Cindy,
I think God’s holiness does trump His love. It’s like how I trump you in conversation. 
(Just kidding)
But Holy, Holy, Holy, is repeated three times to show it is most important about God. Not love. I have shown this already. This is also why I have to repeat myself with you.
No, Cole. No. Holy Holy Holy is repeated three times to emphasize its importance – but not to emphasize that holiness is what God is. I have shown this already. What’s more, God’s holiness does not require Him to be a monster at any time.
Cindy,
Holy, Holy, Holy is an adjective showing that Holiness is most important about God. God is love but it’s a Holy love. God’s holiness can be terrifying as my experience shows as well as the whole Bible. Especially the OT.
Note:
The Bible also says God is light. This refers to His holiness in His moral purity. He is love and He is light. It’s who He is. There is no darkness in Him at all. Holy Love.
Cole, God is not a collection of parts with one part more important than the others. It all adds up to love. Aside from your insistence that God’s holiness is His most important attribute, we are in agreement. Perhaps it’s fortuitous that you’ve mentioned the picture of God as light, since light perhaps combines the picture of His purity and His love in a way that better displays their holy character.
I think that your view of God as being monstrous at times might be a corollary of your view of Him as primarily holiness. Holiness without love is certainly a terrifying thought.
But I’m done dancing around in circles. I think we’ve worn this topic out.
Cindy,
When you have lived in darkness your whole life coming into the light can be terrifying. Trust me.
Cole,
I for the most part agree with the others, that God the Father’s essence is love and everything else refers to attributes coming from His essence. Yet, I can sympathize with you in considering the Father as you do. Because for many years from the time I was led to say yes to His Son Jesus, I have struggled with the problem of evil and a loving God. All the examples you gave were in of themselves terrifying to me; disciplining children, destroying the inhabitance of earth with a flood, sending the unbeliever to an eternal torture and etc. What finally got me on track to seeing God has a God of love as His primary essence and extending this love to us as sons and daughters as His chief work, was through the eyes of universal reconciliation and the finish work of the cross. All the things that happen in nature be they floods, earthquakes, epidemics and etc., are all under the auspice of God as “second causes” (due to the Fall). Certainly this is the case, when God uses evil men to bring judgment upon a nation and people of his own like what is written in Habakkuk and the Chaldeans as His tool. God can also be the “first cause “as with His Son Jesus the Christ, “slain before the foundation of the earth” , “smitten by God”; In order that we His children can have life forever. Without evil as a background and a contrast, we would not understand mercy, love, goodness and holiness. In fact Satan himself, in my understanding was created the way he is, by God as the ultimate instrument of His disposal (“a murderer and a liar from the beginning”). I believe the insidiousness of man’s sin grows exponentially with or without Satan’s help since the Garden’s rebellion, but God will still use this unabridged evil for His glory. This happens with the total reconciliation of mankind, and victory over death and sin. This has been my only solace to all the examples you have given that in your estimation makes God the Father a “monster”.
Grace, George
Cole, God is not “loving”: love is God’s very DNA, not just an attribute. In 1 John 4:8,16 we read that God IS love. So by nature, He could never be “a monster at times.” You have a perception problem.
Don’t get fouled up in the “letter of the Law.” The Scriptures are part of a progressive revelation:
(Taken from “Scriptural Inerrancy?”, by Professor C.S. Cowles at pointloma.edu/sites/default/ … nt-way.pdf )
And along these same lines, for a wonderful biblical defense of the truly NONviolent nature of God, (in the very face of Scriptures that indicate otherwise), please see this discussion of Richard Murray’s ideas at
Blessings.