Our Image of God.

An important factor in our worship is our image of God.

This is a significant part of the New Paradigm.

Progressive Christians are rejecting the punitive, angry God of the Old Testament in favor of the loving, benevolent God which we believe Jesus showed us.

In order to make this transition we must look at how we interpret the Bible.

If we view the Bible as a series of revelations written down by men years after the event we can see how their image of God evolves from the tribal god Yahweh to the universal God of Christianity.

God gradually loses His primitive violence and becomes less punitive as the Bible progresses.

The loving, forgiving, compassionate God of Jesus is the last Biblical evolution of God.

But it is 2000 years since Jesus walked the earth.

What has changed in that 2000 years?

What progress have we made?

The time has come to discard all notions of violence and anger from our image of God.

No longer will He be seen as an enforcer of rules.

No longer will He be the dispenser of punishments.

God is our loving Father, and He wishes to be close to us.