Does God punish people like he did with the Israelites?

To me there are three theological issues here: 1) trial or testing and 2) punishment for sin and 3) how much we know. I want to address the second one first. If we think about punishment as chastisement for a specific sin, I don't think that is how God operates. Sin and its natural consequences are the punishment for sin. read more

Firstly because He doesn´t exist, at least in the sense the Bible (a book written by men!) preaches, secondly because even if you believe that He does, and believe that the Bible isn´t just a bunch of mumble jumbo, he would rather love you than punish you. read more