Goodness and Severity

As the conflict between God and Pharaoh continues into Exodus 9, it is notable how the intensity of the plagues increases in both their seriousness and their impact on Egypt and the Egyptians. By the end of Exodus 9, it is clear that a certain quality of severity attends the great acts of judgment that will lead to the release of Israel from slavery in Egypt. Because these plagues, as great acts of judgment, serve as signs or revelations of who the God of Israel is, one may begin to wonder about the goodness of God as the land of Egypt begins to be laid waste and the people of Egypt are personally affected by these judgments. This is a matter that J. I. Packer takes up in the sixteenth chapter of his valuable book Knowing God. The rest of this reflection will summarize and then apply Packer’s thought to the events of Exodus 9.

Packer begins by affirming the Biblical notion that God’s goodness and severity are not at odds with one another. He cites Rom 11:22 (ESV): “Note then the kindness [goodness (KJV)] and the severity of God: severity toward those who have fallen, but God's kindness to you, provided you continue in his kindness. Otherwise you too will be cut off.” He then notes that “the crucial word here is and. … The Christians at Rome are not to dwell on God’s goodness alone, nor on his severity alone, but to contemplate both together. Both are attributes of God—aspects, that is, of his revealed character. Both appear alongside each other in the economy of grace. Both must be acknowledged together if God is to be truly known.”[1]

The problem, as Packer defines it, is that the fruit of liberal theology, “first learned from some gifted German theologians” of the 19th century, has recast God’s character as that “of indulgent benevolence without any severity.”[2] This “doctrine of a celestial Santa Claus” has so construed God as one who “is infinitely forbearing and kind” that the gravity of sin has been miscalculated.[3] In our day, the popular religious sentiment about God is expressed in the phrase, “Moralistic Therapeutic Deism.” If there is a god, he is only involved in this world to give a few tips on how to live and to help one cope with hard things—but only when called upon. But when truly hard things happen, this kind of god is quickly questioned. Packer writes that “it is not possible to see the good will of a heavenly Santa Claus in heartbreaking and destructive things like cruelty, or marital infidelity, or death on the road, or lung cancer.”[4] Moreover, texts like Exodus 9, if they are taken at all seriously, pose an insurmountable threat to the doctrine of a celestial Santa Claus, for YHWH severely judges hard hearts, beginning with Pharaoh.

There are two solutions. Either one goes the route of Marcion, the heretic of the early church who excised all the unsettling things that revealed God’s true character in the Scriptures, or one rejects the celestial Santa Claus as an adequate doctrine of God. In rejecting the celestial Santa Claus, a deeper and richer appreciation for God’s character can be developed that allows for goodness and severity. Packer thus begins by developing the idea of goodness, which is reflected in God’s moral perfection along with the perfections of all his attributes. The external manifestation of God’s goodness is then applied variously depending on the circumstances. God is good in that he is faithful to his promises, generous, gracious in a common and special way, and loving.[5] All of these expressions of God’s goodness find their antithesis in the “decisive withdrawal” goodness that is described as severity. God’s moral perfection demands that guilt be punished; his faithfulness requires that those who curse Abraham and his offspring are themselves cursed; his love demands that boundaries be established so that love actually means something.[6]

If goodness and severity are two sides of the same coin, so to speak, then the key to how God’s character is manifest toward a person or nation must be identified. Exodus 9 itself offers that key when the text highlights how some of Pharaoh’s servants sheltered their livestock and servants before seventh plague because they feared the word of God (Exod 9:20). Far better, as I see it, to embrace goodness and severity than to rampage through the word of God to erase what might make me uncomfortable. Ultimately, the inseparability of goodness and severity is part of what makes God worth our worship, our glory, laud, and honor.

[1] J. I. Packer, Knowing God (Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 1973), 158.

[2] Packer, Knowing God, 159.

[3] Packer, Knowing God, 160.

[4] Packer, Knowing God, 160.

[5] Packer, Knowing God, 161–63.

[6] Cf. Packer, Knowing God, 164.