Steve, I have mentioned serveral times Jesus' words, as recorded by Luke, where He said that God is kind to ungrateful people and to evil people (Luke 6:35).
I don't know why I go over these answers to your points again and again, since you do not accept the testimony of scripture, upon which I base my beliefs. However, this oft-repeated statement of yours (which constitutes your entire case, according to our previous discussions) is the perfect example of why I refer to your view of God as "one-dimensional." There is nothing in these words to cancel out the rest of the scriptural testimony, including the rest of Jesus' teaching, about God's judgments on the wicked. It is quite legitimate to say about a certain judge, "He is very kind to his personal enemies, but he is likewise very just in meting out severe punishments to offenders, according to their crimes."
This is, in fact, exactly what Paul said about God:
Or do you despise the riches of His goodness, forbearance, and longsuffering, not knowing that the goodness of God leads you to repentance? But in accordance with your hardness and your impenitent heart you are treasuring up for yourself wrath in the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God, who “will render to each one according to his deeds”... to those who are self-seeking and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness—indignation and wrath, tribulation and anguish, on every soul of man who does evil, of the Jew first and also of the Greek." (Romans 2:4-9)
Of course, God said the same thing about Himself when He appeared to Moses and declared His name (His glory) to him:
Now the Lord descended in the cloud and stood with him there, and proclaimed the name of the Lord. And the Lord passed before him and proclaimed, “The Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abounding in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, by no means clearing the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children and the children’s children to the third and the fourth generation.” (Ex.34:5-7)
Moses' face glowed after that encounter—something Paul took at face value as a true account (2 Cor.3:7).
I know that you doubt Paul's authority (and that of any other prophet or apostle) whenever he disagrees with your opinion, but it is clear that he found no problem affirming the goodness and the wrath of God in the same paragraph. You seem to be the only person I know who cannot see God as possessing more than one mode of dealing with mankind. You cannot deny that Paul disagrees with you (as we could have deduced by the fact that Luke, Paul's companion, disagrees with you). Sadly for your case, Jesus also disagreed with you.
To the best of my knowledge, Jesus never said that God kills people or wreaks vengeance upon anyone. Jesus Himself never killed anyone or took revenge on anyone while He walked this earth...
Neither did Noah ever go about killing anyone, nor did the prophets—points equally irrelevant as yours to our topic. However, they had no difficulty warning their generation that the judgment of God was soon to fall upon them. Jesus did precisely the same (Luke 11:50-51)
What Jesus did along these lines while on earth is not as instructive as what the Book of Revelation claims He will do at His return. I know that you are one who would "take away from the words" of the Book of Revelation, since it, too, contradicts you. I would be more concerned, if I were you, about the warnings given to those who do this.
Jesus' revelation of the Father's nature is good enough for me.
Then you have no problem with Jesus depicting God as a King who sent His armies to destroy Jerusalem (Matt.22:1-7). In Luke, Jesus spoke about the Jews who killed Jesus, and said that His Father will "come and destroy those vinedressers and give the vineyard to others." Like yourself, His listeners said, "Certainly not!" (Luke 20:15-16). Of course, they were contradicting Jesus, just as you do when you say the same thing.
Jesus obviously believed in the flood and in the destruction of Sodom by fire from heaven (Luke 17:26-29). Since God spoke to Noah, and supernaturally gathered the animals before the flood, and since God appeared to Abraham, foretelling the destruction of Sodom—and in both places claimed that He (God) was going to pull off both of these calamities—Jesus' reference to them presupposes His acceptance of the Genesis accounts. In any case, His listeners were expected to be familiar with, and to accept, the accounts in Genesis, which, if they misrepresented God's character, Jesus was remiss in failing to correct.
I don't understand why you don't come right out and plainly say, "Stop using scripture against my position! I have already declared that I reject the testimony of most of the scriptures! I have my own sentimentalized view of Christ, contrary to that of historic Christianity, and even the Bible will not change my mind." If you had stated this as plainly when you began posting here years ago as you have stated it in these recent conversations, it would have saved a lot of keystrokes on the part of people who thought that appeal to scripture counts for something in theological discussions with you.
By your rejection of the authority of just about every biblical writer, and your twisting of Jesus' teaching to make even Him conform to your opinions, you give those here who believe the Bible to be authoritative excellent reason to doubt any theological position you espouse—since you will inevitably trust your intuitions even to the rejection of the Word of God. The whole of scripture stands against your position. Can't you be humble enough to admit that the apostles might have understood Christ as well as you do?
I feel uncomfortable being this direct in confronting a friend, but I believe you are very much in need of either embracing the scripture or ceasing to quote it to make your points. It seems disingenuous and harmful.