through-line of mercy and comfort running from Sinai to the Psalms, and all the way through exile and return. Beginning with Exodus 34, where God introduces himself as merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, we explore how this creed shapes the rest of the Old Testament and reframes popular assumptions about a harsh, distant deity.

Across vivid stories, grace stops being theory. Hagar meets the God who hears in the wilderness. Elijah finds food, rest, and a renewed call under a broom tree. We revisit the conquest texts with ancient Near Eastern context in view, acknowledging tough questions while uncovering the nuance of judgment aimed at moral corruption, not ethnic erasure, and the surprising mercy extended to outsiders like Rahab. Along the way, we name how our church upbringing and family dynamics can tilt our view of God toward fear or favor—and why careful interpretation can heal those lenses.

We then map a practical theology of grace: God initiates relationship with flawed people, sustains it through provisions like sacrifice and the Day of Atonement, and restores it even after devastating failure. Repentance means turning, and grace empowers the turn. The Psalms model honest faith, giving language for seasons when God feels silent and showing how remembering his character revives courage. Jonah challenges our blind spots as we confront whether we want mercy for those we dislike as much as we want it for ourselves. Threaded through it all is divine patience—the long-suffering love that refuses to give up on people.

If you’re wrestling with hard passages, heavy seasons, or a history of fire-and-brimstone faith, this conversation offers clarity, context, and comfort. Listen, reflect, and share it with someone who needs a gentler, truer vision of God. If it resonates, subscribe, leave a review, and tell us: which story most reshaped your view of grace?

Books by Dr. Yates

30 Days to Jeremiah

The Message of the Twelve

Transcript

Welcome And Topic Setup

SPEAKER_00 0:05

Alright, everyone, welcome back to the God Attachment Healing Podcast. I'm excited that you're here. It's been a really great journey just having these very uh insightful conversations about how God heals his people, how he meets our needs, and how he continues to speak to us through his word, through prayer, through the church. And um we're I'm just really excited about these conversations that we've been having. So hopefully they've been a blessing to you. And today I get to interview uh Dr. Gary Yates, and he is a professor at Liberty and also a pastor at Living Word Baptist Church. And Dr. Yates, I'm excited to have you here today, sir.

SPEAKER_01 0:48

Yeah, thanks for asking me to be a part of it. I'm looking forward to the looking forward to the conversation.

Starting With God’s Character In Exodus 34

SPEAKER_00 0:52

Absolutely, absolutely. And uh yeah, so for those of you guys who are listening, uh today our topic is really about exploring and understanding God's grace and comfort through the Old Testament. And um, the reason why I was thinking about this topic is because usually the way that people try to um explain God, especially in the Old Testament, more as this judge and maybe warrior and other descriptions of kind of getting this um stronger. Uh I don't know, some people would describe it as harsh and how he dealt with some of the punishments with his people. But we often miss also the grace and comfort that he's shown to his people as well, both in the Old Testament and also in the New Testament through Jesus. So um, yeah, Dr. Yates, just in general, what what are some thoughts that you have about people's misconceptions or thoughts that when they speak about God in the Old Testament, they only see him through that lens of judgment and justice and harsh and punishments and all of these things because it shapes how we experience God?

Mercy And Justice Held Together

SPEAKER_01 2:03

Yeah, well, I think first of all, just to admit that um it's somewhat understandable uh when we when we look at all of the judgments, the flood, the exile, uh all of the occasions of war and violence in the Old Testament. I I think though that maybe a good starting point is to realize that's not really where the Old Testament begins when it wants to talk to us about the person of God. And uh one of the one of the key passages that I think demonstrates this is um really maybe what was the most important theological confession that Israel had about who the Lord was. And it's found in Exodus chapter 34, verses six and seven. And if it's okay, I might just read that passage to get us started. But this is the one where the Lord, um, Moses wants to see God's glory. Um, you know, this is after the golden calf, and he wants to see the glory of God and make sure that God's presence is going to be with the people of Israel as they go up to the land. And the Lord not only shows his glory, the glory, the Lord also reveals his glory by what he says. And what he says is he gives a description of himself. This is the Lord's um, you know, Instagram profile. It's what God says about himself, you know, not some theologian. And what it what it says there, he says, uh, I am Yahweh, Yahweh, uh, you know, the God I am or he is. And it's like, well, what does that mean? Well, here's the kind of God he is a Lord merciful and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression. And then it mentions that he will, of course, by no means excuse the guilty. But nothing there is mentioned about God's wrath or God's anger. The starting point for Israel when they thought of God and what they immediately experienced with God in their relationship with him, you know, after they had failed in a significant way at Mount Sinai, was God's mercy, God's grace, God's compassion, God's covenant faithfulness. And and this um this confession about God ends up showing up um, you know, eight or nine, ten different times in the old testament. And it I think it's really the the hub uh around which everything that that we see about God or you know or is revealed about God in the Old Testament needs to be seen in light of that first and foremost, and not all of these acts of violence and judgment and and war and and all the things. I I think you know, again, we just start in the wrong place sometimes.

SPEAKER_00 4:40

Gotcha. Yeah, no, and and that makes that makes a lot of sense. And as you were sharing that, you know, you mentioned how this these are the things that God is revealing about himself. And oftentimes one of the things that I think about for us as people, and maybe this is just a a natural way in which we look at things, um, we look at more so the behaviors than what we say about ourselves or what people say about themselves or what God says about himself. And I think people focus so much on, well, he did this, but aren't there other places as well where God does share about how he does bring justice and does um punish sin?

SPEAKER_01 5:20

Yeah, well, even in this passage, you know, you know, after he's given us this description of his his grace and his mercy, he says, Yeah, I will by no means clear the guilty. And he even talks about visiting the iniquity of the father, the the iniquity of the fathers on their children and their children's children, even for three or four generations. But even there, I think the the wrath and the anger of God, uh, you know, in this in this text is is tempered in certain ways because you know it says that he keeps uh mercy and grace and faithfulness for a thousand generations, uh, but only punishes sin for three or four. So I think there's always ways that even in his acts of wrath, even in his acts of judgment and justice, um, there are ways that ultimately we see the mercy of God uh shining through and all of that. Um and you know, even in even in his judgment, there's always there's always grace there in some way.

Stories Of Nearness: Hagar And Elijah

SPEAKER_00 6:19

Yeah. No, that's true. That's true. And you know, many believers often will will carry on this this feeling that um God is distant or harsh um when they look at the old testament. What do you what are what are they missing? So it sounds like they're missing this big piece of also seeing God's grace and his mercy with his people. But why do you think it's that's hard for people to understand? Like you mentioned early when we first started that it's understandable why would they see him as a just and righteous God. But what do you think people are missing that they're not able to see the grace? Because I look at scripture and I see that all the time, right? There is that, there is judgment, but there's so much grace and so much mercy with his people. Um, what do you think people are missing when it comes to understanding that aspect of God?

SPEAKER_01 7:08

Well, it may be some of the uh some of the stories in the Bible where God is especially close to people in times of need. And I I was thinking of the story of uh of Hagar, where she's you know, she's she's expelled from Abraham's house, she's all alone, she's under this bush, and and there with her son, and they're starving or thirsting to death, and she's just crying out, and and no one's there to help her. And that's where God meets her, God hears her, and and God intervenes when no one else seems to care. And and and again, I think over and over in the Bible, when people are at those places, those those Christmas, and here, you know, a woman who's all alone and has no one else to help her, completely defenseless in every way, in the most desperate situation that you could possibly imagine, that's where God shows up.

SPEAKER_03 8:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:02

And uh, yeah, you know, we could we could look at other examples of this. Elijah, when he's running away from God and or running away from his calling, and the Lord appears to him, and the first thing that the Lord does is prepare, has a has a meal prepared for him and sort of restores him and refreshes him physically and emotionally, and those kinds of things. I I I think there's you know, we there's that aspect of God in the narratives and stories of the Old Testament where God is dealing with his own people. Um, I I think maybe we we miss some of those stories and and just the personal interactions that God has with people.

Reading Hard Texts With Nuance

SPEAKER_00 8:40

Yeah. Um, do you see people making any interpretive mistakes of certain texts where they may read too much into something or not read enough? You know, I'm just now going back through um, I don't know what you think about uh Hayes and Duval, I think it is, through grasping God's Word. So just kind of learning the literary text, the historical context, and so on. Do you think people who read those passages, are they missing something from an interpretive standpoint? Where uh I don't know, I'm trying to think of maybe like Sodom and Gomorrah, right? That's a commonly held one where they try to interpret it different ways. Um, but yeah, do you see any common errors that people make when interpreting texts like that?

SPEAKER_01 9:19

Well, I I think the story that probably comes up the most when we start talking about uh the wrath of God or this angry God uh often is the story of the conquest and is often portrayed uh in a lot of contemporary discussion as um you know Canaanite genocide. But as you look at that story, you know, first of all, it's not really a story of genocide, it's not about the the racial uh purging of a group of people. It's it's more uh of uh an act of of judgment against uh a wicked society and a wicked culture, but it's not, it's it's more of a moral and religious issue, it's not an ethnic issue. And and uh I think some of the the language that's in that story, uh go in and wipe them out and destroy them and exterminate them. Uh we often don't understand that in its ancient Near Eastern context, which uh you know that that type of uh hyperbolic language was often used as war rhetoric uh and has more the idea of uh you know completely defeat them and destroy them, but but the idea that they were supposed to go in and kill every single Canaanite uh is really not realistic, and I don't think that's what God was commanding anyway. Um, you know, there's also commands to drive them out of land. God was more concerned about removing the influence of the Canaanites over the Israelites than he was in wiping out a group of people and those kinds of things. And in those those kinds of nuances, uh, sometimes these stories um it seems to me that that sometimes uh conservative people and very uh you know liberal people that want to attack the they often read the Bible in the same very literalistic ways. And sometimes I don't think we always see the nuances and um and things that are there. And and that story uh to me is one place where that really uh I think comes to the forefront.

Formation, Upbringing, And Views Of God

SPEAKER_00 11:19

Yeah, no, absolutely. And you know, another factor, and I'd be curious to get your thoughts on this, Dr. Yeats, how people grew up. So a lot of the listeners are, you know, they grew up in church, and you know, they either some of them have deconstructed, others not so much. And usually the common denominator that I find is the type of church that they grew up in shapes a lot of the way that they view God, as well as their relationship with their parents. So if they grew up in a church that was fire and brimstone, and their parents believed the same way, and maybe their parents were harsh or they were very um, yeah, when they disciplined them, so they have that idea of who God is. And then you have another group that they grew up in a more, more um maybe love and grace um filled church, and they see that aspect of God a little bit more clearly. Do you see that at all as you, you know, um preach to your congregation or even when you teach in your classes where those things kind of are a factor in how they view God?

Defining Grace: Initiate, Sustain, Restore

SPEAKER_01 12:20

Yeah, I I think uh again, sometimes it comes it emerges from um either simplistic readings of the text or or maybe when they had these questions, well, you know, uh how how do we how do we talk about a God that would uh carry out this kind of judgment against a group of people like the Canaanites? Sort of an unwillingness to really even address those questions or to admit the tensions that are there or the problems. And so they never they never got those answers. They they never um you know heard anything other than a very literalistic uh or or simplistic reading of some of these stories. And and I think that's where uh again you end up with um uh all you see there is a is a wrathful God. Yeah um you know, there like for example, with that again going back to that story, if you go back to Genesis, um, Lord tells Abraham, you're you're not going to go in and possess the land for uh another 400 years, and the reason for that is the sins of the Amorites is not yet full. So the Lord, before he carries out this judgment, there's 400 years that God's giving uh an entire culture of people an opportunity to repent. Also, you know, when you read the story, the very first thing that happens, they they haven't defeated anyone, they haven't conquered a single city. And the very first thing they do is they make an agreement that because Rahab has confessed her faith in Yahweh, that her family will be protected and um will will not be uh killed or put to death. And and I and I think that's suggesting that even the story itself is sort of undermining this idea that that that really the goal of this was to go in and kill everyone. You know, those that acknowledge the Lord, um, there was there was the possibility, I think, that they could potentially be incorporated into Israel or they were not killed or under the ban uh that was there. So there's all these sort of you know, kind of incidental details that that we often don't get, um, uh, you know, in a sort of simplistic reading, or maybe our old Sunday school stories that we're where we went through the uh you know, went through the old testament.

SPEAKER_00 14:38

Yeah, yeah. You know, it brings me to my next question of as we are exploring that and we are seeing this um these uh stories in the Bible come to life. What what do we mean then? Or yeah, what do we mean then when we say um God's grace, that God was gracious with his people, um, that God is gracious towards us. I think um, at least just speaking from for myself, I grew up in a church where it was very much excuse me, uh fire and brimstone, very harsh, very judgmental. So I grew up, and that just made sense to me. But I remember, you know, when I came to college for my master's degree, I remember that I went through a season of loneliness and kind of isolation because I felt like I had left my church and I was getting challenged by all these different uh other believers who believed differently than I did. And they were emphasizing a lot of grace. And for me, in my mind, grace was permissiveness, like you're just allowing things to happen, right? And it wasn't until I went through a season of loneliness and pain that I started to experience God's grace through one of my mentors and professors who met me where I was at, and I was like, I wonder if this is what I wonder if this is what God's grace is that I'm experiencing this pain and Lord is meeting me here where I'm at. So he was very um important in my walk and understanding what grace and love was because I never got that message as much. So when we talk about God's grace, be it the Old Testament, New Testament, what are we referring to in in that regard?

SPEAKER_01 16:12

Well, I I would see several aspects to God's grace that are really important. I I think, first of all, is that like grace uh in the Old Testament is really the basis on which God initiates relationships with either individuals or his people. Um when you look at the book of Genesis, I mean, it's a the pretty Abraham's family is a pretty messed up family as you go from generation to generation, you know, uh Jacob's sons or Esau and Jacob and the relationship that we have. And you're you're almost looking at the book of Genesis and saying, like, why is God involved with this group of people? Even, you know, Abraham himself comes from um a long line of uh of idol worshipers. So I think there's right at the very beginning, God initiates relationships based on grace, it's not based on our worthiness. And the Lord will tell Israel often, you know, I didn't I didn't choose you because you were the greatest of people, you were one of the least of peoples. I didn't choose you because of uh your righteousness or those things, you're as stubborn and hard-hearted as everyone else. So I think it initiates the relationship, but then grace also sustains the relationship. And um, you know, people people think about the Old Testament law.

SPEAKER_03 17:31

Right.

Seeking, Repentance, And Transformation

Is Suffering Required To Know Grace

SPEAKER_01 17:31

Well, God expected um, you know, God expected his people in the in the Old Testament to keep the law perfectly, obey all the commands, or or else you're gonna get it. But but God did demand obedience, but God also expected and anticipated that there would be failure to obey. So within the covenant itself, within the Old Testament law, here are the sacrifices that you can perform that will restore the relationship when it's broken. Here's a way to provide atonement for sin. Um, every year you're gonna come to the day of atonement, and here's a way for all of the sin that has accumulated in the sanctuary uh as the people have come there with sacrifice, all of that is gonna be wiped clean and cleansed away and taken care of. And even at times when sacrifice, there were there were certain sins, you know, high-handed sins, or the sins like David committed with Bathsheba, um, those those sins couldn't be remediated by sacrifice. But even then, they could be forgiven and dealt with just by God's gracious forgiveness. So when David in Psalm 51 is appealing to to God to forgive him and be gracious and merciful to him, there's nothing that David can do to restore that relationship through sacrifice. Like he can't go and offer a sacrifice that's going to fix that problem. But the Lord can graciously forgive and and that type of grace just sustain the relationship. And then I think finally, uh, you know, that the grace of God would also restore the relationship when it appeared to be hopelessly broken. Uh so when exile takes place, or even when God uses the language of uh I'm divorcing my people, I've rejected them, and the covenant seems to be broken and just kind of irreparably, like what's going to happen now? Uh the Lord promises, you know, over and over again in the prophets that he will restore his people. They've experienced the ultimate judgment of being taken away into exile, but the Lord will bring them back home and restore them. And not only that, he will restore their relation, the relationship that he has with them, and then by grace uh enable them and empower them so that they won't keep uh making the mistakes and committing the sins that they've done in the past that have required uh the kind of judgment that he's brought against them. So I, you know, you see grace at the beginning, you see grace all throughout the relationship, and then you see grace is the thing that maintains that so that it, you know, even when it looks like the covenant is completely broken, grace makes sure that um that that that relationship will be restored.

SPEAKER_03 20:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 20:20

And Dr. Eats, is there something that um that the people or us as believers need to do uh in order to be able to accept that grace? Because you you said that uh that they would have to do the sacrifices to reestablish the relationship, but some sins were too much that it wouldn't be able to be done that way. But it sounds like God's grace is it's just Him giving it to us. Is there something that people do or that we as Christians do that we can reject that grace? Is it by continuing to be disobedient or is it uh not understanding what grace actually means? Does that make sense?

Exile And The Promise Of Restoration

SPEAKER_01 20:57

I don't know if I'm yeah, I I I think the the primary response um and the way that we receive grace is one, um, you know, grace comes to us at times when it's sin's really not the issue. Um it's um we're we're going through uh a crisis or a problem, or even times when it seems like uh you talked about feeling that God has abandoned us or God is silent. And I think at those times it's it's the idea of um, you know, what James said, draw near to God and he will draw near to you. And uh the Lord tells his people, uh, like in Jeremiah 29, uh, when you seek me with all of your heart, uh, you will seek me and you will find me, and God will make himself available to. So I I think partly what we do to veil uh ourselves to his grace is that and and uh even when God is silent or when God appears to be absent. Um God is probably using those times, or God may be using that as a way of just causing us to seek him more intensely until the time that we do find him. Um, I think as far as with with grace, when when sin has occurred, the thing that God is desiring from his people is um is the idea of repentance. And and uh in in the Old Testament, the idea of repentance, uh actually the word means to turn around. And so you're re you're redirecting your life uh away from your sin, away from the disobedience, and then you're uh you know orienting your life back to God and uh to God's ways. Grace is uh never something that we receive so that we can you know go and sin more, but it it's always something that restores the relationship, empowers us, and enables us to live in a in a new way. And and I think that um you know the forgiveness that God gives his people uh is is is empowering in that way, and that you know that's that's ultimately what is able to overcome our sinful tendencies and dispositions. Like we experience this grace and the freedom of God's forgiveness, and um and that becomes transformative for us.

SPEAKER_00 23:15

Yes, yes. You know, I wonder if it would it be fair to say that we only experience God's grace when we go through times of suffering. You know, when things are good, like where we're thankful, we're grateful to God. Hey, thank you, Lord, for blessing me, and you know, everything's going well. And I know, um, at least for a number of people, where the expectation is that something's gonna happen. Something's gonna happen, and I'm just kind of waiting to see what that is, but Lord just give me the the strength to be able to get through it, right? There's this expectation that something will happen. Um, but yeah, do you think suffering is necessary for us to experience grace? I know not a lot of people like to suffer, we don't like to suffer, and but it seems to be a necessary component of us to be able to experience his grace.

Lament Psalms As A Path To Hope

SPEAKER_01 24:05

Well, I I think um the suffer the times of suffering that we go through, and um you you know, the psalms, a third of the psalms, someone's crying out to God. It's not just uh a book about praise the Lord and uh hallelujah, things are going great in my life and and thanking God. Uh often they're crying out to God. So so yeah, I think um suffering does um you know make us make connects us more to God's grace. But at the same time, I I think the uh biblical idea of grace, one of the the grace words in the Old Testament is the word hesed, which is this word that just basically it's a it's a relationship word. Um it's it's used uh at a human level for the relationships that humans would have with each other. But it's the idea of uh concern and um uh graciousness or generosity to someone based on that relationship. So often I, you know, even the the good times in life are an expression of God's grace, because all of the gifts that he gives to us are are are not things that uh that we have earned or deserved, uh, but but all of the blessings in life, like the things that are listed out in Psalm 103, for example, uh where the the the word Hesed is really prominent. Those those things are expressions of of God's grace in the good times of life. And uh in those times we can praise the Lord and thank the Lord for his grace, we can enjoy it, we live in that, we're surrounded by that kind of grace every day. But I do think that you know it's the times of suffering or trial or these lament times that people are going through in the Psalms when we become most aware of our need for grace. And and often that's what leads us to draw near to God because we're seeking that and searching that out.

SPEAKER_00 25:59

Yeah.

unknown 25:59

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 26:00

I know one of the things that happens often is we uh look at many biblical um examples of these people who experience great suffering and we identify with some part of their story and um and try to learn from that that story, whether it be, I don't know, whether it be David or Daniel or just just something that we pick up from that. I'm curious, do you have uh a specific story in in the Bible that you are that you appreciate that shows God's grace and mercy, or that you I don't know if I'd say that you identify with there, that you just like one of your favorite stories of grace and redemption, I guess?

When You Know Truth But Feel Nothing

SPEAKER_01 26:43

Well, I'm uh I I teach the prophets, so uh spent a lot of time in Isaiah and Jeremiah and and those passages. I I uh I think the way that God promises to bring his people back from exile and restore that broken relationship. And I mean, you're talking about a relationship that um God has brought against them um, you know, the covenant curses that he had warned about in Leviticus 26, Deuteronomy 28, which uh, you know, every terrible thing, and this is where we often get this idea is like, yeah, God is so incredibly uh you know wrathful and terrible, he brings all these things on people. But remember, um, it took it took them 500 years to get to the place where God did bring those judgments against them. And then when they did, uh, or then when he did, uh the Lord, the Lord was quick to restore them and to bring them back. Um, they returned to the land within 70 years. Um, you know, and ultimately Jesus, uh, I think a big reason that Jesus, uh part of his mission, is that Jesus is coming to bring about the full restoration of Israel from exile that they haven't yet experienced, uh, even when we get to the time of Jesus. But just the way that uh, you know, everything is taken away from them, but that's not the end of the story. Um, God promises to restore, God promises to do a new work in their heart. Um, I I think that's one of my favorite examples of grace in uh in the in the Hebrew Bible.

SPEAKER_00 28:22

Yeah. And and Dr. Eats, you mentioned earlier about just the Psalms, how there's many Psalms of lament, and even a lot of them sharing about um God's nearness to us in those difficult times. Are there any uh psalms that you use to encourage people who may be going through a difficult time um of lament where they're experiencing uh you know broken relationships or loss of a family member, anything like that that helps them?

SPEAKER_01 28:53

Yeah, I I think um, you know, almost um I I I kind of encourage people to just start uh in the early chapters of the Psalms because if you go through uh Psalm 3 to 41, uh a large portion uh of those uh of those psalms are their laments. And I and I think reading them cumulatively, and just you know, here's a psalm about somebody in trouble in Psalm 3, and then we get to the next Psalm, the same thing is going on, and just kind of how the repetition of all of that and how God meets all of these different individuals. I I think reading them sort of collectively uh is a is a is a is a great way of doing that. I I really appreciate uh Psalm 40, which actually starts out as a song of thanksgiving. Um thankful that God God I'm singing a new song to God because God has uh rescued me, God has delivered me, um, God has set my feet, uh, he's pulled me out of the clay and set my feet on the solid, on solid ground. And we're thinking, wow, this is this is great. The psalmist says, I just want to live the rest of my life um, you know, as an expression of thanksgiving to you. But then the second half of the psalm, and I think it's around verse 11, that it turns back to lament. And the psalmist is in trouble again and he needs God's help. And I think that is maybe one of the most honest, realistic uh portrayals of life. It's like God gets me through this one trial, his grace delivers me. I learned something new about God's grace through whatever, and I'm I'm I'm overjoyed at God's deliverance. And then I turn around and there's another problem, there's another crisis. Um, but what God has done for me in the past uh gives me confidence that the Lord can deliver me in the future. So I think I think just the way that uh thanksgiving and lament and crying for God to help out, the way those things come together in Psalm 40, uh that's one that stands out for me.

SPEAKER_00 31:00

Yeah. And the Psalms have a typical format, don't they, where it starts initially with giving thanks, then with a problem, and then back to things at the end. Am I getting that right?

Undeserving Yet Welcomed: David To Jonah

SPEAKER_01 31:13

Uh well, most of the uh the laments start with some kind of crisis, but then by the end of the psalm, um, and you know, in all but I think about all but like two of them, they're expressing their confidence. There's I I'm gonna give my vow of praise to God that I know he's going to deliver me, and when he's delivered me, I will go and tell other people what he's done for me, or I will praise the Lord. Um, David, at one point, I think in Psalm 3, he's surrounded by his enemies and he's lamenting all that, but he says, you know, I lie down and go to sleep because I know that God is the one that's in control. So most of these laments, they begin with lament, they cry out to God. Uh often they rehearse God's attributes like his Hesed or His faithfulness or the way He's answered prayer. And it seems like that meditation and reflection uh on God's character is what then enables them. Like they haven't gotten the answer to their prayer yet. They haven't been, you know, they haven't been delivered or removed from the crisis yet, but they're confident that God will do that. And it seems like just either being in the presence of God or rehearsing God's attributes and God's qualities, it's almost like it changes their entire perspective uh on what they're going through and it moves from lament to praise. And really, when you read um the Psalms as a whole, most of the Psalms at the beginning of the book are lament. Then toward the end of the book, most of the most of the psalms are thanksgiving and praise. And I think that's the way that's the way worship works. That's the progression that we go through.

SPEAKER_00 32:52

No, that makes that makes a lot of sense. I wonder if if you could speak to the aspect of Christians who know, here's I know this is what the Bible teaches, I know here's what the Psalms are teaching me throughout this um passage, but I'm not feeling uh comforted or I'm not feeling the grace of God. Um what do you share with with people who have that, who have a good understanding? Maybe they grew up in the church, they know all the verses, know the passages, and they go and they're just not feeling it. I I know that this is uh this is something I I wrestle with when it comes to um working with people because it's not that I minimize or lower the uh the effect of the feeling of not feeling God close because I know the truth is there, that he's there. But there are a lot of people who do struggle with, well, if I don't feel him, then I must be doing something wrong, right? Maybe they're not understanding the passage correctly, or they just feel like they're doing something wrong and they're trying to get close to God. Um, what would you share with them? Because they talk about the experience. I don't feel like God is close, even though I know um theoretically or theologically that He is close.

SPEAKER_01 34:01

I maybe one of the things um that would help with uh when you go through the Psalms is just uh is just to point out the number of places where the psalmist is is expressing exactly what they're saying is that God seems absent or God seems silent, or um, you know, I'm I'm crying out to God, but I'm not getting the del. Um and I think sometimes being able to uh voice that as a complaint to God, to realize that uh that there are times that we can express uh anger or negative emotions toward God. And that's that's part of worship as well. Um I I think you know, often like, well, wow, I'm not I'm not sure I can talk to God this way. But but you know, look at what uh look at you know in the Psalms, like why are you asleep? Or uh Psalm 44 is one, it's it's more of a kind of a national lament, but the people have been defeated in battle. And instead of them talking to God as their shepherd, uh really it's almost the anti-Psalm 23. Feel like we feel like God has sold us to the butcher. So I think helping people to understand that they can express these negative emotions to God. They can bring that directly, not just to their counselor, which you know sometimes that's helpful as well, to talk to a friend or someone that's been through that experience, but just to realize that you can come to God and tell God that um, you know, this, that your your disappointment, your frustration, your anger, um, your your bewilderment as to why God has uh you know not answered your prayer in a certain way or not not been there when you've needed him. Um I mean, there's just a lot of that in the scriptures, uh, the book of Lamentations.

unknown 35:45

Yeah.

The Scandal Of Grace For Our Enemies

SPEAKER_01 35:45

You know, hey, we we understand, we understand the theology that we sinned and we deserve the judgment, but you know, come on, God, uh, this is uh what you've done is a bit excessive. And and in some sense, I think they're right. Um, but um they they can come to God and express that. Uh Jeremiah uh again uh often expresses his disappointment with God. And that one's been helpful, you know, to or those prayers have been helpful to me because those of us that are in ministry, uh sometimes we expect that, well, you know, we're we're never gonna go through this because we're doing the Lord's work. And and Jeremiah reflects, here's someone that was going through this specifically because he was doing God's work. And so those those kinds of prayers have been helpful to me, uh, you know, um from the context of a pastor and someone involved in ministry.

SPEAKER_00 36:36

Yeah. I we I couldn't help but think about people. I mean, we're we're trying to understand what God's grace means and how we can experience that and so on. And I just thought about the person who may be thinking that they're not deserving of God's grace and that they've fallen too far. And I know we've talked about various examples of um the people of uh the Israelites kind of falling away from God and then coming back and how long it took and and all of that. And I'm just imagining the person who's there, you know, I've I've really I really messed up. I I've I don't think I deserve God's grace. Um I think that I I just I just don't deserve it. They're just kind of stuck in that I don't deserve it. And we see a lot of key characters in the Bible, Moses, David, Jonah, um, where they they fell. And um we do see God's grace extended towards them. So what do you see or what what would you like to communicate about how God views um us as flawed people? You mentioned earlier about like it's not like he doesn't know that we're gonna fail, and yet he still extends his grace. What else would you add to that message for that person who is thinking that maybe they've gone to they've they failed too much or they failed very badly and that they don't feel like they deserve God's grace?

Final Takeaways And Resources

SPEAKER_01 37:57

Um, I I hopefully just to help them to understand um the ways that God interacts and engages with uh uh very flawed and fallen people uh in the Bible itself. And I think that the key thing is um uh our brokenness that as we approach God with brokenness, um, that that's definitely what happens you know with David in Psalm 51. Uh I mean we've been talking about these laments. David is lamenting his sin and grieving over his sin in the way that we might grieve over some problem that we've gone through. So I think when we when we when we come to God in this broken over that, then um, you know, realizing how how how deep how how deeply we have sinned is actually a starting point to experiencing God's grace and God's forgiveness. And I I love the passage you know in Isaiah where it says that the Lord dwells in this high and holy place, uh, and he's you know seems inaccessible in that way because of his greatness and he's high and lifted up, but he also deals with uh the lowly and the broken and the contrite. And um I think that's that's what we see coming out of um uh you know Psalm 51 and David and his response to God. When you read the story um over about David and Bathsheba in uh in Samuel, it says, you know, David says, I have sinned against the Lord, and then uh you know, Nathan says, Well, you're you're forgiven, but you have to read that in light of uh you have to go over to Psalm 51 and see there's a little bit more there than just I sinned against the Lord, now I'm ready to be forgiven. There's a process of brokenness that he goes through. And um, I think the more deeply we feel that, uh, the more able we are to um, you know, it experience God's grace, but then also appreciate uh what God's grace has done for us.

SPEAKER_00 39:59

Yeah. And even how he brings us to that grace, right? Because correct me if I'm wrong, David was confronted by Nathan. Was it a year after the sin with Bathsheba?

SPEAKER_01 40:09

Yeah, it's uh, you know, it's almost the time for the baby to be born and that sort of thing. So he's covered up that sin. And you know, finally, I think in Psalm 32, you know, David talks about how blessed you are when you, you know, your sins are covered over by the Lord. But but he says, when I when I stopped covering up my sin uh myself, uh God covered it up uh by his forgiveness. And and the way that God covers up our sin is a lot better than the way that we do it. Because when we cover it up, it's still there and and God's able to take it away and remove it.

SPEAKER_03 40:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 40:45

Yeah. You know, I was really intrigued, Dr. Yeats, by by Jonah, because I was thinking to myself, Mike, how did where did he receive grace in the sense of you know, he got his marching orders from the Lord, but it just seems that he was just so resistant. You know, where's grace in in that story?

SPEAKER_01 41:05

Yeah, well, well, first of all, it it it's there's grace there, even if Jonah is not quite ready to uh admit. I mean, the mere fact that uh God spares him from death, uh, you know, drowning as a the fish in that story is actually Jonah's life preserver. Yeah. Um and and I think the the problem with Jonah is that Jonah sort of presumes on God's grace that you know, even in the belly of the fish, he's confident that God's gonna deliver him. Uh well, how does he how does he know that maybe God's just uh prolonging the uh the torture or the judgment? And and really, in some ways, you know, even in his prayer in chapter two, he he still views himself as being superior to you know these pagan people that worship the idols and salvation is of the Lord, and I praise the Lord for that. But I I I don't think he realizes that basically he is as undeserving of the grace that he receives uh as the grace that the Ninevehes are going to receive in the second hand book. So he, you know, as an Israelite, yeah, hey, I rejoice in what God has done for me, and yet then turns around and is angry and like wants to die because God has really shown the same grace to these Ninevehites. So maybe, you know, part of growing in grace is is realizing that the same grace that God has shown to me, how am I showing that to people uh when they come to me, you know, trying to talk about where do I find forgiveness or where do I find grace? Or or maybe we feel like, well, the type of sin they committed uh is a little worse than what I've done. And and and I and I think you know, really the the cycle of grace has really worked its way through in our lives when when we are helping other people to find that and realize that uh we are no more deserving of that grace than um uh than they are. And and you know, the the the grace keeps growing in that book because the Ninevehes receive it, um, they're you know spared from death. Uh, the sailors on the boat uh you know who are a lot more sensitive to God than Jonah was, they experience it, they receive it.

SPEAKER_03 43:16

That's true.

SPEAKER_01 43:17

And and Jonah um, you know, doesn't really acknowledge that. So uh so ultimately I think the book is kind of an unfinished story uh where Jonah's really going to have to learn uh more about grace, and really it's forcing us as readers to sort of put ourselves in Jonah's place and say, look, do we understand grace? Uh especially when we think about how God shows his grace to other people that we see as undeserving.

SPEAKER_00 43:43

That's a great point. That's a really great point, Dr. Heats. Yeah, I I I I guess I just never thought about it where if he didn't feel or even if he did receive the grace, just also seeing the grace that God was extending to others whom he deemed unworthy or that didn't deserve it. Um Really agree point. Um, well, I I think we've um really covered and gone deep on on this aspect of God's grace and his mercy and and comfort in a lot of ways. Um, but before closing out today, Dr. Yeats, is there any final um thoughts or takeaways that you'd like to leave the audience with from our conversation today? Maybe something that I missed that you wish uh maybe we could go into.

SPEAKER_01 44:25

Yeah, I I think you've uh I think you've covered you've covered this more deeply than probably I've even thought about it. Yeah, one one uh I will say this is one thing that I'm thankful for in God's life or in my life and God's grace in my life is uh I as I was thinking about this topic, I I was really thinking about the patience of God um, you know, in the in the Old Testament. Uh how God, you know, how patient God was with um, you know, a Moses when he's trying to, you know, work with him, or how patient God was when he was working with Israel. That that again, that yeah, the the Lord does get angry, the Lord's anger does break out, the Lord's wrath does break out against people. But the Lord's the Lord's just persistent patience. Like how many of us could put up with a people like Israel that just repeatedly, recurringly, you know, Ezekiel 20 says, You guys have been idol worshippers from the time that you were in Egypt, and it hasn't changed until now. Um, I I think just realizing that uh that a big um uh a huge aspect of grace in the Bible is the patience that God has with sinful people like us. And he, you know, he never stops working or shaping or molding in our lives in spite of our continual failures. And again, you know, growing in grace means that uh that we learn to be patient uh with others that we need to forgive or that need God's grace and forgiveness, just like we do. So I I think that aspect of you know, he's uh in that description in Exodus 34, he's long suffering. And the Hebrew idea is he's long of nose. Uh, you know, he doesn't he doesn't get angry quickly or that you know the the the nostrils flaring and and exploding. God's wrath does come out at times, but he's very slow to get there. And uh I'm I'm incredibly thankful for God's patience uh you know in my life.

SPEAKER_00 46:25

Absolutely. As am I, yeah, absolutely, sir. Um well sir, and this has been a great conversation. I again I really appreciate your time and being able to speak tonight. And um would you be able to share just some uh some of your resources with the audience? I know they're they're gonna be interested in the topic. Uh I know you've read a couple of uh books involved in a couple of things. Um you mind sharing any of those at the I'll put the links below in my in the notes.

SPEAKER_01 46:51

But yeah, anything that you'd want to refer this the audience to um there is um uh I think from a theological uh side, um Mark Boda has a book called The Heartbeat of Old Testament Theology that has a great discussion of just the nature of uh of God. And um Mark Vogrop has a has a book on the laments in the Psalms. That book has been really helpful for me in just understanding how laments and crying out to God and our need for grace and the way that we grow in those kinds of things.

SPEAKER_00 47:30

Um thank you for your time, Dr. Aids. I I really appreciate your insight and wisdom on the topic, and uh hopefully we can uh do it again sometime.

SPEAKER_01 47:40

I appreciate it. Always uh yeah, honored to be uh uh on the on the podcast, and uh again, I hope it's been helpful and that it's been a beneficial discussion.

SPEAKER_00 47:50

Thank you, sir.

SPEAKER_01 47:50

Okay, all right, thanks very much.